Movies that feel likeAngels with Dirty Faces (1938)

Name: Angels with Dirty Faces
Director: Michael Curtiz
Genre: crime, drama
Released: 1938

Childhood chums Rocky Sullivan and Jerry Connelly grow up on opposite sides of the fence: Rocky matures into a prominent gangster, while Jerry becomes a priest, tending to the needs of his old tenement neighborhood.

If you loved Angels with Dirty Faces, the closest films we have are Mildred Pierce (1945), Force of Evil (1950) and The Set-Up (1949). All three share Angels with Dirty Faces' gritty and contemplative feel, which is what we rank on before quality.

Seen the big three already? The under-the-radar pick below is Blast of Silence (1961).

🍅 100% Rotten Tomatoes★ 7.8 IMDb ↗TMDB ↗dir. Michael Curtizgritty contemplative atmospheric

6 of 12 streaming nowHBO Max · Amazon Prime Video · Criterion Channel

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See it on the Mood Map

If Angels with Dirty Faces hit the spot, these will too

Mildred Pierce

1945 · dir. Michael Curtiz

🍅 88%★ 7.9crime · drama

Michael Curtiz working the same nerve twice

A hard-working mother inches towards disaster as she divorces her husband and starts a successful restaurant business to support her spoiled daughter.

Force of Evil

1950 · dir. Abraham Polonsky

🍅 100%★ 7.2crime · drama

Two things both keep coming back to: gangster and film noir

Lawyer Joe Morse wants to consolidate all the small-time numbers racket operators into one big powerful operation. But his elder brother Leo is one of these small-time operators who wants to stay that way, preferring not to deal with the gangsters who dominate the big-time.

The Set-Up

1949 · dir. Robert Wise

🍅 85%★ 7.8drama · crime

The same preoccupation in both: film noir

Expecting the usual loss, a boxing manager takes bribes from a betting gangster without telling his fighter.

Scarlet Street

1945 · dir. Fritz Lang

🍅 100%★ 7.7drama · crimePrime Video

Gritty where it counts, contemplative underneath

Cashier and part-time starving artist Christopher Cross is absolutely smitten with the beautiful Kitty March. Kitty plays along, but she's really only interested in Johnny, a two-bit crook. When Kitty and Johnny find out that art dealers are interested in Chris's work, they con him into letting Kitty take credit for the paintings. Cross allows it because he is in love with Kitty, but his love will only let her get away with so much.

The Asphalt Jungle

1950 · dir. John Huston

🍅 98%★ 7.8crime · drama

One thread runs through both: black and white

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.

The Big Combo

1955 · dir. Joseph H. Lewis

🍅 93%★ 7.3drama · crime

Both lean on atmosphere more than on crime

Police Lt. Leonard Diamond vies to bring a clever, well connected, and sadistic gangster to justice all the while obsessing over the gangster's girlfriend.

Odd Man Out

1947 · dir. Carol Reed

🍅 100%★ 7.6crime · drama · thrillerMax

Both keep coming back to the same thing: black and white

The difference: Leans harder into thriller than Angels with Dirty Faces does

Belfast police conduct a door-to-door manhunt for an IRA gunman wounded in a daring robbery.

Blast of Silence

1961 · dir. Allen Baron

🍅 83%★ 7.4crime · drama · thriller

Gritty drama in both cases

The difference: Made in the 1960s, in a different era of the craft

A hired killer from Cleveland has a job to do on a second-string mob boss in New York. But a special girl from his past and a fat gun dealer with pet rats get in his way.

High Sierra

1941 · dir. Raoul Walsh

🍅 92%★ 7.5crime · drama · action

Crime built on stillness, twice over

Given a pardon from jail, Roy Earle gets back into the swing of things as he robs a swanky resort.

The Big Risk

1960 · dir. Claude Sautet

🍅 100%★ 7.5crime

Atmospheric drama, and it commits to that

The difference: Takes it somewhere less contemplative than Angels with Dirty Faces does

Two men pull off a daring daylight payroll heist in Milan, making a fast getaway. One is returning to France after years in hiding, needing money to start fresh with his family.

Shoot the Piano Player

1960 · dir. François Truffaut

🍅 90%★ 7.4drama · thriller · crimeMax

Crime with a pulse of grit, in both cases

Charlie is a former classical pianist who has changed his name and now plays jazz in a grimy Paris bar. When Charlie's brothers, Richard and Chico, surface and ask for Charlie's help while on the run from gangsters they have scammed, he aids their escape. Soon Charlie and Lena, a waitress at the same bar, face trouble when the gangsters arrive, looking for his brothers.