Subject: Crime
Criminals and their Illegal activities (where their motives are not politically or religiously subversive) provide a twist on “economic history.”
Against All Flags
- Director: George Sherman
- Release Date: 1952
- Production Country: United States
British naval officer Brian Hawke infiltrates a band of pirates in the Indian Ocean and proceeds to save the princess, out-duel the pirate captain, and convince the beautiful Spitfire that a pirate's life is not for her.
American Gangster
- Director: Ridley Scott
- Release Date: 2007
- Production Country: United States
Frankie Lewis has a new twist on an old game: importing heroin into the United States from Thailand, his "Blue Magic" brand has made him king of the Manhattan drug scene, with corrupt officials and cops and D.E.A. agents on his payroll–all except Richie Roberts, the lone honest cop in the area who is determined to take Frankie down.
Body and Soul
- Director: Oscar Micheaux
- Release Date: 1925
- Production Country: United States
A corrupt minister consorts with and then blackmails the owner of a gambling house in the 1920s.
Bonnie and Clyde
- Director: Arthur Penn
- Release Date: 1967
- Production Country: United States
Bonnie, a pretty and bored small town girl, pairs up with Clyde, a dashing petty criminal, and the pair embark on a crime spree, quickly graduating from simple robberies to more complex jobs and gaining fame in a bleak depression-era world eager for any heroes to fill the news. Ultimately, though, their nonchalant violence begins to turn the public against them and, when Clyde shoots a bank manager in cold blood, law enforcement pulls out all the stops in the hunt to bring Bonnie and Clyde and their gang to justice.
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
- Director: George Roy Hill
- Release Date: 1969
- Production Country: United States
With the Old West fading away and with increasingly professional—and persistent—modern lawmen chasing them, outlaw Butch Cassidy and his sidekick, the Sundance Kid, decide to take their show on the road to Bolivia.
Cidade de Deus (City of God)
- Director: Fernando Meirelles, Kátia Lund
- Release Date: 2002
- Production Country: Brazil, France
Feral children in the squalid 'City of God' suburb of Rio de Janeiro grow into gods themselves–ruling over a world of street violence, drugs and rage.
El chacal de Nahueltoro (The Jackal of Nahueltoro)
- Director: Miguel Littin
- Release Date: 1969
- Production Country: Chile, Mexico
Illiterate, poor, alcoholic José takes in Rosa and her five children but, in a fit of rage, he murders them. While awaiting execution, José is tutored by a priest, becoming, just before his death, something more than just the Jackal of Nahueltoro.
Gangs of New York
- Director: Martin Scorsese
- Release Date: 2002
- Production Country: United States, Italy
Years after fighting between immigrant Irish-Catholics and "Nativist" gangs, Amsterdam Vallon's father, "Priest" Vallon, is left dead and Bill "the Butcher" is in charge of their New York neighborhood. Vallon then returns to New York, determined to exact his revenge on the Butcher—plans complicated, however, by the Union's ongoing need for troops to fight in the South and his own growing loyalty to and affection for the Butcher, who seems determined to honor the man he killed by raising his son up in his own organization.
Heavenly Creatures
- Director: Peter Jackson
- Release Date: 1994
- Production Country: New Zealand, Germany
Imaginative and intelligent, friends Juliet and Pauline avoid the fearsome real world by escaping into a fantasy heaven they have built together. But when their worried parents threaten to separate the girls permanently, Juliet and Pauline enact a desperate plan to ensure they will never be apart again.
Helter Skelter
- Director: Tom Gries
- Release Date: 1976
- Production Country: United States
Investigating two horrific mass murders in Hollywood, the police eventually arrest Charles Manson and his strange cult of followers and then put them on trial for the violent killings.
In the Valley of Elah
- Director: Paul Haggis
- Release Date: 2007
- Production Country: United States
When his son, a soldier recently returned from Iraq, is reported missing from his base in New Mexico, Hank Deerfield decides to investigate on his own, but when the military stonewalls his efforts, he quickly becomes convinced that something far more sinister has happened to his son. But as he searches for answers, Hank's investigation must first uncover the truth about his son’s service in Iraq and his unit’s experience of modern, urban warfare—all of which is shrouded in a code of silence that mandates what happens in the warzone stays in the warzone.
Jungfrukällan (The Virgin Spring)
- Director: Ingmar Bergman
- Release Date: 1960
- Production Country: Sweden
Beautiful, blonde Karin is also a virgin, and is therefore sent to carry holy candles to the church. She goes unaware that her dark-haired, pregnant stepsister has placed a curse upon her in a fit of jealous pique. When Karin inadvertently insults a group of traveling warriors by offering them toad-infested bread, Karin's fate is brutal and gruesome—but her father's vengeance may be the most brutal act of all.
Kill the Irishman
- Director: Jonathan Hensleigh
- Release Date: 2011
- Production Country: United States
Rising to power as an enforcer for the Cleveland Mafia, Danny Greene decides to pursue his own agenda, setting off a turf war that spreads out from Cleveland throughout the United States. Danny Greene becomes the one man the entire Mob would love to kill—but no one seems to be able to pull off a hit on him.
Nueve reinas (Nine Queens)
- Director: Fabián Bielinsky
- Release Date: 2000
- Production Country: Argentina
Enlisted by an elderly con man to help him sell a rare sheet of counterfeit stamps, two small-time criminals continually complicate the original swindle with ever more outrageous cons, until no one can be certain who is conning whom.
Once Upon a Time in America
- Director: Sergio Leone
- Release Date: 1984
- Production Country: Italy, United States
Four childhood friends—determined to find a way out of the ghetto—turn to violence and crime, but when their success leads to more dangerous jobs and questionable allies, one friend makes a decision to save the rest: turning them all in to the police... If only he didn't have to live with himself after the betrayal.
Perdón, viejita (Forgive Me, Mother)
- Director: José A. Ferreyra
- Release Date: 1927
- Production Country: Argentina
Nora, the prostitute Carlos brings home to meet mother, takes the fall for his sister in order to protect her from an evil don, but Carlos is determined to save Nora, whether she wants to be saved or not.
Po zakonu (By the Law)
- Director: Lev Kuleshov
- Release Date: 1926
- Production Country: Soviet Union
Stranded deep in the Yukon after their fellow prospectors are murdered by one of their party, a couple must decide whether they will keep the murderer alive and restrained through the winter until they can turn him over to the authorities... or to mete out justice on their own.
Posledniye kanikuly (Last Holiday)
- Director: Amir Karakulov
- Release Date: 1996
- Production Country: Kazakhstan
When their friend is beaten by the police for stealing a used guitar, Soviet teens take a brutal vengeance–but if the children are rotten, what does that say about the society in which they grew up?
Sacco e Vanzetti (Sacco & Vanzetti)
- Director: Giuliano Montaldo
- Release Date: 1971
- Production Country: Italy, France
Two Italian immigrants are tried and convicted for robbery and murder, but the prosecution's case appears to be based more upon their political beliefs than any proof that the men committed the murders.
Snow Falling on Cedars
- Director: Scott Hicks
- Release Date: 1999
- Production Country: United States
In Washington state, a local fisherman, Kabuo, is accused of murdering another fisherman, Carl, and the only person in town who can help is the young white journalist whose love for Kabuo's wife was thwarted by racial tensions years prior.