Nicolas Cage is Nick Cage.
Read MoreGenre: Crime
Director/writer Melvin Van Peebles sparked the blaxploitation genre with thisfilm about a orphan who is groomed to be a sex show performer and framed for murder he didn’t commit. Set to a score by Earth, Wind, and Fire, this film devolves into an increasingly hallucinogenic world of violence and bigotry, where no one can be trusted and the possibility of death lurks at every corner.
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It’s the dawn of a new era for cult cinema in Pittsburgh! Row House Cinema’s Cult-O-Rama series is thrilled…
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Francis Ford Coppola’s mid-70s thriller follows a privacy-obsessed surveillance expert (Gene Hackman) who is hired to tail a young couple. Tormented by memories of a previous case that ended badly, he becomes obsessed with the resulting tape and trying to determine if the couple are in danger.
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Guillermo Del Toro’s 2021 film stars Bradley Cooper as an ambitious carnival man with a talent for manipulating people with a few well-chosen words. He hooks up with a female psychiatrist who is even more dangerous. Cate Blanchett, Rooney mara, Toni Collette, and Willem Dafoe make up this all-star cast.
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Masahiro Shinoda was a pioneer in Japanese new wave noirs, and he applies his mastery of mood and character to the yazuka genre in Pale Flower. When a gangster is released from prison, he tries to find his footing in the gambling underworld of his gang when he encounters a wealthy and beautiful thrill seeker who draws him into her web. Together and apart they enter a self-destructive spiral.
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In the yakuza genre of Japanese Cinema, Tokyo Drifter is a staple. Director Seijun Suzuki adds a 1960s pop art aesthetic to a classic tale of a badass gang enforcer trying to go straight… but his old rival has other plans for him.
One of the best Japanese films ever made, Tokyo Drifter is thrilling, stylish, and exciting. It’s got the look of a classic Bond movie, but a darker feel thanks to a seedy and dark narrative that makes it a classic yakuza film.
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Kurosawa’s Stray Dog plays like a Hollywood detective noir set in gritty post-war Tokyo.
Japanese cinema legend Toshiro Mifune gives a raw and magnetic performance as a young detective who loses his gun and tries to save face by tracking it down before reporting it stolen. His search leads him to the slums and criminal underbelly of the city, where a veteran detective helps him find it before it’s used in a violent crime.
With experimental shots and lingering scenes, this early Kurosawa hints at the master director that was to come.
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A stylish and profound silent film from Yasujiro Ozu — director of Tokyo Story and Late Spring — Dragnet Girl stands alone in the gangster (yakuza) genre.
True to Ozu, the film is intimately focused on family and the interpersonal relationships between career hardened criminal Joji, his jealous girlfriend, and an innocent shop girl who gets pulled into his world.
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Kiyoshi Kurosawa breaks the mold of serial killer movies with an engrossing thriller that takes you inside the psyche of society.
When police uncover a series of murders, committed by different people using the same strange method, a gloomy detective takes on the descent into the killers’ madness while managing his wife’s own mental stability.
Eerie and masterful, Bong Jon-ho (director of Parasite) lists it as one of his all-time favorite films.
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