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Escape from Alcatraz poster

Movies that feel likeEscape from Alcatraz (1979)

San Francisco Bay, January 18, 1960. Frank Lee Morris is transferred to Alcatraz, a maximum security prison located on a rocky island. Although no one has ever managed to escape from there, Frank and other inmates begin to carefully prepare an escape plan.

If you loved Escape from Alcatraz, the closest films we have are A Man Escaped (1956), Illustrious Corpses (1976) and Army of Shadows (1969). All three share Escape from Alcatraz's tense feel, which is what we rank on before quality.

Seen the big three already? The under-the-radar pick below is Charley Varrick (1973).

🍅 97% Rotten Tomatoes★ 7.5 IMDb ↗TMDB ↗dir. Don Siegelcontemplativetense
6 of 12 streaming nowHBO Max · Amazon Prime Video · Peacock Premium

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If Escape from Alcatraz hit the spot, these will too

A Man Escaped poster
A Man Escaped
1956 · dir. Robert Bresson
🍅 100%★ 8.1drama · thriller

Common ground in both: prison and escape

The difference: Made in the 1950s, in a different era of the craft

A captured French Resistance fighter during World War II engineers a daunting escape from prison.

Illustrious Corpses poster
Illustrious Corpses
1976 · dir. Francesco Rosi
★ 7.3thriller

Thriller with a pulse of tension, in both cases

The difference: Easier on the stillness than Escape from Alcatraz

A detective is assigned to investigate the mysterious murders of some Supreme Court judges.

Army of Shadows poster
Army of Shadows
1969 · dir. Jean-Pierre Melville
🍅 97%★ 8.1drama · thriller

Contemplative drama, and it commits to that

Betrayed by an informant, Philippe Gerbier finds himself trapped in a torturous Nazi prison camp. Though Gerbier escapes to rejoin the Resistance in occupied Marseilles, France, and exacts his revenge on the informant, he must continue a quiet, seemingly endless battle against the Nazis in an atmosphere of tension, paranoia and distrust.

No Way Out poster
No Way Out
1987 · dir. Roger Donaldson
🍅 92%★ 7.1thriller · drama

Both lean on stillness more than on drama

Navy Lt. Tom Farrell meets a young woman, Susan Atwell, and they share a passionate fling. Farrell then finds out that his superior, Defense Secretary David Brice, is also romantically involved with Atwell. When the young woman turns up dead, Farrell is put in charge of the murder investigation. He begins to uncover shocking clues about the case, but when details of his encounter with Susan surface, he becomes a suspect as well.

Charley Varrick poster
Charley Varrick
1973 · dir. Don Siegel
🍅 82%★ 7.5crime · thriller · drama

Don Siegel directing both, with the same fingerprints on each

The difference: Leans harder into crime than Escape from Alcatraz does

Charley Varrick robs a bank in a small town with his friends, but instead of obtaining a small amount of money, they discover they stole a very large amount of money belonging to the mob. Charley must now come up with a plan to not only evade the police but the mob as well.

Knife in the Water poster
Knife in the Water
1962 · dir. Roman Polanski
🍅 97%★ 7.4drama · thrillerMax

Thriller built on tension, twice over

On their way to an afternoon on the lake, husband and wife Andrzej and Krystyna nearly run over a young hitchhiker. Inviting the young man onto the boat with them, Andrzej begins to subtly torment him; the hitchhiker responds by making overtures toward Krystyna. When the hitchhiker is accidentally knocked overboard, the husband's panic results in unexpected consequences.

Dirty Harry poster
Dirty Harry
1971 · dir. Don Siegel
🍅 89%★ 7.7action · crime · thriller

The same hand behind both of them: Don Siegel

The difference: Takes it somewhere less contemplative than Escape from Alcatraz does

When a madman dubbed 'Scorpio' terrorizes San Francisco, hard-nosed cop, Harry Callahan – famous for his take-no-prisoners approach to law enforcement – is tasked with hunting down the psychopath.

Yojimbo poster
Yojimbo
1961 · dir. Akira Kurosawa
🍅 96%★ 8.2drama · thrillerMax

Contemplative drama in both cases

A nameless ronin, or samurai with no master, enters a small village in feudal Japan where two rival businessmen are struggling for control of the local gambling trade. Taking the name Sanjuro Kuwabatake, the ronin convinces both silk merchant Tazaemon and sake merchant Tokuemon to hire him as a personal bodyguard, then artfully sets in motion a full-scale gang war between the two ambitious and unscrupulous men.

We Need to Talk About Kevin poster
We Need to Talk About Kevin
2011 · dir. Lynne Ramsay
🍅 74%★ 7.4drama · thrillerPrime VideoPeacock

A 2010s answer to the same itch

After her son Kevin commits a horrific act, troubled mother Eva reflects on her complicated relationship with her disturbed son as he grew from a toddler into a teenager.

Foxcatcher poster
Foxcatcher
2014 · dir. Bennett Miller
🍅 88%★ 7drama · thriller

One thread runs through both: a true story

The greatest Olympic Wrestling Champion brother team joins Team Foxcatcher led by multimillionaire sponsor John E. du Pont as they train for the 1988 games in Seoul - a union that leads to unlikely circumstances.

Juror #2 poster
Juror #2
2024 · dir. Clint Eastwood
🍅 93%★ 7drama · thrillerMax

Common ground: apologetic

While serving as a juror in a high profile murder trial, family man Justin Kemp finds himself struggling with a serious moral dilemma…one he could use to sway the jury verdict and potentially convict—or free—the accused killer.

The Wave poster
The Wave
2008 · dir. Dennis Gansel
🍅 67%★ 7.6drama · thriller

Drama in the same key

The difference: The critics' underdog of the pair

A school teacher discusses types of government with his class. His students find it too boring to repeatedly go over national socialism and believe that dictatorship cannot be established in modern Germany. He starts an experiment to show how easily the masses can become manipulated.

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The best-reviewed films that share Escape from Alcatraz’s defining feeling.