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The Top 50 Best British Crime FIlms
Top 50 Crime movies ranked and rated
Us Brits do drama rather well, but the British Crime film can be a cut above the rest. Over the decades, there have been some excellent examples, although the genre of Crime is wide-ranging, covering heist movies, gangster films, football hooliganism flicks etc. So we came up with a list of around 150 qualifying movies, then using a data-driven approach, we collected their scores from IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes and Letterboxd, worked out their averaged score, and here are the TOP 50.
50 – Legend (2015)
Love, fight, live, rule like a legend.
Crime  |  Thriller
IMDb: 6.9
RT Audience: 5.9
Letterboxd: 6.32
Star icon
6.37 /10
DIRECTED BY: Brian Helgeland
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Suave, charming and volatile, Reggie Kray and his unstable twin brother Ronnie start to leave their mark on the London underworld in the 1960s. Using violence to get what they want, the siblings orchestrate robberies and murders while running nightclubs and protection rackets. With police Detective Leonard “Nipper” Read hot on their heels, the brothers continue their rapid rise to power and achieve tabloid notoriety.
49 – The Escapist (2008)
5 Men. 4 Walls. 1 Plan.
Action  |  Thriller
IMDb: 6.7
RT Audience: 6.6
Letterboxd: 6.42
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6.57 /10
DIRECTED BY: Rupert Wyatt
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Frank Perry is an institutionalized convict twelve years into a life sentence without parole. When his estranged daughter falls ill, he is determined to make peace with her before it’s too late. He develops an ingenious escape plan, and recruits a dysfunctional band of escapists – misfits with a mutual dislike for one other but united by their desire to escape their hell hole of an existence.
48 – Sitting Target (1972)
The Hit Man never stops till he scores.
Action  |  Crime  |  Drama  |  Thriller
IMDb: 6.6
RT Audience: 6.2
Letterboxd: 7.06
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6.62 /10
DIRECTED BY: Douglas Hickox
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Harry Lomart, a convicted murderer, and Birdy Williams are convicts planning a breakout. Before the two men can abscond to another country, Lomart gets word that his wife Pat has been having an affair with another man and has become pregnant. The two men had made plans to lie low after their escape from jail, but Lomart decides to find and kill his wife and the man she has been seeing. A police inspector, Milton, is the man assigned to catch the two escaped convicts.
47 – Face (1997)
A Blag to Kill For. Only One of Them Meant It For Real.
Crime  |  Drama  |  Thriller
IMDb: 6.6
RT Audience: 6.7
Letterboxd: 6.36
Star icon
6.69 /10
DIRECTED BY: Antonia Bird
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Five men, criminals Ray, Dave, Stevie, Julian (“Julie” as a nickname), and Jason, plan a heist to steal a minimum of £2 million. Using a truck modified as a battering ram, the group break into a security depot in London and steal a large amount of money before the police arrive. They discover they got much less money than they expected and only get £68,000 each. Julian demands an extra sum for “expenses” for his work but is beaten and placed in the boot of Ray’s car until he accepts his share. The group, without Julian, later spend time at a bar with Jason’s uncle and fellow criminal Sonny, and Ray’s girlfriend Connie, a protester. Ray and Stevie also visit an elderly couple, Linda and Bill, where they leave their stolen money for safekeeping.
46 – Jawbone (2017)
Sometimes the hardest fight is with yourself
Action  |  Drama
IMDb: 6.5
RT Audience: 7.0
Letterboxd: 6.76
Star icon
6.75 /10
DIRECTED BY: Thomas Napper
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
A former youth boxing champion, Jimmy McCabe is a man in search of hope but looking in all the wrong places. When he hits rock bottom he turns to his childhood boxing club and the only family he has left: gym owner Bill corner man Eddie and promoter Joe. Back in training, years after anyone thought he was a contender, he risks his life, as he tries to stand tall and regain his place in the world.
45 – Bullet Boy (2004)
You only get one shot at life.
Action  |  Crime  |  Drama
IMDb: 6.4
RT Audience: 7.3
Letterboxd: 6.56
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6.75 /10
DIRECTED BY: Saul Dibb
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Ricky is just out of a young offenders institute, heading home to Hackney and determined to go straight. Instead, he heads straight for trouble when he becomes involved in a street confrontation, siding with his best friend Wisdom against a local rude boy. The trouble escalates into a series of tit-for-tat incidents that threaten to spiral out of control. Ricky’s 12-year-old brother Curtis, hero-worships Ricky, though he appears smart enough to know he doesn’t want to follow his example. Yet, despite the stern warnings from his mother and support from her friends in the community, might Ricky’s bad boy allure be too attractive for Curtis to resist?
44 – Avengement (2019)
He’s out for blood
Action  |  Crime
IMDb: 6.5
RT Audience: 7.1
Letterboxd: 6.68
Star icon
6.76 /10
DIRECTED BY: Jesse V. Johnson
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Prisoner Cain Burgess is being escorted by police to a hospital where he learns of his mother’s death. After seeing her corpse, he fights off the cops and escapes their custody. He then visits a private bar, entering it after attacking the bouncers. While having his drink, he overhears one of the patrons named Tune describe how an unknown assailant killed a fellow gangster named Rook. Cain intervenes with his laughter, only to invite the wrath of Tune, his fellow patrons and Bez, the bartender. Claiming himself to be a friend of Lincoln, the owner of the bar, he tells everyone he’d walk away after finishing his drink, but gets into a brawl, acquires a double-barreled shotgun and holds everyone hostage. Soon, Lincoln’s lieutenant Hyde arrives, recognizes Cain as Lincoln’s brother and is also held hostage. One of the patrons trying to intervene is shot in the kneecap by Cain, who blames Hyde and Lincoln for his condition. Cain then starts narrating that he got sent to the notorious London prison HMP Belmarsh and had to fight for survival in prison due to a £20,000 price put on his head.
43 – The Debt Collector (1999)
Some debts can never be paid.
Thriller  |  Action  |  Crime
IMDb: 6.5
RT Audience: 7.4
Letterboxd: 6.56
Star icon
6.82 /10
DIRECTED BY:   Anthony Neilson
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
Mean, gritty, dirty and low, and that’s just the policeman Gary Keltie, out for retribution for the horrendous crimes against the helpless people of Edinburgh during the 1970s, by notorious, torturous, and killer, debt collector Nickie Dryden.
42 – Kidulthood (2006)
Before adulthood comes…
Drama
IMDb: 6.7
RT Audience: 7.7
Letterboxd: 6.28
Star icon
6.89 /10
DIRECTED BY: Menhaj Huda
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
It’s just another day at school for West London teenagers Trife, Jay and Moony: beatings in the classroom, sex on the playing field and drugs in the schoolyard. Things are about to flip sharply for this trio, however. With school cancelled following the tragic suicide of bullied pupil Katie, the teenagers are all forced to face up to their own responsibilities and evaluate the choices they have made.
41 – The Krays (1990)
When people are afraid of you… you can do anything. Remember that.
Drama  |  Crime  |  History
IMDb: 6.6
RT Audience: 8.0
Letterboxd: 6.10
Star icon
6.90 /10
DIRECTED BY: Peter Medak
TOP BILLED CAST:
SYNOPSIS:
The film charts the lives of the Kray twins from childhood to adult life. The plot focuses on the relationship between the twins and their doting mother (Whitelaw). Ronald (Gary Kemp) is the dominant one, influencing his brother Reginald (Martin Kemp) to perform several acts of violence as they rise to power as the leaders of a powerful organised gang in 1960s London. The movie focuses more on the personal life of the brothers, including Ron’s marriage and then alienation from his wife, culminating in her suicide. The movie omits the police investigation going against the Kreys and ends with a jump-cut to them attending their mother’s funeral in 1982, already serving time in prison by then.
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