20 best movies like Blue Velvet (1986)

List of the best movies like Blue Velvet (1986): Out of the Past, Uncle John, In the Mouth of Madness, Bad Day at Black Rock, The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, Population 436, Where the Truth Lies, The Tenant, Original Sin, The Spanish Prisoner.

Tags: movies similar to Blue Velvet (1986) - full list

Markimdb: 8
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, crime, film noir
CountryUSA
Duration01:37

Jeff Bailey seems to be a mundane gas station owner in remote Bridgeport, CA. He is dating local girl Ann Miller and lives a quiet life. But Jeff has a secret past, and when a mysterious stranger arrives in town, Jeff is forced to return to the dark world he had tried to escape.

Markimdb: 6.2
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration02:03

Uncle John revolves around the struggle to keep a mysterious disappearance unsolved

Markimdb: 7.1
Genrehorror, thriller, fantasy, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:31

An insurance investigator begins discovering that the impact a horror writer's books have on his fans is more than inspirational.

Markimdb: 7.7
Genrethriller, drama, western, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:21

One-armed war veteran John J. Macreedy steps off a train at the sleepy little town of Black Rock. Once there, he begins to unravel a web of lies, secrecy, and murder.

Markimdb: 6.6
Genrethriller, drama, adventure, crime, detective
CountryUnited Kingdom, USA
Duration01:53

Concerned about his friend's cocaine use, Dr. Watson tricks Sherlock Holmes into travelling to Vienna, where Holmes enters the care of Sigmund Freud. Freud attemts to solve the mysteries of Holmes' subconscious, while Holmes devotes himself to solving a mystery involving the kidnapping of Lola Deveraux.

Markimdb: 5.7
Genrehorror, thriller, melodrama, drama, detective
CountryCanada, USA
Duration01:29

A census-taker (Sisto) is sent to investigate why a certain small town has had the same population -- 436 residents -- for the last 100 years.

Markimdb: 6.5
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryCanada, United Kingdom
Duration01:48

An ambitious reporter probes the reasons behind the sudden split of a 1950s comedy team.

Markimdb: 7.6
Genrethriller, drama, detective
CountryFrance
Duration02:06

A quiet and inconspicuous man rents an apartment in France where the previous tenant committed suicide, and begins to suspect his landlord and neighbors are trying to subtly change him into the last tenant so that he too will kill himself.

Markimdb: 6.1
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, detective
CountryFrance, Mexico, USA
Duration01:58

A young man is plunged into a life of subterfuge, deceit and mistaken identity in pursuit of a femme fatale whose heart is never quite within his grasp

Markimdb: 7.2
Genrethriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:50

An inventor of a secret process suddenly finds himself alone as both his friends and the corporation he works for turn against him.

Markimdb: 3.6
Genrefantastic, thriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:43

S. Darko follows Samantha Darko, the younger sister of Donnie, the protagonist of Donnie Darko, and her friend Corey. On their way to California, their car breaks down, forcing them to wait in a small town until it is fixed. While there, Samantha begins to have dreams that warn her of the end of the universe.

Markimdb: 5.6
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA, Germany, France
Duration02:01

Lee Blanchard and Bucky Bleichert are former boxers-turned-cops in 1940s Los Angeles and, when an aspiring young actress turns up dead, Blanchard and Bleichert must grapple with corruption, narcissism, stag films and family madness as they pursue the killer.

Markimdb: 6.5
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, crime, detective, biography, history
CountryUSA, Canada
Duration02:06

The complicated life and controversial suicide of George Reeves is investigated by a fictional private detective who finds that there are reasons to suspect that Reeves may not have killed himself after all. The detective also finds that there is a little of George Reeves in himself, and maybe, each of us.

Markimdb: 6.2
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration02:07

Porter Wren is a Manhattan tabloid writer with an appetite for scandal. On the beat he sells murder, tragedy, and anything that passes for the truth. At home, he is a dedicated husband and father. But when Caroline, a seductive stranger asks him to dig into the unsolved murder of her filmmaker husband Simon, he is drawn into a very nasty case of sexual obsession and blackmail--one that threatens his job, his marriage, and his life.

Markimdb: 3.5
Genreaction, thriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:33

Nationally acclaimed evangelist John Luther is the last obstacle in the way of sweeping religious reform in the States. When a U.S. Senator and Luther's own supporters abduct and frame him in the murder of an innocent teenage girl, an unprecedented era of persecution is unleashed. Out on personal recognizance, Luther escapes police surveillance in search of the truth. And suddenly, a once-normal life is targeted by a team of ex-military operatives who wage a relentless campaign to eliminate the incriminating evidence. As evangelist turned fugitive, Luther vows to expose anyone involved with or profiting from the girl's murder; a mission that brings him face-to-face with the coming storm of persecution that will threaten the entire Christian community in America.

Markimdb: 5.8
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA, Canada, France
Duration01:53

A newspaper photographer, Jean, researches the lurid and sensational axe murder of two women in 1873 as an editorial tie-in with a brutal modern double murder. She discovers a cache of papers that appear to give an account of the murders by an eyewitness.

Markimdb: 7.6
Genrethriller, fantasy, melodrama, drama, detective
CountryUSA, Czech Republic
Duration01:50

With his eye on a lovely aristocrat, a gifted illusionist named Eisenheim uses his powers to win her away from her betrothed, a crowned prince. But Eisenheim's scheme creates tumult within the monarchy and ignites the suspicion of a dogged inspector.

Markimdb: 5.9
Genrehorror, thriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA

Suspecting that people around him are turning into evil creatures, a troubled man questions whether to protect his only friend from an impending war, or from himself.

Markimdb: 4.6
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:29

Two homicide detectives find their careers - and lives - on the line when they get caught up in a case of murder and betrayal in high-society Savannah.

Markimdb: 6.5
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, detective
CountryUnited Kingdom, Hungary
Duration01:44

Day in and day out, lovers Cynthia and Evelyn enact an elaborate sadomasochistic fantasy as mistress and maid. But as their ritual of domination and submission begins to turn stale, Cynthia yearns for something more conventional, while Evelyn tries to push their taboos even further.

Markimdb: 4.2
Genrethriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA

Brought together at their childhood home over their dying mother, an estranged family is thrust into a deadly fight for their own survival.

Markimdb: 5
Genrethriller, drama
CountryUSA
Duration01:20

JIM TAHANA doesn't leave much of an impression when he passes you by. But look closer and you'll sense his hunger - the deep hunger of an insatiable American soul - always scanning to devour something - anything that might fill the searing, unexplained void within him. Jim obsesses over the hobby that has been part of his DNA since he was a young boy: grief tourism - the act of traveling with the intent to visit places of tragedy or disaster. Every year his week-long vacations from work are spent going to grief tourist locations in the lives of different serial killers he is fascinated with. This years obsession is Carl Marznap, a mass murder from New Orleans, Louisiana. But this trip is no ordinary vacation as Jim's rancid sexual impulses and weakening grip on reality deteriorate into a violent despair that will ultimately unlock an unspeakable secret festering within him, bringing The Grief Tourist to it's brutal and shocking finale...

Markimdb: 7.3
Genrethriller, drama, detective, film noir
CountryUSA
Duration01:29

Leona Stevenson is confined to bed and uses her telephone to keep in contact with the outside world. One day she overhears a murder plot on the telephone and is desperate to find out who is the intended victim.

Markimdb: 3.8
Genrehorror, thriller, fantasy, drama, detective
CountrySpain, United Kingdom

Studying under a disciple of Aleister Crowley, the leader of an upper class group invokes a supernatural force that slowly devours the village of Marienbad and its inhabitants, threatening to spread beyond its geographical limits. The mayor from the town nearby commissions the building of a dam which would flood the valley and therefore submerge the village forever sealing the evil force under water after leader and his followers were incapacitated to be kept from escaping. However, fate ensured the leader's freedom as he remained in the depths when the waters covered Marienbad. Now 40 years later an array of disappearances and deaths in mysterious circumstances are threatening the town next to the reservoir that now covers Marienbad.

Markimdb: 7.1
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration02:10

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.

Markimdb: 4.6
Genrehorror, thriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:32

Radio talk show therapist Sonny Blake (Rose McGowan) moves back to her childhood home on seemingly idyllic Rosewood Lane after her alcoholic father dies. But upon arrival in the old neighborhood, Sonny discovers her neighbors are terrified of the local paperboy (Daniel Ross Owens). She thinks this is ridiculous, until she encounters the boy himself. It turns out that he is a cunning and dangerous sociopath, one who may have gruesomely killed her father - and others.

Markimdb: 4.3
Genrethriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA, France, United Kingdom, Germany, Spain
Duration01:54

Novelist Catherine Tramell is once again in trouble with the law, and Scotland Yard appoints psychiatrist Dr. Michael Glass to evaluate her. Though, like Detective Nick Curran before him, Glass is entranced by Tramell and lured into a seductive game.

Markimdb: 6
Genrethriller, melodrama, drama, detective, military
CountryUSA
Duration01:45

An American journalist arrives in Berlin just after the end of World War Two. He becomes involved in a murder mystery surrounding a dead GI who washes up at a lakeside mansion during the Potsdam negotiations between the Allied powers. Soon his investigation connects with his search for his married pre-war German lover.

Markimdb: 6.1
Genrethriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:26

In "An Amish Murder", the peaceful Amish farming community of Painter’s Mill, Ohio, is shattered when a series of brutal murders leaves the town with a sense of frailty and loss of innocence. Among the most affected by the tragedy was Kate Burkholder (Campbell), a young girl who survived the terror and, as a result, left the Amish life behind. Fifteen years later, Kate returns to Painter’s Mill as its Chief of Police. Certain she’s come to terms with her past, Kate’s renewed life in her hometown is shattered when a murder investigation triggers deep-seated emotions from her childhood and exposes a dark secret that could destroy her.

Markimdb: 4.2
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA

A female American reporter searches for her missing brother against the backdrop of violence and human smuggling across the US/Mexican border.

Markimdb: 4.7
Genrehorror, thriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:23

Fiona Wagner, a journalism student, tracks a cold-blooded killer with the help of her detective father and a therapist.

Markimdb: 5.7
Genrethriller, fantasy, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:35

A single mother is swept into a dark underworld, while her teenage son discovers a road that leads him to a secret underwater town.

Markimdb: 6.1
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA

A sheriff begins an investigation into the death of a local transsexual after hearing that high ranking politicians may have been involved. Although he is homophobic, his investigation causes him to be rejected by others, forcing him to seek help from the people he once despised.

Markimdb: 4.3
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:50

After witnessing a miracle, a young Latina woman experiences strange things as a police detective searches for the truth behind his partner's death.

Markimdb: 7.8
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA, Sweden, Norway
Duration02:33

This English-language adaptation of the Swedish novel by Stieg Larsson follows a disgraced journalist, Mikael Blomkvist, as he investigates the disappearance of a weary patriarch's niece from 40 years ago. He is aided by the pierced, tattooed, punk computer hacker named Lisbeth Salander. As they work together in the investigation, Blomkvist and Salander uncover immense corruption beyond anything they have ever imagined.

Markimdb: 7.4
Genrethriller, drama, crime, detective
CountryUSA
Duration02:12

Dolores Claiborne was accused of killing her abusive husband twenty years ago, but the court's findings were inconclusive and she was allowed to walk free. Now she has been accused of killing her employer, Vera Donovan, and this time there is a witness who can place her at the scene of the crime. Things look bad for Dolores when her daughter Selena, a successful Manhattan magazine writer, returns to cover the story.

Markimdb: 7.4
Genrehorror, thriller, fantasy, drama, detective
CountrySouth Korea
Duration01:50

A stranger arrives in a little village and soon after a mysterious sickness starts spreading. A policeman is drawn into the incident and is forced to solve the mystery in order to save his daughter.

Markimdb: 6.8
Genrefantastic, thriller, drama, detective
CountryFrance, USA
Duration01:38

Kafka, an insurance worker gets embroiled in an underground group after a co-worker is murdered. The underground group is responsible for bombings all over town, attempting to thwart a secret organization that controls the major events in society. He eventually penetrates the secret organization and must confront them.

Markimdb: 7.3
Genrehorror, thriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:23

In 1916, a shadowy serial killer is targeting women with "afflictions". One night, during a thunderstorm, the mute Helen feels menaced.

Markimdb: 3.5
Genrehorror, thriller, drama, detective
CountryUSA
Duration01:50

Six young adults struggle with their personal demons while staying at a secluded mansion during a dark and stormy night where a seemingly innocent game of 'taboo' brings out their inter-most secrets which soon leads to murder.

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