The cat-and-mouse story is one of the tensest subgenres of the thriller because there are few scenarios more nail-biting than one person relentlessly pursuing another person. Sometimes the hero is the cat, like if the cat is a detective and the mouse is a criminal, and sometimes the hero is the mouse, like if the cat is a sadistic hitman and the mouse is an average Joe they’ve been paid to kill.
In the case of Michael Mann’s Heat, a prominent example of a cat-and-mouse thriller, the line between hero and villain is fascinatingly blurred as a cop hunts for a bank robber on the streets of Los Angeles.
Heat (1995)
Michael Mann paired up Robert De Niro and Al Pacino on-screen for the first time ever in his 1995 crime epic Heat. De Niro plays a bank robber and Pacino plays the detective on his trail.
The movie is almost three hours long, but those are three visceral hours. Heat has some of the most breathtaking action scenes ever put on film. Its shootout sequence is so realistic that it’s sometimes screened in real-life police training.
Inside Man (2006)
Spike Lee doesn’t usually make straight Hollywood movies, but Inside Man is a full-on heist thriller with all the genre trimmings. Clive Owen plays the mastermind behind a New York City bank heist and Denzel Washington plays the cop on his case.
The movie has an intriguing nonlinear structure, as the hostage crisis at the bank is intercut with police interviews with the hostages days later.
Se7en (1995)
Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt star as a classically mismatched buddy cop pairing in David Fincher’s grisly crime thriller Se7en. Freeman is a veteran detective on the brink of retirement who’s seen it all before, while Pitt is a hotshot rookie eager to bring some bad guys to justice.
They’re on the trail of John Doe, a vicious serial killer who’s been picking off victims based on the seven deadly sins outlined in the Bible.
The Dark Knight (2008)
Christopher Nolan was heavily influenced by Michael Mann’s portrayal of a crime-ridden L.A. in Heat when he brought the dangerous streets of Gotham City to life in The Dark Knight, arguably the quintessential Batman movie.
Christian Bale’s Caped Crusader contends with a psychological threat he can’t take down with mere brute force alone. Heath Ledger’s elusive Joker is one of the greatest movie villains of all time.
The Fugitive (1993)
It’s not easy to turn a TV show into a movie because the premise is designed for an indefinite episodic format, but the premise of The Fugitive arguably works better as a movie. Harrison Ford stars as a doctor who’s falsely accused of murdering his wife.
Tommy Lee Jones plays the U.S. Marshal who relentlessly chases him across America as he tries to clear his name and find the “one-armed man” who’s really responsible for his wife’s death.
The Departed (2006)
In Martin Scorsese’s cat-and-mouse thriller The Departed, his English-language remake of Infernal Affairs, the cat and mouse are both looking for each other. Matt Damon plays a police mole trying to figure out the identity of the undercover cop that’s infiltrated his boss’ operation. Leonardo DiCaprio plays the undercover cop trying to figure out who the mole in the police force is.
When he won a long-overdue Academy Award for Best Director for The Departed, Scorsese joked that it was his first movie with a plot — and it’s a riveting one at that.
Dirty Harry (1971)
Clint Eastwood’s vigilante cop “Dirty” Harry Callahan made his debut in Don Siegel’s aptly titled gritty police thriller Dirty Harry. As a serial killer known as “the Scorpio Killer” (a thinly veiled stand-in for the Zodiac) terrorizes San Francisco, Harry operates outside the law to take him down.
In the thrilling finale, the Scorpio Killer hijacks a school bus full of kids and Callahan forces him off the bus and chases him into a nearby quarry.
No Country For Old Men (2007)
In the Coen brothers’ masterfully crafted neo-western No Country for Old Men, Josh Brolin plays a hunter who comes across the site of a drug deal turned deadly. He finds a briefcase full of cash and goes on the lam with it.
Javier Bardem plays the infamous hitman who’s sent after him, and won an Oscar for his authentically sadistic turn as a ruthless killer.
The French Connection (1971)
Gene Hackman stars in William Friedkin’s hard-hitting police thriller The French Connection as tough-as-nails New York cop Popeye Doyle, who stop at nothing — including breaking the law — in his pursuit of French heroin smuggler Alain Charnier.
In addition to having one of the greatest car chases ever filmed, The French Connection culminates in one of the most talked-about ambiguous endings in movie history.
The Silence Of The Lambs (1991)
In Jonathan Demme’s Oscar-laden horror masterpiece The Silence of the Lambs, the cat chases the mouse with the help of a different mouse. When she’s assigned to the case of Buffalo Bill, a serial killer targeting women, FBI rookie Clarice Starling consults with imprisoned serial killer Dr. Hannibal “the Cannibal” Lecter, who complies in exchange for a reduced sentence.
Hannibal effectively gets in Clarice’s head in this jaw-dropping psychological thriller. Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins are mesmerizing in the roles, and both deservingly received Oscars for their work.