Movies Like The Petrified Forest

If you liked The Petrified Forest (1936), a crime and drama movie directed by Archie Mayo, 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
The Last Stop in Yuma County (2024)
★ 6.9/10Also crime and drama
While awaiting the next fuel truck at a middle-of-nowhere Arizona rest stop, a traveling young knife salesman is thrust into a high-stakes hostage situation by the arrival of two similarly stranded bank robbers with no…
2
Gangster Squad (2013)
★ 6.4/10Also crime and drama
Los Angeles, 1949. Ruthless, Brooklyn-born mob king Mickey Cohen runs the show in this town, reaping the ill-gotten gains from the drugs, the guns, the prostitutes and — if he has his way — every wire bet placed west…
3
The Dancer Upstairs (2002)
★ 6.1/10Also crime and drama
A police detective in a South American country is dedicated to hunting down a revolutionary guerilla leader.
4
High Sierra (1941)
★ 7.1/10Also crime and drama
Given a pardon from jail, Roy Earle gets back into the swing of things as he robs a swanky resort.
5
End of the Road (2022)
★ 6/10Also drama and thriller
Recently widowed mom Brenda fights to protect her family during a harrowing road trip when a murder and a missing bag of cash plunge them into danger.
6
Devil in a Blue Dress (1995)
★ 6.5/10Also thriller and crime
In late 1940s Los Angeles, Easy Rawlins is an unemployed black World War II veteran with few job prospects. At a bar, Easy meets DeWitt Albright, a mysterious white man looking for someone to investigate the…
7
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)
★ 6.5/10Also crime and romance
The sensuous wife of a lunch wagon proprietor and a rootless drifter begin a sordidly steamy affair and conspire to murder her Greek husband.
8
Black Butterfly (2017)
★ 6.2/10Also thriller and drama
Paul is a down-on-his-luck screenwriter who picks up a drifter and offers him a place to stay. However, when the deranged stranger takes Paul hostage and forces him to write, their unhinged relationship brings buried…
9
Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile (2019)
★ 7/10Also drama and crime
A chronicle of the crimes of Ted Bundy, from the perspective of his longtime girlfriend, Elizabeth Kloepfer, who refused to believe the truth about him for years.
10
The Killers (1946)
★ 7.4/10Also crime and thriller
Two hit men walk into a diner asking for a man called "the Swede". When the killers find the Swede, he's expecting them and doesn't put up a fight. Since the Swede had a life insurance policy, an investigator, on a…
11
The Outfit (2022)
★ 7.1/10Also crime and drama
Leonard is an English tailor who used to craft suits on London’s world-famous Savile Row. After a personal tragedy, he’s ended up in Chicago, operating a small tailor shop in a rough part of town where he makes…
12
Breakdown (1997)
★ 7/10Also crime and thriller
On their cross-country drive, a married couple, Jeff and Amy Taylor, experience car trouble after their SUV breaks down. Stranded in the New Mexico desert, the two catch a break when a passing truck driver offers Amy a…
13
Sexy Beast (2001)
★ 7/10Also crime and thriller
Ex-safecracker Gal Dove has served his time behind bars and is blissfully retired to a Spanish villa paradise with a wife he adores. The idyll is shattered by the arrival of his nemesis Don Logan, intent on persuading…
14
Winged Creatures (2009)
★ 5.9/10Also crime and drama
A psychotic man opens fire in a diner, murdering numerous people before killing himself. The survivors struggle in different ways following this horrendous event: a doctor doubts his own instincts and elects to use an…
15
The Hot Spot (1990)
★ 6.3/10Also romance and crime
Upon arriving to a small town, a drifter quickly gets into trouble with the local authorities — and the local women — after he robs a bank.
16
The Usual Suspects (1995)
★ 8.2/10Also drama and crime
The lone survivor of an explosive heist gone wrong recounts for interrogators the events that began with five disparate criminals assembled for a police lineup - with alleged criminal mastermind Keyser Soze at the…
17
The Whisper Man (2026)
★ 6.8/10Also crime and drama
When his young son vanishes, a widower enlists help from his estranged father, a retired detective who put away the serial killer now linked to the case.
18
Killer Heat (2024)
★ 5.8/10Also crime and drama
An expat PI is hired to investigate a suspicious death in Crete, Greece, where jealousies run deep amongst the victim's powerful family.
19
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
★ 8.7/10Also drama and crime
Imprisoned in the 1940s for the double murder of his wife and her lover, upstanding banker Andy Dufresne begins a new life at the Shawshank prison, where he puts his accounting skills to work for an amoral warden…
20
They Drive by Night (1940)
★ 6.9/10Also drama and crime
Joe and Paul Fabrini are Wildcat, or independent, truck drivers who have their own small one-truck business. The Fabrini boys constantly battle distributors, rivals and loan collectors, while trying to make a success…