20 best movies like Elsewhere (2009)

A dark comedy about four self-absorbed twenty-somethings who become entangled in an ominous mystery when a former college acquaintance suddenly disappears.

It’s 1994: a 13-year-old boy disappears from his home in San Antonio, Texas. Three and a half years later, he is found alive, thousands of miles away, in Spain. Disoriented and quivering with fear, he divulges his shocking story of kidnap and torture. His family is overjoyed to bring him home. But all is not what it seems. Sure, he has the same tattoos, but he looks decidedly different, and he now speaks with a strange accent. Why doesn't the family seem to notice these glaring inconsistencies? It's only when an investigator starts asking questions that this astounding true story takes an even stranger turn.

A man with the ability to enter peoples' memories takes on the case of a brilliant, troubled sixteen-year-old girl to determine whether she is a sociopath or a victim of trauma.

Jordan Turner is an experienced 911 operator but when she makes an error in judgment and a call ends badly, Jordan is rattled and unsure if she can continue. But when teenager Casey Welson is abducted in the back of a man's car and calls 911, Jordan is the one called upon to use all of her experience, insights and quick thinking to help Casey escape, and not just to save her, but to make sure the man is brought to justice.

Rachel Watson, devastated by her recent divorce, spends her daily commute fantasizing about the seemingly perfect couple who live in a house that her train passes every day, until one morning she sees something shocking happen there and becomes entangled in the mystery that unfolds.

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

In this spine-tingling and visually stunning thriller, Academy Award®-nominee Samuel L. Jackson (Unbreakable, Shaft, Pulp Fiction delivers a "full-throttle performance" (People) as Romulus Ledbetter, a misunderstood musician turned recluse, hiding from personal demons in a New York City cave. When Romulus finds the frozen body of a young drifter in a tree, the authorities - including his police officer daughter (Aunjanne Ellis) - claim the death is accidental. Romulus is convinced the man was murdered by prominent art photographer David Leppenraub (Colm Feore). But how can he prove he's right when everyone thinks he's insane?

"To Catch a Killer" tells the true gruesome story of John Wayne Gacy - a good friend and helpful neighbour, a great child entertainer, a respectful businessman, and a violent serial killer who raped and murdered over 30 young boys.

Thirty years ago, in the sleepy community of Waterbury, a killer known as “The Executioner” murdered Sarah Bennett's parents. Now Sarah and her husband Dylan have returned to town, only to find herself the centerpiece in a series of horrifying murders centered around the seven deadly sins.

A gang of criminals and corrupt cops plan the murder of a police officer in order to pull off their biggest heist yet across town.

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

A stranger in the increasingly strange city of San Francisco, Japanese crime novelist Aki is unsure of precisely what role she has to play in a real-life murder mystery involving ambiguous MacGuffins and amorphous identities. Unfolding in lonely places such as bookshops and hotel bars, Dave Boyle's moody thriller uncovers exhilarating new takes on genre conventions. Consequently, it's an alluring l'homme fatal who supplies Aki with the breadcrumb trail of clues that entices her into a labyrinthine plot of sinister dealings. In turn, the aging sheriff (veteran character actor Pepe Serna, fantastic in a rare leading role), who should rightfully be riding to her rescue, proves to be equally out of his depth. The game is afoot, the chase is exhilarating and the stakes are perilously high in this inspired neo-noir.

Anna Macy left Kettering when she was just 14, shortly after her best friend, Gillian Baxter mysteriously disappeared. The two girls had been playing in the forbidden forests outside Kettering when they saw strange lights in the sky. Eight hours later, Anna was found alone, terrified and covered in blood. 15 years on, Anna returns to find the town struggling to survive. The forests have been marked for logging and the community is being torn apart by passionate but violent clashes between environmentalists and the local loggers.

Inspired by actual events, a group of 12 year old girls face a night of horror when the compulsive addiction of an online social media game turns a moment of cyber bullying into a night of insanity.

A recently released ex-con gets involved in a fake kidnapping scheme that turns very real.

Based on true events, The Wannabe, a story about Thomas, a man obsessed with Mafia culture during the 1990s in New York City. When Thomas’s failed attempts to fix the trial of infamous mobster John Gotti gets him rejected by the people he idolizes most, he sets off on a drug infused crime spree with his girlfriend and longtime mob groupie, Rose, by brazenly robbing the local Mafia hangouts.

A small southwestern town sheriff finds a body in the desert with a suitcase and $500,000. He impersonates the man and stumbles into an FBI investigation.

A retired ex-cop and private detective gets mixed up in murder when he is asked to deliver blackmail money and walks into a 20 year old case involving the mysterious disappearance of an actress' former husband.

Police chief Xavier Quinn investigates the gruesome murder of Donald Pater, one of the wealthiest residents on a Caribbean island. He was found decapitated in his Jacuzzi. Although the local political establishment, especially crooked Governor Chalk, insists that small-time thief Maubee is responsible, Xavier has his doubts. This view is complicated by the police chief's personal history with Maubee: The men have been friends since childhood.

A thriller set in New York City during the winter of 1981, statistically one of the most violent years in the city's history, and centered on a the lives of an immigrant and his family trying to expand their business and capitalize on opportunities as the rampant violence, decay, and corruption of the day drag them in and threaten to destroy all they have built.

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.

A masked maniac terrorizes the same small community where a murderer known as the Phantom Killer struck decades earlier.

When a mafia accountant is taken hostage on his beat, a police officer – wracked by guilt from a prior stint as a negotiator – must negotiate the standoff, even as his own family is held captive by the mob.

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.

6 strangers are kidnapped and through governmental technology have proof they have all killed before and are told 5 will die this night, one may walk, and the six have 2 hours to decide who gets to live.

Matt Lee Whitlock, respected chief of police in small Banyan Key, Florida, must solve a vicious double homicide before he himself falls under suspicion. Matt Lee has to stay a few steps ahead of his own police force and everyone he's trusted in order to find out the truth.

After losing an acting role and his girlfriend, Jake Scully finally catches a break: he gets offered a gig house-sitting in the Hollywood Hills. While peering through the beautiful home's telescope one night, he spies a gorgeous blonde dancing in her window. But when he witnesses the girl's murder, it leads Scully through the netherworld of the adult entertainment industry on a search for answers -- with porn actress Holly Body as his guide.

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 DEA agent investigates the disappearance of a legendary Army ranger drill sergeant and several of his cadets during a training exercise gone severely awry.

In this true story, Veronica Guerin is an investigative reporter for an Irish newspaper. As the drug trade begins to bleed into the mainstream, Guerin decides to take on and expose those responsible. Beginning at the bottom with addicts, Guerin then gets in touch with John Traynor, a paranoid informant. Not without some prodding, Traynor leads her to John Gilligan, the ruthless head of the operation, who does not take kindly to Guerin's nosing.

A woman who survived the brutal killing of her family as a child is forced to confront the events of that day.

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.

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 his SUV breaks down on a remote Southwestern road, Jeff Taylor lets his wife, Amy, hitch a ride with a trucker to get help. When she doesn't return, Jeff fixes his SUV and tracks down the trucker -- who tells the police he's never seen Amy. Johnathan Mostow's tense thriller then follows Jeff's desperate search for his wife, which eventually uncovers a small town's murderous secret.

Freddy Heflin is the sheriff of a place everyone calls “Cop Land” — a small and seemingly peaceful town populated by the big city police officers he’s long admired. Yet something ugly is taking place behind the town’s peaceful facade. And when Freddy uncovers a massive, deadly conspiracy among these local residents, he is forced to take action and make a dangerous choice between protecting his idols and upholding the law.

In the Texas bayous, a local homicide detective teams up with a cop from New York City to investigate a series of unsolved murders.

Kale is a 17-year-old placed under house arrest after punching his teacher. He is confined to his house, and decides to use his free time spying on his neighbors. Things start to get weird when guests enter the Turner's house and don't come back out. Kale and his friends, Ronnie and Ashley, start to grow more and more interested in what is actually happening within the house of Robert Turner.

A CBI officer goes in search of a ruthless serial killer. Things get worse when the murderer targets the former and her family

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.

Cold Moon takes place in tiny Babylon, Fla., where the granddaughter of Clark’s character is murdered by a mysterious assailant, her body sunk into the black waters of the Styx River — the river where her parents disappeared from their boat a decade earlier. Suspicion falls on a duplicitous banker and his wealthy father, played by Stewart and Lloyd.

The mysterious murder of a US senator bearing the distinctive trademark of the legendary Soviet assassin 'Cassius', forces retired CIA operative, Paul Shepherson to team with rookie FBI agent, Ben Geary to solve the crime. Having spent his career chasing Cassius, Shepherdson is convinced his nemesis is long dead, but is pushed to take on the case by his former supervisor, Tom Highland. Geary, who wrote his Master's thesis on Shepherdson's pursuit of the Soviet killer, is certain that Cassius has resurfaced.

A psychological thriller about a man who is sometimes controlled by his murder-and-mayhem-loving alter ego.

A slightly unhinged former Navy SEAL lands a job as a police officer in Los Angeles where he's partnered with a veteran detective trying to keep maintain a low stress level in his life.

25 year-old Dwayne McLaren, a former athlete turned auto mechanic, dreams of getting out of tiny Cut Bank, Montana the coldest town in America. But his effort to do so sets in moton a deadly series of events that change his life and the life of the town forever...

When 4 year old Amanda McCready disappears from her home and the police make little headway in solving the case, the girl's aunt, Beatrice McCready hires two private detectives, Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro. The detectives freely admit that they have little experience with this type of case, but the family wants them for two reasons - they're not cops and they know the tough neighborhood in which they all live. As the case progresses, Kenzie and Gennaro face drug dealers, gangs and pedophiles. When they are about to solve the case, they are faced with a moral dilemma that tears them apart.

Young lovers Billy and Sarah journey from L.A. to Texas with plans to make a false claim to the valuable assets left behind by a dead friend. But when their voyage brings them to Tremo, Texas, they find a bizarre and sinister world awaiting them.

Idealistic young attorney Adam Hall takes on the death row clemency case of his racist grandfather, Sam Cayhall, a former Ku Klux Klan member he has never met.

A serial killer, who drains his victims for blood is on the loose in London, the Police follow him to a house owned by an eccentric scientist.

Following a series of drug deals and murders, three criminals -- Fantasia, Ray Malcolm and Pluto -- travel from Los Angeles to Houston, finally arriving in a small Arkansas town to go into hiding. Two detectives from the LAPD, who are already on the case, contact the town's sheriff, Dale Dixon, to alert him of the fugitives' presence in the area. Underestimating Dixon, the criminals have no idea what they are about to face.

A Los Angeles detective and his Japanese partner woo an artist while solving a stripper's murder.