Movies Like An American Tragedy

If you liked An American Tragedy (1931), a crime and drama movie directed by Josef von Sternberg, 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
A Place in the Sun (1951)
★ 7.3/10Also drama and romance
A young social climber wins the heart of a beautiful heiress but his former girlfriend's pregnancy stands in the way of his ambition.
2
Party Girl (1958)
★ 6.8/10Also crime and drama
Slick lawyer Thomas Farrell has made a career of defending mobsters in trials. It's not until he meets a lovely showgirl at a mob party that he realizes that there's more to life than winning trials. Farrell tries to…
3
Absence of Malice (1981)
★ 6.6/10Also drama and romance
Megan Carter is a reporter duped into running an untrue story on Michael Gallagher, a suspected racketeer. He has an alibi for the time his crime was allegedly committed—but it involves an innocent party. When he tells…
4
Fallen Angel (1945)
★ 6.6/10Also crime and drama
An unemployed drifter, Eric Stanton wanders into a small California town and begins hanging around the local diner. While Eric falls for the lovely waitress Stella, he also begins romancing a quiet and well-to-do woman…
5
Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
★ 8.2/10Also drama and crime
An ailing barrister is thrust back into the courtroom in what becomes one of the most unusual and eventful murder cases of the lawyer's career when he finds himself defending a man being tried for the murder of a…
6
Murder in Three Acts (1986)
★ 6/10Also crime and drama
In Acapulco, Hercule Poirot attends a dinner party in which one of the guests clutches his throat and suddenly dies. The causes seem to be natural until another party with most of the same guests produces another corpse.
7
A Kiss Before Dying (1956)
★ 6.3/10Also drama and crime
A college student tries to get rich quick by wooing two wealthy sisters.
8
You Only Live Once (1937)
★ 7.1/10Also crime and drama
Based partially on the story of Bonnie and Clyde, Eddie Taylor is an ex-convict who cannot get a break after being released from prison. When he is framed for murder, Taylor is forced to flee with his wife Joan Graham…
9
Strangers on a Train (1951)
★ 7.7/10Also crime and drama
A charming psychopath tries to coerce a tennis star into his theory that two strangers can commit the perfect crime by exchanging murders—each killing the other’s most-hated person.
10
They Won't Believe Me (1947)
★ 6.6/10Also drama and romance
On trial for murdering his girlfriend, philandering stockbroker Larry Ballentine takes the stand to claim his innocence and describe the actual, but improbable sounding, sequence of events that led to her death.
11
Time Without Pity (1957)
★ 6.5/10Also crime and drama
Alec Graham is sentenced to death for the murder of his girlfriend Jennie, with whom he spent a weekend at the English country home of the parents of his friend Brian Stanford. Alec’s father, David Graham, a…
12
Plunder Road (1957)
★ 6.9/10Also crime and drama
A spectacular heist starts to unravel as the crooks take it on the lam.
13
Mata Hari (1931)
★ 6.2/10Also crime and drama
A semi-fictionalized account of the life of Mata Hari, an exotic dancer who was accused of spying for Germany during World War I.
14
Manhattan Melodrama (1934)
★ 7/10Also crime and drama
The friendship between two orphans endures even though they grow up on opposite sides of the law and fall in love with the same woman.
15
Perfect Sisters (2014)
★ 5.8/10Also drama and crime
Tired of their mother's alcoholism and a string of her abusive boyfriends, two sisters plot to kill her.
16
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946)
★ 7.1/10Also drama and romance
A married woman and a drifter fall in love, then plot to murder her husband.
17
Last Scene Alive: An Aurora Teagarden Mystery (2018)
★ 7.2/10Also crime and drama
There is excitement in the air when a Hollywood crew comes to Lawrenceton to film a movie about the town’s sleuthy librarian, Aurora Teagarden. However, when the film’s leading lady is found murdered in her dressing…
18
Northanger Abbey (2007)
★ 6.8/10Also romance and drama
A young woman's penchant for sensational Gothic novels leads to misunderstandings in the matters of the heart.
19
Aurora Teagarden Mysteries: Haunted By Murder (2022)
★ 7/10Also crime and drama
A murder investigation is reignited in a house that is considered haunted by the Lawrenceton locals and where years ago Aurora and Sally, as teenagers, discovered a body.
20
They Live by Night (1949)
★ 6.8/10Also crime and romance
An escaped convict, injured during a robbery, falls in love with the woman who nurses him back to health, but their relationship seems doomed from the beginning.