20 Crime Movies Inspired by Real Cases, From Goodfellas to The Wolf of Wall Street

Some crime movies stick fairly close to court records, reporting, memoirs, or law-enforcement investigations. Others take a real crime and build a heavily dramatized story around it. Either way, the phrase "based on a true story" can cover a lot of ground.

The films below pull from real murders, fraud schemes, robberies, corruption investigations, prison escapes, and other crimes. In some cases, the people and major events are well documented. In others, characters were combined, timelines were compressed, or the source material itself has been questioned. Those distinctions matter, especially when real victims are part of the story.

For this updated list, we checked the film details against studio, film-industry, and classification records and reviewed the underlying cases using law-enforcement, government, historical, and other established sources. Here are 20 notable movies inspired by real crimes.

• Director: David Fincher
• Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey Jr., Anthony Edwards, Brian Cox, Elias Koteas, Donal Logue, John Carroll Lynch, Chloë Sevigny, Philip Baker Hall, and Dermot Mulroney
• Release Date: March 2, 2007
• Running Time: 158 minutes

David Fincher's Zodiac draws primarily from Robert Graysmith's book about the still-unidentified killer who attacked people in Northern California and sent letters and cryptograms to newspapers beginning in the late 1960s. Rather than treating the case as a conventional serial-killer thriller, the movie follows journalists and investigators as the unsolved case consumes years of their lives. The film focuses heavily on suspect Arthur Leigh Allen, but Allen was never charged with the Zodiac murders, and law enforcement has never officially identified the killer.

• Director: Rob Schmidt
• Starring: Eliza Dushku, Cary Elwes, Michael Ironside, Bill Moseley, and Timothy Hutton
• Release Date: November 7, 2008
• Running Time: 98 minutes

The Alphabet Killer takes its starting point from the unsolved Alphabet Murders in the Rochester, New York, area between 1971 and 1973. Three young girls were killed, with each victim sharing the same first and last initial and being found near a community beginning with that same letter. The real crimes remain unsolved. The movie goes much further into fiction, however. Eliza Dushku's detective Megan Paige is not a real investigator, and the psychological and supernatural elements surrounding her investigation were created for the film.

• Director: Svetozar Ristovski
• Starring: Jesse Moss, William Forsythe, Emma Lahana, Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman, and Patrick Gilmore
• Release Date: May 11, 2010 (Canada)
• Running Time: 103 minutes

This movie is based on The Last Victim, the book co-written by college student Jason Moss about his correspondence with convicted serial killer John Wayne Gacy. Moss contacted Gacy while researching serial killers and developed an increasingly personal exchange with him before eventually meeting Gacy in prison. The movie dramatizes that relationship rather than reconstructing Gacy's murders themselves. There is an important caveat here: the film's own closing credits acknowledge that some events described by Moss could not be independently verified.

• Director: Martin Scorsese
• Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Margot Robbie, Matthew McConaughey, and Kyle Chandler
• Release Date: December 25, 2013
• Running Time: 179 minutes

The Wolf of Wall Street is adapted from Jordan Belfort's memoir about his rise and fall at Stratton Oakmont, the Long Island brokerage firm he helped build. Regulators accused Stratton Oakmont and its brokers of fraudulent sales practices and stock manipulation, and the firm became one of the most notorious "boiler room" operations of the era. Scorsese's movie keeps Belfort and the basic criminal enterprise but freely dramatizes conversations, relationships, and episodes from Belfort's account. In other words, the fraud was real. The three-hour fever dream around it is very much a movie.

• Director: Marc Meyers
• Starring: Ross Lynch, Anne Heche, Alex Wolff, Dallas Roberts, Tommy Nelson, and Vincent Kartheiser
• Release Date: November 3, 2017
• Running Time: 107 minutes

My Friend Dahmer is based on cartoonist Derf Backderf's graphic memoir about attending high school with Jeffrey Dahmer in Ohio. Backderf really was Dahmer's classmate, which gives the source material an unusual perspective on the years before Dahmer became a serial killer. The movie largely stays in that period rather than recreating the later murders for which Dahmer became infamous. It follows his isolation, alcoholism, home life, and increasingly disturbing behavior through the end of high school, shortly before his first known murder in 1978.

• Director: David O. Russell
• Starring: Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, and Jennifer Lawrence
• Release Date: December 13, 2013
• Running Time: 138 minutes

American Hustle is inspired by ABSCAM, the FBI undercover investigation that began in 1978 and eventually exposed public corruption at the federal and local levels. Agents and their informant posed as representatives of a wealthy Middle Eastern sheik while offering bribes and business opportunities. The investigation ultimately resulted in the convictions of one U.S. senator, six members of the House, and more than a dozen other officials and criminals. The movie is deliberately loose with the history, using fictionalized characters and rearranged events rather than attempting a literal reconstruction of the operation.

• Director: Craig Gillespie
• Starring: Margot Robbie, Sebastian Stan, Julianne Nicholson, Bobby Cannavale, and Allison Janney
• Release Date: December 8, 2017
• Running Time: 120 minutes

I, Tonya centers on figure skater Tonya Harding and the 1994 attack on her rival Nancy Kerrigan. Harding pleaded guilty to conspiracy to hinder the prosecution after the attack and received probation, a fine, and community service. U.S. Figure Skating later stripped her of the 1994 national title and banned her for life. Its hearing panel concluded under its own evidentiary standard that Harding had prior knowledge of the attack, although she was never criminally tried for planning it. The movie deliberately presents competing and sometimes contradictory versions of events rather than pretending everyone involved remembered the story the same way.

• Director: Peter Jackson
• Starring: Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Sarah Peirse, Diana Kent, Clive Merrison, and Simon O'Connor
• Release Date: October 14, 1994 (New Zealand)
• Running Time: 99 minutes

Peter Jackson's Heavenly Creatures dramatizes one of New Zealand's most notorious murder cases. On June 22, 1954, 16-year-old Pauline Parker and 15-year-old Juliet Hulme killed Pauline's mother, Honorah Parker, in Christchurch's Victoria Park. Both teenagers were convicted of murder but could not receive the death penalty because they were under 18. They were imprisoned for roughly five years before being released separately. Hulme later changed her name to Anne Perry and became a successful crime novelist. The film incorporates Pauline's surviving diary entries while using elaborate fantasy sequences to portray the girls' shared imaginary world.

• Director: Marielle Heller
• Starring: Melissa McCarthy, Richard E. Grant, Dolly Wells, Jane Curtin, Anna Deavere Smith, Stephen Spinella, and Ben Falcone
• Release Date: October 19, 2018
• Running Time: 106 minutes

Can You Ever Forgive Me? is adapted from writer Lee Israel's memoir about the literary-forgery scheme that derailed her career. After her biography work dried up, Israel began creating and altering letters she attributed to famous writers and celebrities, then selling them to collectors and dealers as authentic documents. The scheme eventually expanded beyond simple forgery. Melissa McCarthy plays Israel while Richard E. Grant plays her accomplice Jack Hock in a movie that treats the fraud less like a glamorous caper and more like the increasingly desperate operation it became.

• Director: John Requa and Glenn Ficarra
• Starring: Jim Carrey, Ewan McGregor, Rodrigo Santoro, Antoni Corone, and Leslie Mann
• Release Date: December 3, 2010 (U.S.)
• Running Time: 98 minutes

The strange premise of I Love You Phillip Morris comes from a real person. The movie is based on journalist Steve McVicker's book about Steven Russell, a Texas con artist and prison escapee who fell in love with fellow inmate Phillip Morris. Russell repeatedly used fraud, assumed identities, and elaborate schemes as he cycled through the criminal-justice system. The film turns the story into a broad romantic comedy starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor, so individual scenes should not be treated as a documentary reconstruction, but Russell, Morris, and the basic criminal story were real.

• Director: Steven Spielberg
• Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks, Christopher Walken, Martin Sheen, Nathalie Baye, Amy Adams, and James Brolin
• Release Date: December 25, 2002
• Running Time: 140 minutes

Catch Me If You Can is based on Frank Abagnale Jr.'s memoir about supposedly spending his teenage years passing bad checks while impersonating an airline pilot, doctor, lawyer, and other professionals. There is an important catch to this particular "true story." Major parts of Abagnale's account have been challenged over the years, and Abagnale himself has said that his co-writer exaggerated and overdramatized portions of the book. He has described it as storytelling rather than a strict biography. Spielberg's film is therefore best understood as an adaptation of Abagnale's famous account, not a scene-by-scene record of verified events.

• Director: Sofia Coppola
• Starring: Emma Watson, Katie Chang, Israel Broussard, Taissa Farmiga, Claire Julien, Georgia Rock, and Leslie Mann
• Release Date: June 14, 2013
• Running Time: 88 minutes

Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring was inspired by the real group of young people who burglarized celebrity homes around Los Angeles in 2008 and 2009. Investigators linked the group to break-ins involving stars including Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Audrina Patridge, Orlando Bloom, and Rachel Bilson, with more than $3 million in property reportedly taken. Coppola based the screenplay in part on Nancy Jo Sales' article "The Suspects Wore Louboutins." The film changes names, combines details, and fictionalizes its characters, but the celebrity-home burglary spree behind it was very real.

• Director: Martin Scorsese
• Starring: Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, Joe Pesci, Lorraine Bracco, and Paul Sorvino
• Release Date: September 19, 1990
• Running Time: 146 minutes

It is hard to make a list of famous crime movies drawn from real life without Goodfellas. Scorsese and writer Nicholas Pileggi adapted Pileggi's nonfiction book Wiseguy, which was based on interviews with mob associate Henry Hill. Ray Liotta plays Hill, while several other real criminals were given altered names in the film. Events were also compressed and rearranged for storytelling purposes. Even with those changes, the central story of Hill's years around organized crime, his cooperation with authorities, and his entry into witness protection came directly from real events.

• Director: Patty Jenkins
• Starring: Charlize Theron, Christina Ricci, and Bruce Dern
• Release Date: December 24, 2003
• Running Time: 109 minutes

Monster stars Charlize Theron as Aileen Wuornos, who was convicted of multiple murders in Florida and executed by lethal injection in 2002 after spending years on death row. Writer-director Patty Jenkins drew from Wuornos' life and correspondence but did not present the film as a literal record. Its closing disclaimer specifically states that numerous characters are composites or inventions and that some incidents were fictionalized. Christina Ricci's character, for example, is a fictionalized counterpart rather than a direct portrayal of one specific person from Wuornos' life.

• Director: Lorene Scafaria
• Starring: Constance Wu, Jennifer Lopez, Julia Stiles, Keke Palmer, and Lili Reinhart
• Release Date: September 13, 2019
• Running Time: 110 minutes

Hustlers was inspired by journalist Jessica Pressler's New York magazine article "The Hustlers at Scores." The reporting examined a real scheme involving women connected to New York strip clubs who targeted wealthy clients and ran up large charges on their credit cards, sometimes after the men had been drugged. Lorene Scafaria's film changes names and reshapes the real people into fictional characters, so Jennifer Lopez's Ramona and Constance Wu's Destiny should not be read as exact biographical portraits. The underlying fraud scheme, however, came from a real criminal case.

• Director: Ridley Scott
• Starring: Lady Gaga, Adam Driver, Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons, and Jared Leto
• Release Date: November 24, 2021
• Running Time: 158 minutes

House of Gucci adapts Sara Gay Forden's book about the Gucci family and the events surrounding the murder of Maurizio Gucci. The former head of the fashion house was shot and killed in Milan in 1995. His ex-wife, Patrizia Reggiani, was later convicted of arranging his murder. Lady Gaga and Adam Driver play Reggiani and Gucci, while the movie expands outward into decades of family rivalries and fights over the company. The killing and prosecution are matters of record, although the film condenses years of family history and dramatizes private conversations and relationships.

• Director: Tobias Lindholm
• Starring: Jessica Chastain, Eddie Redmayne, Nnamdi Asomugha, Kim Dickens, and Noah Emmerich
• Release Date: October 19, 2022
• Running Time: 121 minutes

The Good Nurse tells the story of nurse Charles Cullen and coworker Amy Loughren, whose cooperation with investigators helped expose him. Cullen worked at a series of hospitals in New Jersey and Pennsylvania and murdered patients by administering medications. New Jersey records show that he pleaded guilty to killing 16 patients at two hospitals in that state alone, while additional cases were prosecuted in Pennsylvania. Cullen told authorities that he may have killed as many as 40 people. The film is based on journalist Charles Graeber's nonfiction book about Cullen and the investigation.

• Director: Martin Scorsese
• Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, and Lily Gladstone
• Release Date: October 20, 2023
• Running Time: 206 minutes

Killers of the Flower Moon is based on David Grann's nonfiction book about the murders of Osage people in Oklahoma during the 1920s. Oil wealth had made Osage mineral rights enormously valuable, and a conspiracy developed around murdering people whose "headrights" could then pass through inheritance. The FBI says at least two dozen people in the area died under suspicious circumstances during what became known as the Reign of Terror. Its investigation ultimately helped expose cattleman William Hale and his associates. Hale was convicted in 1929. Scorsese's film focuses largely on Mollie Burkhart, her husband Ernest, and Hale's plot against her family.

• Director: Anna Kendrick
• Starring: Anna Kendrick, Daniel Zovatto, Tony Hale, and Nicolette Robinson
• Release Date: October 18, 2024
• Running Time: 95 minutes

Anna Kendrick's directorial debut uses a genuinely bizarre moment in television history as its anchor. Serial killer Rodney Alcala appeared as a contestant on The Dating Game in 1978, years before the full extent of his crimes became known. He was eventually convicted of five first-degree murders in California and later pleaded guilty to two murders in New York. Woman of the Hour places Alcala's game-show appearance inside a broader story about his victims, but many scenes and characters are fictionalized. Kendrick's Sheryl Bradshaw, for example, is a dramatized version of the real contestant who encountered Alcala on the show.

• Director: Derek Cianfrance
• Starring: Channing Tatum, Kirsten Dunst, Ben Mendelsohn, LaKeith Stanfield, and Juno Temple
• Release Date: October 10, 2025
• Running Time: 126 minutes

Roofman sounds like the kind of crime story a screenwriter would invent and then be told to make more believable. It is based on Jeffrey Manchester, a former Army soldier who became known for entering McDonald's restaurants by cutting through their roofs. After being imprisoned, Manchester escaped and secretly lived inside a Toys "R" Us for roughly six months while trying to avoid capture. Channing Tatum plays Manchester in the film, which uses the real robbery spree, escape, and unusual hiding place as its foundation while dramatizing the relationships and events surrounding them.