Crime movies often cannot resist the temptation to fall into the wheelhouse of convention, settling to be nothing more than pulpy entertainment that shares the tired message that "crime doesn't pay." Those that stretch the imagination create intelligent or violent villains whose ingenuity or destructiveness keep them out of reach of the long arm of the law.
That is not to say those movies that dare to be different are always successful. In some cases, their ambition exceeds their ability. When done right, audiences watch these movies in anticipation of how and when the criminal will be caught, yet, in their heart, secretly hoping they escape.
Anton Chigurh: No Country For Old Men
Evil cannot be chained or destroyed, just as this crime drama from the Coen Brothers suggests. When psychopathic hitman Anton Chigurh arrives to recover the lost cash of a drug deal gone awry, Sheriff Ed Tom Bell observes his peaceful county descend into violent chaos that he is helpless to control.
Chigurh leaves a blighted and bloody trail behind him, eluding the authorities who trace his movements from one massacre to the next. He is as visceral and untouchable to them as a nightmare.
Everyone Except Danny Ocean: Ocean's Eleven
Few other scenes of criminal victory are as memorable as the gang from Ocean's Eleven watching the famous fountains of the Bellagio, which is one of the casinos that they just robbed, as an irresistible smile spreads across their faces. The leader of the group, Danny Ocean, is not so lucky.
He also succeeds in the heist but is arrested and jailed on the basis that being in Las Vegas is a violation of his parole.
Gabriel Shear: Swordfish
When logic takes a backseat in favor of an implausible plot twist that swims in the ankle-deep platitudes of the cliche "not everything appears as it seems," then a turn of the century film like Swordfish is what's on offer.
With a cool post-internet boom aesthetic of old computer monitors, chaotic bundles of cables draping the backgrounds, and other cutting-edge paleolithic technology of the age, Swordfish is a heist movie for the new Millenium. It's antagonist Gabriel Shear is successful in pulling off his scheme, going on to enjoy the good life of riding his yacht around the waters of Monaco like so many others of his kind, but not before inexplicably escaping death.
Hannibal Lecter: The Silence of the Lambs
Hannibal Lecter may not be the central villain of The Silence of the Lambs, functioning more like a friendly nemesis to FBI investigator Clarice Starling, but he nonetheless goes on a flesh-eating crime spree and gets away with it.
Lecter possesses the divination skills of a devil, always ripe with answers, and it's this omniscience that casts a dark shadow over the Starling's movements. There is a creeping feeling as the plot progresses that whether Lecter will escape is not a matter of "if but a matter of "when." His maniacal charm has a nefarious purpose other than psychoanalyzing Starling, setting in motion the events that lead to his freedom.
Ichi: Ichi The Killer
Explicit content warning: the graphic scenes of torture, abuse, and gang violence would make comparable American movies blush. For those who like hyperbolic ultra-violence, then this Japanese Yakuza crime drama adapted from the manga of the same name has plenty of blood to flush your eyes out. Despite its mature themes, the movie has a sense of humor.
It follows rivaling Yakuza factions who are engaged in a gang war that eventually unravels, as a mentally unstable, sexually frustrated, and seemingly invincible teen named Ichi starts terrorizing them. Ichi first appears as an empathetic anti-hero, but his kill count and affinity for dismembering his victims are irredeemable. Not even Tokyo's most formidable Yakuza can put him down, so, as you may have guessed, Ichi survives the carnage.
Jules Winnfield: Pulp Fiction
While Jewels may be a more sympathetic and philosophical hitman than his partner in crime Vincent, the fact of the matter is he still empties nine-millimeter clips into people's chests for a living. No character survives Pulp Fiction's non-linear interlocking narrative unscathed. Jewels walks away with his life and his dignity, which is more than most characters can say, but he becomes the prisoner of an existential crisis that leaves his fate as a career criminal in question.
Keyser Soze: The Usual Suspects
One of the most famous crime thrillers from the 1990s, The Usual Suspects has become a model for other movies in the genre and the subject of parodies. It's criminal mastermind, Keyser Soze, is now part of the popular culture consciousness. Allusions to Soze are so prevalent because of his plot twisting deceptiveness.
The movie consists of him sitting in an interrogation room testifying to a crime he is responsible for orchestrating, but fabricating details of the crime that confuse his interrogator and exculpates him. Only after he is free to leave police custody does he drop his innocent persona, revealing himself to the audience that he is indeed the man the cops are after.
Noah Cross: Chinatown
Jack Nicholson stars as private investigator Jack Gites who traces a puzzling trail to uncover a scheme of white-collar crime. The father of the woman who hires Gites, Noah Cross, is revealed as the wealthy real estate mogul who plans to divert water away from the City of Los Angeles to develop his own quarter of the city.
When he confesses his crime to Gites, they are in the criminally ravaged neighborhood of Chinatown, where Cross has the protection of corrupt police officers.
Mallory & Mickey Knox: Natural Born Killers
Controversial with the public and divisive among critics, Natural Born Killers is a satire on American media's unhealthy fascination with psychopaths and the violent crimes they commit. Originally a screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, director Oliver Stone heavily edited it after media coverage of true crime cases inspired him to change its focus.
The movie depicts mass murdering couple Mickey and Mallory Knox as they carve a bloody trail across the desert sands of New Mexico. Police capture the pair, and they are subject to capital punishment, but, in a disorienting jailbreak scene, the sadistic lovers escape.
The Zodiac Killer: Zodiac
This true-crime movie adapts the Zodiac Killer case which remains unresolved to this day. Knowing that the killer may still walk about freely, that it's possible he sat down with a bowl of popcorn and enjoyed the movie like the rest of us, makes this adaptation one of the most unnerving crime movies in recent memory.
In the revelry of the hippie movement and its subsequent hangover in the early 70s, the Zodiac killer rips his way through unsuspecting free-spirited youth in the San Francisco Bay area. What is more harrowing is the Zodiac's hubris in his belief that he won't be caught. The Zodiac taunts investigators and journalists, sending them cryptic messages that he requests be published on pain of death if the newspapers refuse to comply. As the movie and history shows, despite the frustrated efforts of investigators, the Zodiac killer was never caught.