20 best movies like Birthday Girl (2001)

Adrian Messenger, a famous writer, asks his friend Anthony Gethryn, a former British agent, to help him investigate the whereabouts of the people who appear on a list, without asking him the reason why he should do so.

A woman tries to straighten out her life, even as her past as a con-woman comes back to haunt her.

When novelist Paula Martin retreats to the seclusion of her family home Crows Hall she hopes to clear her mind and focus on her new book. The arrival of an assistant, Linda, should take the pressure off... but as the bodies pile up, Paula finds herself trapped in a terrifying nightmare of murder and madness.

With his wife's disappearance having become the focus of an intense media circus, a man sees the spotlight turned on him when it's suspected that he may not be innocent.

When three friends open a hot pot restaurant in a former bomb shelter, they discover it’s linked by a single wall to the bank vault next door. While deciding to take the easy money or go to the police, they find out one of the bank’s employees is a former classmate and look to enlist her in deciding their future.

A young assassin is sent to kill a retired mob boss. But things get complicated when she begins to like him.

Career criminal Johnny Clay recruits a sharpshooter, a crooked police officer, a bartender and a betting teller named George, among others, for one last job before he goes straight and gets married. But when George tells his restless wife about the scheme to steal millions from the racetrack where he works, she hatches a plot of her own.

Bill, an idle, unemployed aspiring writer, walks the crowded streets of London following randomly chosen strangers, a seemingly innocent entertainment that becomes dangerous when he crosses paths with a mysterious character.

A crew of officers at an armored transport security firm risk their lives when they embark on the ultimate heist against their own company. Armed with a seemingly fool-proof plan, the men plan on making off with a fortune with harm to none. But when an unexpected witness interferes, the plan quickly unravels and all bets are off.

A girl falls for the "perfect" guy, who happens to have a very fatal flaw: he's a hitman on the run from the crime cartels who employ him.

Barr is a psychiatrist who falls in love with the sister of one of his clients. She's beautiful and married to a gangster. She hates her husband but is unable to escape from him.

Seen-it-all New York detective Frank Keller is unsettled - he has done twenty years on the force and could retire, and he hasn't come to terms with his wife leaving him for a colleague. Joining up with an officer from another part of town to investigate a series of murders linked by the lonely hearts columns he finds he is getting seriously and possibly dangerously involved with Helen, one of the main suspects.

The Spanish deep South, 1980. A series of brutal murders of adolescent girls in a remote and forgotten town bring together two disparate characters - both detectives in the homicide division - to investigate the cases. With deep divisions in their ideology, detectives Juan and Pedro must put aside their differences if they are to successfully hunt down a killer who for years has terrorized a community in the shadow of a general disregard for women rooted in a misogynistic past.

A PC becomes a vigilante after a head trauma.

A shady lawyer attempts a Christmas Eve crime, hoping to swindle the local mob out of some money. But his partner, a strip club owner, might have different plans for the cash.

After spending 12 years in prison for keeping his mouth shut, notorious safe-cracker Dom Hemingway is back on the streets of London looking to collect what he's owed.

New York City English professor Axel Freed outwardly seems like an upstanding citizen. But privately Freed is in the clutches of a severe gambling addiction that threatens to destroy him.

A series of brutal murders puts the lives of three men on a collision course: The father of the latest victim now out for revenge, a vigilante police detective operating outside the boundaries of law, and the main suspect in the killings - a religious studies teacher arrested and released due to a police blunder.

Two kids find themselves in the centre of a deadly game of cat and mouse after taking a sheriff's cruiser for a joy ride.

Police commander Simon Weiss, head of the division that supervises Paris’s demi-monde, starts out on his nightly tour of bars, discos and strip clubs, making sure once again that the owners don’t bend the rules too far. Weiss knows he’s between a rock and hard place: it’s obvious that criminal gangs run rampant in his special domain, and even more obvious that they’re protected by higher-ups in the department.

A passionate filmmaker creating a film based upon a true crime casts an unknown mysterious young woman bearing a disturbing resemblance to the femme fatale in the story. Unsuspectingly, he finds himself drawn into a complex web of haunting intrigue: he becomes obsessed with the woman, the crime, her possibly notorious past, and the disturbing complexity between art and truth. From the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina to Verona, Rome, and London, new truths are revealed and clues to other crimes and passions, darker and even more complex, are uncovered.

The story of the daring romance Solovyov Sevastyanov G., ctupivshem by the call of blood on the path of the valiant Russian robbery. And while the security forces led by a secret agent trying to close H7 gang Nightingale the Robber, he, with his drive and mischief, restores fairness in my native land. But sooner or later every "Tale" comes to an end ...

An evocative crime thriller that captures the chilling action and sharp wit of Peter Temple's acclaimed novel The Broken Shore. In this gripping adaptation, Detective Joe Cashin uncovers a web of lies, betrayal and police corruption in a small coastal town where tensions are at boiling point and the shocking face behind the community's respectable mask is slowly unveiled.

Private investigator Matthew Scudder is hired by a drug kingpin to find out who kidnapped and murdered his wife.

Ensemble film revolving around characters living in Forest Gate, London. Over the course of a few days, six inter-linking stories explore issues of drug use, prostitution and urban poverty.

Police investigate when a man having an affair with his brother's wife disappears suddenly.

The story of Jacques Mesrine, France's public enemy No. 1 during the 1970s. After nearly two decades of legendary criminal feats -- from multiple bank robberies and to prison breaks -- Mesrine was gunned down by the French police in Paris.

After losing her waitressing job, Katie Franklin takes a job as a caretaker to a wealthy elderly man in his sprawling, empty Chicago estate. The two grow close, but when he unexpectedly passes away and names Katie as his sole heir, she and her husband Adam are pulled into a complex web of lies, deception, and murder. If she's going to survive, Katie will have to question everyone's motives — even the people she loves.

Martin is a screenwriter, who finds himself in one of his own plays: A young woman is found dead in the Thames and no one really knows, what has happened to her.

The true story of Whitey Bulger, the brother of a state senator and the most infamous violent criminal in the history of South Boston, who became an FBI informant to take down a Mafia family invading his turf.

When Dr. Anthony Edwardes arrives at a Vermont mental hospital to replace the outgoing hospital director, Dr. Constance Peterson, a psychoanalyst, discovers Edwardes is actually an impostor. The man confesses that the real Dr. Edwardes is dead and fears he may have killed him, but cannot recall anything. Dr. Peterson, however is convinced his impostor is innocent of the man's murder, and joins him on a quest to unravel his amnesia through psychoanalysis.

At the height of the London blitz, Dr Lennox Collins, pioneer of the new forensic science, is enlisted by DI Wilkins after prostitute Mary Williams is strangled and a swastika carved on her tongue.

Infamous London gangster cousins, Micky Mannock and Ray Collishaw, are at the top of the food chain, when their world is turned upside down as they lose a shipment of the Russian Mafia's cocaine in rough seas. Set in London, Amsterdam and Berlin, the story races across Europe at breakneck speed as Micky and Ray attempt to stay one step ahead of the Police. Can they pull off a daring diamond heist in time to put things right and retire to a "legitimate" way of life.

Minka is a teenage Polynesian boy living in the heart of the city. With his P-addicted mother well on the way to going completely off the rails, three people enter his life - each with a promise - each with the power to destroy.

A stylish suspense thriller that confounds the audience while presenting them with an extraordinary and elusive mystery. Max is a former playboy who has decided to settle down by marrying his current love, Muriel. However, during a business trip, Max catches a glimpse of the great lost love of his life, reviving his wanderlust and sending him off on a chase of the elusive Lisa, whom he had overheard suggesting to a friend that her lover, Daniel, had killed someone for her. Soon, Max is trying to unravel the mystery behind the suspicious death of Daniel's wife, which he hopes will lead him closer to Lisa.

A Jewel thief named Frank Stone is a very deeply disturbed, anti social, milquetoast who finds no joy or humor in anything - until he awakens from a deep coma.

Corky, a tough female ex-convict working on an apartment renovation in a Chicago building, meets a couple living next door, Caesar, a paranoid mobster, and Violet, his seductive girlfriend, who is immediately attracted to her.

Two romantically-engaged corporate spies team up to manipulate a corporate race to corner the market on a medical innovation that will reap huge profits and enable them to lead an extravagant lifestyle together.

In the late 1950s, British police officer Tony Aaron resigns from the force after sleeping with Hazel, wife of the man whose house he was supposed to guard. In his new job as a fake private investigator, he helps couples get divorces by photographing Hazel having "affairs" with the husband. When she is murdered during a job, Tony begins having an affair with the dead man's mistress, Angeline, while trying to prove his innocence.

ACP Vishnu is sent on a mission to investigate and clean the underbelly of Goa. During his investigation, he uncovers a huge racket and discovers the involvement of various politicians.

Literature professor Jim Bennett leads a secret life as a high-stakes gambler. Always a risk-taker, Bennett bets it all when he borrows from a gangster and offers his own life as collateral. Staying one step ahead, he pits his creditor against the operator of an illicit gambling ring while garnering the attention of Frank, a paternalistic loan shark. As his relationship with a student deepens, Bennett must risk everything for a second chance.

She was a beautiful fugitive. Fleeing from corruption. From power. He was a professional athlete past his prime. Hired to find her, he grew to love her. Love turned to obsession. Obsession turned to murder. And now the price of freedom might be nothing less than their lives.

After a group of Irish mobsters in Hell's Kitchen are sentenced to jail, their wives take their place—and do as good of a job, if not better.

Madison Avenue executive Graham Marshall has paid his dues. A talented and devoted worker, he has suffered through mounting bills and a nagging wife with one thing to look forward to: a well-deserved promotion. But when the promotion is given to a loud-mouthed yuppie associate, Graham unleashes his rage on an overly aggressive panhandler, who he accidently kills by pushing him into the path of an oncoming subway train. He re-thinks his problems with an entirely new solution. First, he arranges an "accident" for his annoying wife. Then he creates another "mishap" for his boss. It seems like the world is once more Graham's oyster…but a missing cigarette lighter and a prying police detective may change all that.

A mystery novelist devises an insurance scam with his wife’s lover – but things aren’t exactly as they seem.

Marnie is a beautiful kleptomaniac who is in love with businessman Mark Rutland. Marnie who is a compulsive thief is being watched by her new boss Mark who suspects her of stealing from him and thus decides to blackmail her in the most unusual way. A psychological thriller from Alfred Hitchcock based on a novel of the same name by Winston Graham.

Private detective and former football player Harry Moseby gets hired on to what seems a standard missing person case, as a former Hollywood actress whose only major roles came thanks to being married to a studio mogul wants Moseby to find and return her daughter. Harry travels to Florida to find her, but he begins to see a connection between the runaway girl, the world of Hollywood stuntmen, and a suspicious mechanic when an unsolved murder comes to light.

The tale of two brothers with serious financial woes. When a third party proposes they turn to crime, things go bad and the two become enemies.

When Petula and Dorothy cover up the accidental murder of one jerk boyfriend, they hatch a hilarious scheme to collect a huge ransom.

Clarence marries hooker Alabama, steals cocaine from her pimp, and tries to sell it in Hollywood, while the owners of the coke try to reclaim it.