Best movies like Desperate Crimes
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
In the large industrial port of an Italian city - sailors, women, black market traffickers, sleazy nightclubs, and dingy narrow alleys make up a world of danger, where a young American girl vanishes without a trace while an Italian man tries to track her down. On the way, he encounters a strange group of characters: a beautiful and ambitious prostitute, a girl ravaged by drugs, and the ferocious Joe Nerescu who is battling against a rival gang so he can gain control of the port.
IMDB Rating: 4.9
IMDB Votes: 104
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 103 min
Plot tags: neo noir
Best tv shows and movies like Desperate Crimes (1991):
Similar in 81%
Backstreet Justice (1994)
Plot Summary:
A P.I. is burdened by her late father's reputation as a corrupt cop.
IMDB Rating: 4.4
IMDB Votes: 356
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: neo noir, independent film, cult film
Similar in 81%
Anna: the Pleasure, the Torment (1973)
Plot Summary:
A beautiful but poor young girl finds all the money and material goods she never had when she becomes the girlfriend of a crime boss, but soon learns that there is a price to be paid for that kind of life.
IMDB Rating: 6.0
IMDB Votes: 415
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sexy, grindhouse, action thriller, tense, serious, realistic, suspenseful, psychotronic, poliziottesco, cult film
Similar in 90%
Forbidden Games (1995)
Plot Summary:
Michael is a private investigator with special psychic powers allowing him to subconsciously see clues in a case. He is hired to investigate the death of the very wealthy Charles who has a very healthy sum of money going to his wife and daughter. Michael needs to unravel the clues to see if Charles died accidentally or was murdered. There are several characters who may benefit from his death as well as a mistress and a nude modelling agency.
IMDB Rating: 4.3
IMDB Votes: 316
Genere: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: USA
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: sensual, independent film
Similar in 78%
Roots of Evil (1992)
Plot Summary:
A serial killer is after hookers and strippers. A male detective and his female partner are assigned to stop him.
IMDB Rating: 3.8
IMDB Votes: 237
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: grindhouse, erotic, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, sexual, detective, sexy
Similar in 89%
Live Like a Cop, Die Like a Man (1976)
Plot Summary:
Fred and Tony are members of an elite 'special squad' of police in Rome, Italy who are licensed-to-kill, undercover cops and who love to live dangerously.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Action, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Italy
Duration: 96 min
Plot tags: poliziottesco, perverse, cult classic, psychotronic, cult film
Similar in 84%
Women in Cell Block 7 (1973)
Plot Summary:
A woman goes behind bars in order to save her father's life.
IMDB Rating: 4.7
IMDB Votes: 281
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy, USA
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: psychotronic, grindhouse, poliziottesco
Similar in 79%
Swedish Nympho Slaves (1976)
Plot Summary:
A brothel owner is questioned in the disappearance of the daughter of a wealthy man after she is still not returned, or told of her possible whereabouts, after the $5,000,000 ransom was paid.
IMDB Rating: 4.4
IMDB Votes: 440
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Switzerland
Duration: 70 min
Plot tags: erotic, sensual, hot, sexploitation film
Similar in 85%
Cry of a Prostitute (1974)
Plot Summary:
The gangster Tony Aniante in the middle of a feud between two mafia families. He manipulates both families into believing he is on their side and are just waiting for the right moment to take the initiative.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 694
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 97 min
Plot tags: cult classic, psychotronic, poliziottesco, cult film
Similar in 81%
Satan's Bed (1965)
Plot Summary:
A young Japanese girl arriving in New York City gets mixed up with mobsters and dope dealers.
IMDB Rating: 4.4
IMDB Votes: 162
Genere: Crime, Drama, Horror
Country: USA
Duration: 72 min
Plot tags: independent film, cult film
Similar in 77%
Massacre for an Orgy (1966)
Plot Summary:
A police officer attempts to shut down an illegal girls-for-drugs operation (American version).
IMDB Rating: 5.4
IMDB Votes: 35
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Luxembourg, France
Duration: 83 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 76%
China Dolls (1992)
Plot Summary:
Tong catches Chiu attempting to rape his wife May (Amy Yip). They scuffle and Tong shoots Chiu dead with Chiu's gun. They flee but Tong is killed in a shootout with police. May begs an officer to take her child, since if he is repatriated he'll have a horrible life. So, the infant son ends up in Hong Kong separated from his mother. Six years pass and May is a hotel maid then gets forced into prostitution. She longs to see her son, who is now a young boy, maybe to fully reunite with him. The problem with this film is it becomes so sleazy. There is nudity (not Ms. Yip), violence and forcible rape.
IMDB Rating: 4.7
IMDB Votes: 97
Genere: Comedy, Crime, Drama
Country: Hong Kong
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 81%
The Most Beautiful Wife (1970)
Plot Summary:
Based on the story of Franca Viola and Filippo Melodia. In Sicily, as a Mafia boss leaves for prison, he advises Vito, a young man who's his potential successor, to marry a virtuous and poor woman. Vito's eye settles on Francesca, only 15, but lovely and self-possessed. Among her virtues are high self worth and forthright speech, so although she falls in love with Vito, she won't bow down to him. Believing he's losing face, he has his boys kidnap her and he rapes her. Then, he tells her he'll still marry her. Instead, she files charges. Her parents, brother, and neighbors refuse to support her. Will she break?.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 969
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 108 min
Plot tags: poliziottesco
Similar in 83%
Street People (1976)
Plot Summary:
A Mafia boss is enraged when he is suspected of smuggling a heroin shipment into San Francisco. He dispatches his nephew, a hotshot Anglo-Sicilian lawyer, to identify the real culprit. The lawyer also enlists the aid of his best friend, a grand prix driver with an adventurous streak.
IMDB Rating: 5.2
IMDB Votes: 930
Genere: Action, Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: grindhouse, exciting, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, neo noir, independent film, poliziottesco
Similar in 75%
Free Hand for a Tough Cop (1976)
Plot Summary:
Free Hand for a Tough Cop (Italian: Il trucido e lo sbirro, also known as Tough Cop) is an Italian poliziottesco-action film directed in 1976 by Umberto Lenzi. In this movie Tomas Milian plays for the first time Sergio Marazzi aka "Er Monnezza", a role that he later played several more times, in Lenzi's Brothers Till We Die (1978, a sort of sequel of this movie), in Destruction Force by Stelvio Massi (1977), in Uno contro l'altro, praticamente amici by Bruno Corbucci (1980), in Francesco Massaro's Il lupo e l'agnello (1980).
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 695
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 92 min
Plot tags: poliziottesco
Similar in 88%
Dillinger Is Dead (1969)
Plot Summary:
Back home, Glauco, an industrial designer, finds his wife in bed with a serious headache. She has left him dinner but it is cold and Glauco decides to prepare himself a gourmet meal.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: experimental, cult classic, mind bending, psychedelic, surreal, poliziottesco, clever, offbeat, humorous, realistic
Similar in 79%
Agitator (2001)
Plot Summary:
When a young Yakuza torments the customers in a rival crime family's nightclub, it is not long before his dead body is found. Soon, inter-family retaliation follows, resulting in the death fo a prominent crime boss. Devastated by htis turn of events, the temperamental Kenzaki vows to avenge his boss's death and, as bloody violence ensues, the body count reaches excessive proportions.
IMDB Rating: 6.7
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 150 min
Plot tags: suspense, suspenseful, exciting, tense, captivating, crime drama, crying
Similar in 82%
Confessions of a Police Captain (1971)
Plot Summary:
Confessions of a Police Captain (Italian: Confessione di un commissario di polizia al procuratore della repubblica, also known as Confessions of a Police Commissioner to the District Attorney) is an Italian crime-drama film about a cop starring Franco Nero and Martin Balsam who is caught up in suffocating and incriminating big city "corruption." Nero tries desperately to bring an elusive criminal to justice who has been a thorn in his side for many years. This cop has a tough decision to make; does he turn in his partner or turn his head? The film won the Golden Prize at the Moscow International Film Festival in 1971 and the Prix lntemational de l'Academie du Cinema at the Étoile de Cristal Awards in 1972.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 106 min
Plot tags: poliziottesco, grindhouse, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, disturbing, tragic ending
Similar in 89%
Bloody Mama (1970)
Plot Summary:
Sexually abused as a young girl, Kate "Ma" Barker (Shelley Winters) grows into a violently powerful woman by the 1930s. She lovingly dominates her grown sons, and grooms them into a pack of tough crooks. The boys include the cruel Herman (Don Stroud), who still shares a bed with Ma; Fred (Robert Walden), an ex-con who fell in love with a fellow prisoner; and Lloyd (Robert De Niro), who gets high on whatever's handy. Together they form a deadly, bizarre family of Depression-era bandits.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 90 min
Plot tags: psychotronic, grindhouse, bleak, neo noir, hood, cult classic, independent film, psychological, tense, rough
Similar in 78%
Blood Ties (1986)
Plot Summary:
An innocent American engineer is blackmailed by gangsters into a plot to assassinate his cousin, who is a judge in Sicily fighting the Mafia.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 138
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy, USA
Duration: 125 min
Plot tags: rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, poliziottesco
Similar in 85%
The Ruthless (2019)
Plot Summary:
Milan, Italy, 1967. Santo Russo, a boy of Calabrian origin, arrives north with his parents and younger brother to find better living conditions. Due to an absurd misunderstanding and his father's contempt, Santo ends up in prison, where he gets a “true education.” In 1978, he and his friends Slim and Mario embark on a 15-year criminal career, a successful and ruthless spiral of robberies, kidnappings, murders and heroin smuggling.
IMDB Rating: 6.2
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy, France
Duration: 111 min
Plot tags: suspense, realistic, harsh, tense, serious, captivating, suspenseful, intense, erotic, poliziottesco
Similar in 75%
Almost Human (1974)
Plot Summary:
A psychotic small-time criminal realizes that the everyday robberies, rapes and murders he commits aren't profitable enough, so he figures to hit the big time by kidnapping the daughter of a rich man.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Italy
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: poliziottesco, tense, rough, serious, suspenseful, slasher, grindhouse, action thriller, terrifying, realistic
Similar in 75%
A Prophet (2009)
Plot Summary:
Sentenced to six years in prison, Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) is alone in the world and can neither read nor write. On his arrival at the prison, he seems younger and more brittle than the others detained there. At once he falls under the sway of a group of Corsicans who enforce their rule in the prison. As the 'missions' go by, he toughens himself and wins the confidence of the Corsican group.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 101000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: France, Italy
Duration: 155 min
Plot tags: harsh, tense, bleak, rough, atmospheric, political, dramatic, psychological, breathtaking, realistic
Similar in 89%
Romanzo Criminale (2005)
Plot Summary:
The Lebanese has a dream: to conquer the underworld of Rome. To carry out this feat without precedent he puts together a ruthless and highly organized gang. Their progress and changes in leadership take place over 25 years, from the 1970s into the 90s, and are inseparably intertwined with the dark history of modern Italy: terrorism, kidnappings and corruption at the highest levels of government.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy, France, UK
Duration: 152 min
Plot tags: serious, stylized, rough, captivating, realistic, erotic, hood, poliziottesco, neo noir, bleak
Similar in 80%
Sinatra Club (2010)
Plot Summary:
Brutal and celebrated Mafia gangster John Gotti (Danny Nucci) schemes, shoves and murders his way to the top of that world in this gritty biography told from the perspective of Salvatore Polisi (Jason Gedrick), who owns the Sinatra Club, where Gotti's crew hangs out. Determined to make his name, the young Gotti plans a daring armored-car robbery that he expects to get him noticed by the bosses of each of New York's five major crime families.
IMDB Rating: 4.7
IMDB Votes: 877
Genere: Action, Biography, Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 88 min
Plot tags: tense, rough, serious, suspenseful, realistic
Similar in 78%
The Funeral (1996)
Plot Summary:
The story concerns the funeral of one of three brothers in a family of gangsters that lived in New York in 1930s. Details of the past of the brothers and their families are shown through a series of flashbacks.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 9000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 99 min
Plot tags: neo noir, surprise ending, independent film, philosophical, hood, tense, rough, clever, serious, captivating
Similar in 89%
Capone (1975)
Plot Summary:
The story of the rise and fall of the infamous Chicago gangster Al Capone and the control he exhibited over the city during the prohibition years.
IMDB Rating: 5.7
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 101 min
Plot tags: rough, realistic, suspenseful, serious, psychotronic, cult classic, captivating, poliziottesco
Similar in 87%
Gomorrah (2008)
Plot Summary:
An inside look at Italy's modern-day crime families, the Camorra in Naples and Caserta. Based on a book by Roberto Saviano. Power, money and blood: these are the "values" that the residents of the Province of Naples and Caserta have to face every day. They hardly ever have a choice and are forced to obey the rules of the Camorra. Only a lucky few can even think of leading a normal life.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 51000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy
Duration: 137 min
Plot tags: disturbing, tense, harsh, realistic, serious, brutal, depressing, bleak, anthology, thought provoking
Similar in 88%
The Many Saints of Newark (2021)
Plot Summary:
Young Anthony Soprano is growing up in one of the most tumultuous eras in Newark, N.J., history, becoming a man just as rival gangsters start to rise up and challenge the all-powerful DiMeo crime family. Caught up in the changing times is the uncle he idolizes, Dickie Moltisanti, whose influence over his nephew will help shape the impressionable teenager into the all-powerful mob boss, Tony Soprano.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 61000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: tense, captivating, suspense, disturbing, dramatic, hood, anamorphic, powerful, surprise ending, neo noir
Similar in 88%
Hoodlum (1997)
Plot Summary:
In 1934, the second most lucrative business in New York City was running "the numbers". When, Madam Queen, the powerful woman who runs the scam in Harlem, is arrested. Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson takes over the business and must resist against the invasion from merciless mobster Dutch Shultz.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 12000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: hood, stylized, neo noir, black and white, crime drama, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful, clever
Similar in 85%
Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
Plot Summary:
A former Prohibition-era Jewish gangster returns to the Lower East Side of Manhattan over thirty years later, where he once again must confront the ghosts and regrets of his old life.
IMDB Rating: 8.3
IMDB Votes: 371000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: USA, Italy
Duration: 229 min
Plot tags: epic, ambiguous ending, atmospheric, melancholic, breathtaking, captivating, rough, visually appealing, realistic, talky