Movies Like Back to the Wall

If you liked Back to the Wall (1958), a crime and drama movie directed by Édouard Molinaro, here are 20 movies with a similar feel, based on TMDB's recommendations. Each one links to its cast, trailer and where it's streaming.

1
Saint Omer (2022)
★ 6.1/10Also drama and crime
A novelist attends the trial of a woman accused of killing her 15-month-old daughter by abandoning her to the rising tide on a beach in northern France. But as the trial continues, her own family history, doubts, and…
2
Cry of the City (1948)
★ 6.7/10Also crime and drama
Petty crook and cop-killer Martin Rome, in bad shape from wounds in the hospital prison ward, still refuses to help slimy lawyer Niles clear his client by confessing to another crime. Police Lt. Candella must check…
3
Killer's Kiss (1955)
★ 6.3/10Also crime and drama
Davey Gordon, a New York City boxer at the end of his career, falls for dancer Gloria Price. However, their budding relationship is interrupted by Gloria's violent boss, Vincent Rapallo, who has eyes for Gloria. The…
4
Riot in Cell Block 11 (1954)
★ 7.1/10Also crime and drama
A prisoner leads his counterparts in a protest for better living conditions which turns violent and ugly.
5
The Blue Gardenia (1953)
★ 6.5/10Also crime
Upon waking up to the news that the man she’d gone on a date with the previous night has been murdered, a young woman with only a faint memory of the night’s events begins to suspect that she murdered him while…
6
The Parts You Lose (2019)
★ 6.7/10Also drama and crime
An unlikely friendship unfolds between a young deaf boy, Wesley, and a fugitive criminal who takes refuge in an abandoned barn on the family’s rural North Dakota farm.
7
Chaos (2001)
★ 6.4/10Also drama
A bourgeois couple, modern yet conventional. One night by accident, a young prostitute barges into their lives. Hounded down, beaten up, threatened, she will continue to struggle, with the help of a well off lady…
8
The Butcher (1970)
★ 7.1/10Also crime and drama
An unlikely friendship between a dour, working class butcher and a repressed schoolteacher coincides with a grisly series of Ripper-type murders in a provincial French town.
9
Case 137 (2025)
★ 6.9/10Also crime and drama
When Internal Affairs officer Stéphanie investigates a young man severely injured during a chaotic Paris demonstration and finds no police misconduct, the routine case hits close to home upon her discovering the victim…
10
Brute Force (1947)
★ 7.3/10Also crime and drama
Timeworn Joe Collins and his fellow inmates live under the heavy thumb of the sadistic, power-tripping guard Captain Munsey. Only Collins' dreams of escape keep him going, but how can he possibly bust out of Munsey's…
11
Stillwater (2021)
★ 6.6/10Also drama and crime
Bill Baker, an American oil-rig roughneck from Oklahoma, travels to Marseille to visit his estranged daughter, Allison, who is in prison for a murder she claims she did not commit. Confronted with language barriers…
12
The Lady from Shanghai (1947)
★ 7.3/10Also crime and drama
A romantic drifter gets caught between a corrupt tycoon and his voluptuous wife.
13
The Asphalt Jungle (1950)
★ 7.5/10Also crime and drama
Recently paroled from prison, legendary burglar "Doc" Riedenschneider, with funding from Alonzo Emmerich, a crooked lawyer, gathers a small group of veteran criminals together in the Midwest for a big jewel heist.
14
Unsubmissives (2025)
★ 7.2/10Also drama and crime
Early 1990’s, south of France. Katy, Hélène, Laurence and Carole have been best friends since childhood. Now in their twenties, they find themselves struggling with hardship and limited opportunities in their sunny…
15
Without Apparent Motive (1971)
★ 5.9/10Also crime
A series of murders is committed in Nice on the French riviera. The commissaire Carella is in charge and tries to find a missing link between all these murders.
16
Limbo (2023)
★ 6.1/10Also crime and drama
Travis, a jaded detective, arrives in the remote outback town of Limbo to investigate the cold case murder of local Indigenous girl Charlotte Hayes 20 years ago. As truths about the murder begin to unfold, the…
17
TalhotBlond (2012)
★ 6.3/10Also drama
Thomas Montgomery, a married father of two young daughters, gets seduced by the world of online gambling and chat rooms where a virtual romance and sexual obsession ultimately leads to the murder of an innocent man.
18
Stavisky... (1974)
★ 5.9/10Also crime and drama
Biarritz, 1933. Charm and talent assist small-time swindler Serge Alexandre, alias Stavisky, to bribe his way into the centre of French politics. But when his great scam involving millions is exposed, he brings the…
19
The Mask of Dimitrios (1944)
★ 7.1/10Also crime and drama
A mystery writer is intrigued by the tale of notorious criminal Dimitrios Makropolous, whose dead body was found washed up on the shore in Istanbul. He decides to follow the career of Dimitrios around Europe, in order…
20
Anatomy of a Fall (2023)
★ 7.5/10Also crime
A woman is suspected of her husband's murder, and their blind son faces a moral dilemma as the sole witness.