20 best movies like Top of the Lake (2013)

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.

This drama follows Inspector Kurt Wallander – a middle-aged everyman – as he struggles against a rising tide of violence in the apparently sleepy backwaters in and around Ystad in Skane, southern Sweden. Based on the international best-selling books by Henning Mankell.

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

A tight-knit team of FBI investigators, along with their District Attorney supervisor, is suddenly torn apart when they discover that one of their own teenage daughters has been brutally murdered.

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.

After being brutally murdered, 14-year-old Susie Salmon watches from heaven over her grief-stricken family -- and her killer. As she observes their daily lives, she must balance her thirst for revenge with her desire for her family to heal.

Will Graham, a former London crime boss who has left his former life to live as a recluse in the forest. Haunted by the blood of those he has murdered, Will wishes never to return. But when his brother commits suicide, following a sexual assault at the hands of a volatile car dealer, Will returns to London to discover the cause of his brother's death and administer justice to those responsible.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

A prominent Boston family attempts to redefine itself in the wake of a chilling discovery that links their recently deceased patriarch to a string of murders spanning decades — amid the mounting suspicion that one of them may have been his accomplice.

Los Angeles Police Department detective Russell Poole has spent years trying to solve his biggest case -- the murders of The Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur -- but after two decades, the investigation remains open. Jack Jackson, a reporter desperate to save his reputation and career, is determined to find out why. In search of the truth, the two team up and unravel a growing web of institutional corruption and lies.

Christine Collins is overjoyed when her kidnapped son is brought back home. But when Christine suspects that the boy returned to her isn't her child, the police captain has her committed to an asylum.

Two women have been murdered within hours of one another near St. Pancras station, but in quite different ways. When a connection is made with two other murders which occurred months before, but also on the same day, DI Thorne realizes two serial killers may be at work in a macabre partnership

A story about friendship and loyalty, guilt and vengeance, and the fateful affect the past has on the present.

A doctor dealing with the aftermath of his son's death tries to help a troubled young man.

Walter Sparrow is an animal control officer that becomes obsessed with a mysterious book that seems to be based on his own life. As soon as he opens the book, he notices strange parallels between what he reads and what he's experienced. But now he's worried that a fictional murder might materialize.

It took Anna 10 years to recover from the death of her husband, Sean, but now she's on the verge of marrying her boyfriend, Joseph, and finally moving on. However, on the night of her engagement party, a young boy named Sean turns up, saying he is her dead husband reincarnated. At first she ignores the child, but his knowledge of her former husband's life is uncanny, leading her to believe that he might be telling the truth.

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.

Newly-discovered facts, court records and speculation are used to elaborate the true love story and murder mystery of the most notorious unsolved murder case in New York history.

A surrogate mother harbors a deadly secret desire for a family of her own with the husband who is expecting to raise her child.

The clues to a young woman's death come together as the lives of seemingly unrelated people begin to intersect.

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.

Three lighthouse keepers on an uninhabited island off the coast of Scotland discover something that isn't theirs to keep.

Laura, a Spanish woman living in Buenos Aires, returns to her hometown outside Madrid with her Argentinian husband and children. However, the trip is upset by unexpected events that bring secrets into the open.

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.

Sally Lockhart crosses paths with the nefarious industrialist Axel Bellman, the richest and most powerful man in Europe. She's determined to prove him guilty of corruption and fraud, whilst Bellman will stop at nothing to destroy her case.

A black police detective must solve a strange case of a kidnapped boy and deal with a big racial protest.

Jarod takes a keen interest in an ancient symbol that may unlock secrets about his family. But Miss Parker is hot on Jarod's trail and about to make discoveries of her own. Their investigation leads to a remote Island off the Scottish coast, where a set of sacred scrolls, vital to the Centre, have been hidden – and protected – for centuries.

Survivors of a nuclear attack are grouped together for days in the basement of their apartment building, where fear and dwindling supplies wear away at their dynamic.

A young promoter is accused of the murder of Vicky Lynn, a young actress he "discovered" as a waitress while out with ex-actor Robin Ray and gossip columnist Larry Evans.

A man receives a mysterious e-mail appearing to be from his wife, who was murdered years earlier. As he frantically tries to find out whether she's alive, he finds himself being implicated in her death.

Sean Veil is an ultra paranoid murder suspect who takes to filming himself round the clock to provide an alibi, just in case he's ever accused of another crime. Problems arise however when the police do come calling and the one tape that can prove his innocence has mysteriously disappeared.

The gruesome death of a prostitute brings suspicion on one of her clients, James Wayland, a brilliant, self-destructive and epileptic heir to a textile fortune. So detectives Braxton and Kennesaw take Wayland in for questioning, thinking they can break the man. But despite his troubles, Wayland is a master of manipulation, and during the interrogation, he begins to turn the tables on the investigators, forcing them to reveal their own sinister sides.

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?

A terrorist attack in London results in the capture of suspect, and the attorney general appoints Claudia Simmons-Howe as special advocate on his defence team. On the eve of the trial, the accused's attorney dies and a new one, Martin Rose, steps in. Martin and Claudia are former lovers—a fact which must remain hidden—and, as Martin assembles his case, he uncovers a sinister conspiracy that places him and Claudia in danger.

When a 12-year-old boy goes missing, lead investigator Greg Harper struggles to balance the pressure of the investigation and troubles with his wife, Jackie. Facing a recent affair, great strain is put on the family that slowly gnaws away at Jackie's grip on reality. But after a malicious presence manifests itself in their home and puts their son, Connor, in mortal danger, the cold, hard truth about evil in the Harper household is finally uncovered.

A big city cop from LA moves to a small town police force and immediately finds himself investigating a murder. Using theories rejected by his colleagues, the cop, John Berlin, meets a young blind woman named Helena, who he is attracted to. Meanwhile, a serial killer is on the loose and only John knows it.

When a voyeuristic divorcee fixates on the lives of a perfect couple a far, she soon gets embroiled in a murder mystery that unfolds revealing truths about her own life.

Sexy New York detective and single mother Harlee Santos fell in with a tight-knit group of dirty cops, taking bribes and protection money that she uses to provide the best life for her honest, talented daughter. But when she's trapped by the FBI and forced to inform on her own "brothers," she'll have to walk the fine line between love, loyalty, honor and betrayal, and try to keep it together for her daughter's future.

Follows disillusioned young family man John as a mysterious stranger, Richie takes him on a murder-fueled ride that transforms the weak-willed John into a desperate hero willing to go to any length to protect his family.

Lake Tahoe, 1969. Seven strangers, each one with a secret to bury, meet at El Royale, a decadent motel with a dark past. In the course of a fateful night, everyone will have one last shot at redemption.

Adèle and her daughter Sarah are traveling on the Welsh coastline to see her husband James when Sarah disappears. A different but similar looking girl appears who says she died in a past time. Adèle tries to discover what happened to her daughter as she is tormented by Celtic mythology from the past.

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.

Massachusetts, 1892. An unmarried woman of 32 and a social outcast, Lizzie lives a claustrophobic life under her father's cold and domineering control. When Bridget Sullivan, a young maid, comes to work for the family, Lizzie finds a sympathetic, kindred spirit, and a secret intimacy soon blossoms into a wicked plan.

Eight years after fleeing the Congo following his assassination of that country's minister of mining, former assassin Jim Terrier is back, suffering from PTSD and digging wells to atone for his violent past. After an attempt is made on his life, Terrier flies to London to find out who wants him dead -- and why. Terrier's search leads him to a reunion with Annie, a woman he once loved, who is now married to an oily businessman with dealings in Africa.

Aaron Falk returns to his drought-stricken hometown to attend a tragic funeral. But his return opens a decades-old wound - the unsolved death of a teenage girl.

A Russian teenager, living in London, dies during childbirth but leaves clues to a midwife in her journal, that could tie her child to a rape involving a violent Russian mob family.