There have been crime movies coming out of Hollywood since the silent era, and many of them are 10/10 efforts that no one seems to talk about anymore. The earliest crime movies included silent era releases like Intolerance and Golden Age masterpieces like Public Enemy and Scarface. Even the noir movies of the 40s fit in this genre.
However, there are many crime movies that critics and fans agree are 10/10 efforts that no one talks about anymore. These include some big-name actors and some major directors, but for one reason or another, people don’t really bring them up when discussing the best crime movies of all time. However, these 10/10 crime movies deserve respect.
Sexy Beast (2000)
Ben Kingsley is turning heads again thanks to his role in the MCU as Trevor Slattery, most recently appearing in Wonder Man on Disney+. However, for most of his career, he played antagonists in everything from Bugsy and Schindler’s List to The Prince of Persia. However, Kingsley’s best role might be from Sexy Beast.
The man who once played Gandhi took on one of the most violent and deranged roles of his career in Sexy Beast, where he played Don Logan, a ruthless gangster with a job to fulfill. He pulls an old colleague out of retirement to help him pull off a vault heist, but this all leads to unintended consequences.
Kingsley earned an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor, and this remains one of the best British crime movies of all time, a film that deserves more recognition than it receives today.
Thief (1981)
Michael Mann might be the king of crime movies, and he has some masterpieces to his name, with Heat as arguably his masterpiece. However, Mann also had another 10/10 crime movie that came out well over a decade before Heat that deserves more attention, but no one seems to talk about anymore.
Thief came out in 1981 and was Michael Mann’s first-ever movie that he directed. The fact that it is nearly perfect shows that he was a name to watch in the future. James Caan stars as Frank, a jewelry thief and ex-convict who slips back into his life of crime while trying to start a family as well.
Despite it being Mann’s debut film, Thief still debuted at the Cannes Film Festival and was in competition for the Palme d’Or. It was a minor box office success and received high critical acclaim, with an 80% Rotten Tomatoes score, and it remains one of the smartest crime dramas ever made.
Layer Cake (2004)
Guy Ritchie has several crime movies to his name, and when his fans talk about the best of the best, they mention releases like Snatch (2000) and Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels (1998). This led to many “copycat” movies, but one that more people need to see is Layer Cake, a 10/10 movie that gets little attention.
Matthew Vaughn (Kingsman) channeled his inner Guy Ritchie to direct this impressive crime drama, starring Daniel Craig. The actor really stood out in the movie as XXXX, an unnamed protagonist who is a cocaine distributor who hates violence and operates his drug-dealing empire as a businessman.
As with many of these great crime movies, XXXX is preparing to retire, but he has two assignments remaining. He has to find the daughter of his boss’s old friend, and then he needs to broker a deal for a million pounds of ecstasy from a Serbian mob. It has been rumored that this was the movie that helped win Craig the James Bond role.
Prizzi’s Honor (1985)
Prizzi’s Honor is a crime movie with an almost perfect cast, as Jack Nicholson earned an Oscar nomination for his performance, and Kathleen Turner joined him in one of the best roles of her career. Nicholson and Turner play mob assassins who fall in love, but then each is hired to kill the other.
This sounds very familiar to other movies, such as Mr. & Mrs Smith, which has the same basic plot. The fact that more people know about Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s film is tragic, because Prizzi’s Honor is the superior movie, and easily a 10/10 crime release.
Much of that is thanks to John Huston’s masterful direction of his cast, and the dark comedy undertones of the story taking precedence over any action scenes. On top of Nicholson’s nomination, Angelica Huston won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, and it received a Best Picture and Best Director nomination as well.
Point Blank (1967)
Point Blank remains one of the best revenge movies in crime drama history. Released in 1967, the movie stars Lee Marvin as Walker, a character based on Donald E. Westlake’s fictional character Parker from his Stark novels. The character was also in other movies, including Payback, Parker, and Play Dirty.
Walker is a ruthless criminal with almost no redeeming qualities aside from professionalism and efficiency. He also has one ethical principle he lives by, and that is never double-crossing anyone he is working with unless they double-cross him first. That is what happens in Point Blank, as his associates betray him.
Out of all the movies based on Parker, it is Point Blank that stands at the top of the mountain, and more people need to recognize the brilliance of this film. From Marvin’s performance to John Boorman’s direction, this is a 10/10 crime movie from start to finish.
Brick (2005)
Rian Johnson has proven to be a master of the crime genre when it comes to detective fiction, thanks to his three Knives Out movies. However, he proved his love and knowledge of the genre when he directed a smaller indie detective movie in 2005 called Brick.
The movie is a film noir set in a modern-day high school, where the kids all talk like one would expect to read in a classic pulp novel by someone like Raymond Chandler. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Brendan Frye, a young man whose ex-girlfriend was murdered, and he sets out to find the killer.
This is more than just a throwback to old-school noir movies and pulp fiction. It is a brilliantly told murder mystery that plays fair and honors the genre in every way. It does take a little bit to get used to the dialogue, but once that is down, this is a genius 10/10 crime drama and one of the best of the genre.
Rififi (1955)
Rififi needs to be in every conversation about the best crime movies of all time. If anything, it is the best heist movie ever made. Directed by Jules Dassin, the film tells the story of a thief who decides to pull off what might be considered an impossible heist, as he targets an exclusive jewelry shop.
The main character is an aging gangster named Tony (Jean Servais), who has just gotten out of prison, but wants to pull off one more heist that could set him and his crew up for life. He then puts together the men needed to pull off this major heist, and the film then shows in detail how they plan to execute the impossible crime.
It should be noted that director Dassin was making movies in America before the Red Scare and Joseph McCarthy’s Communist witch hunt drove him out of Hollywood and to France. This movie showed that his arrival in France during the New Wave was perfect timing for a perfect movie.
Memories Of Murder (2003)
Bong Joon Ho became a household name when his South Korean dark comedy Parasite became the first non-English language movie to win an Oscar for Best Picture. He is also known for his comic book adaptation of Snowpiercer and his highly entertaining monster movie, The Host.
However, he has a 10/10 masterpiece that he directed two decades ago called Memories of Murder. The film is based on the first ever known serial killer in South Korea, and the two detectives who are tasked to investigate the case and bring him to justice. However, there is a shocking side story here.
The real killer had not been caught before Bong Joon Ho made the movie. He was caught after the movie was made, and the public became familiar with the case again. The film itself is worth watching, regardless, as an exploration of the obsessive nature of detectives bringing a criminal to justice.
The Killing (1956)
Stanley Kubrick is known for several masterpieces, from 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Shining to A Clockwork Orange and Dr. Strangelove. However, not enough people talk about one of his earlier movies, a crime drama from 1956 called The Killing.
This was the first crime movie Kubrick directed, and it helped him start to get a lot more attention away from his earlier war movies. This is a heist movie, with five men coming together to pull off a robbery at a horse racetrack. With Sterling Hayden in the lead, Kubrick immediately mastered the genre.
This movie influenced so many other films that came later, and it is easy to see how Quentin Tarantino pulled from it when he directed Reservoir Dogs. The idea of the heist going terribly wrong and the criminals not being able to trust each other was perfected here by Stanley Kubrick.
Le Samourai (1967)
Le Samourai is a genius crime drama masterpiece. Jean-Pierre Melville made his name as one of the best crime filmmakers in the world, and he might be the best French New Wave crime director in history as well. He has some big movies to his name, including Bob le flambeur, Le Doulos, and Le Cercle rouge.
However, among all these titles, it is Le Samourai that remains his masterpiece. It is a low-key crime movie, with minimal dialogue and a straightforward plot. However, French icon Alain Delon is magnificent in his role as a hitman named Jed Costello, who ends up being betrayed by his boss.
When too many witnesses see a recent hit, the men who hired him put a bounty on Costello’s head, and he ends up looking to get revenge on the men who betrayed him. It is a familiar story for crime movie fans, but few have ever done it better than Melville with Le Samourai.
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