Top 25 Prison/Hostage Movies
by brady-vallbacka | created - 24 Oct 2012 | updated - 20 Nov 2022 | PublicHere are the top 25 prison films that i have viewed or movies with prison scenes. Ordered from best to worst in my opinion.
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1. American History X (1998)
R | 119 min | Crime, Drama
Living a life marked by violence, neo-Nazi Derek finally goes to prison after killing two black youths. Upon his release, Derek vows to change; he hopes to prevent his brother, Danny, who idolizes Derek, from following in his footsteps.
Director: Tony Kaye | Stars: Edward Norton, Edward Furlong, Beverly D'Angelo, Jennifer Lien
Votes: 1,185,116 | Gross: $6.72M
2. The Green Mile (1999)
R | 189 min | Crime, Drama, Fantasy
A tale set on death row, where gentle giant John Coffey possesses the mysterious power to heal people's ailments. When the lead guard, Paul Edgecombe, recognizes John's gift, he tries to help stave off the condemned man's execution.
Director: Frank Darabont | Stars: Tom Hanks, Michael Clarke Duncan, David Morse, Bonnie Hunt
Votes: 1,405,479 | Gross: $136.80M
3. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
R | 142 min | Drama
Over the course of several years, two convicts form a friendship, seeking consolation and, eventually, redemption through basic compassion.
Director: Frank Darabont | Stars: Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, Bob Gunton, William Sadler
Votes: 2,884,967 | Gross: $28.34M
4. Shutter Island (2010)
R | 138 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Teddy Daniels and Chuck Aule, two US marshals, are sent to an asylum on a remote island in order to investigate the disappearance of a patient, where Teddy uncovers a shocking truth about the place.
Director: Martin Scorsese | Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Emily Mortimer, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley
Votes: 1,453,854 | Gross: $128.01M
5. Papillon (1973)
R | 151 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
A French convict in the 1930s befriends a fellow criminal as the two of them begin serving their sentence in the South American penal colony on Devil's Island, which inspires the man to plot his escape.
Director: Franklin J. Schaffner | Stars: Steve McQueen, Dustin Hoffman, Victor Jory, Don Gordon
Votes: 138,281 | Gross: $53.27M
6. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
R | 118 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A young F.B.I. cadet must receive the help of an incarcerated and manipulative cannibal killer to help catch another serial killer, a madman who skins his victims.
Director: Jonathan Demme | Stars: Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Scott Glenn, Ted Levine
Votes: 1,546,504 | Gross: $130.74M
7. Escape from Alcatraz (1979)
PG | 112 min | Action, Biography, Crime
Alcatraz is the most secure prison of its time. It is believed that no one can ever escape from it, until three daring men make a possibly successful attempt at escaping from one of the most infamous prisons in the world.
Director: Don Siegel | Stars: Clint Eastwood, Patrick McGoohan, Roberts Blossom, Jack Thibeau
Votes: 147,299 | Gross: $43.00M
8. The Hurricane (1999)
R | 146 min | Biography, Drama, Sport
The story of Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter, a boxer wrongly imprisoned for murder, and the people who aided in his fight to prove his innocence.
Director: Norman Jewison | Stars: Denzel Washington, Vicellous Shannon, Deborah Kara Unger, Liev Schreiber
Votes: 102,378 | Gross: $50.67M
9. The King of Comedy (1982)
PG | 109 min | Comedy, Crime, Drama
A passionate yet unsuccessful comedian stalks and kidnaps his idol to take the spotlight for himself.
Director: Martin Scorsese | Stars: Robert De Niro, Jerry Lewis, Diahnne Abbott, Sandra Bernhard
Votes: 118,957 | Gross: $2.50M
10. The Defiant Ones (1958)
Approved | 96 min | Crime, Drama
Two chained-together escaped convicts, White and Black, must learn to get along in order to elude capture.
Director: Stanley Kramer | Stars: Tony Curtis, Sidney Poitier, Cara Williams, Theodore Bikel
Votes: 17,811
11. Room (I) (2015)
R | 118 min | Drama, Thriller
A little boy is held captive in a room with his mother since his birth, so he has never known the world outside.
Director: Lenny Abrahamson | Stars: Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Sean Bridgers, Wendy Crewson
Votes: 449,908 | Gross: $14.68M
12. Get the Gringo (2012)
R | 96 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
A career criminal nabbed by Mexican authorities is placed in a tough prison where he learns to survive with the help of a young boy.
Director: Adrian Grunberg | Stars: Mel Gibson, Kevin Balmore, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Jesús Ochoa
Votes: 111,589
13. Panic Room (2002)
R | 112 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A divorced woman and her diabetic daughter take refuge in their newly-purchased house's safe room when three men break-in, searching for a missing fortune.
Director: David Fincher | Stars: Jodie Foster, Kristen Stewart, Forest Whitaker, Dwight Yoakam
Votes: 296,684 | Gross: $96.40M
14. Midnight Express (1978)
R | 121 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
Billy Hayes, an American college student, is caught smuggling drugs out of Turkey and thrown into prison.
Director: Alan Parker | Stars: Brad Davis, Irene Miracle, Bo Hopkins, Paolo Bonacelli
Votes: 88,149 | Gross: $35.00M
15. Cool Hand Luke (1967)
GP | 127 min | Crime, Drama
A laid-back Southern man is sentenced to two years in a rural prison, but refuses to conform.
Director: Stuart Rosenberg | Stars: Paul Newman, George Kennedy, Strother Martin, J.D. Cannon
Votes: 188,369 | Gross: $16.22M
16. Runaway Train (I) (1985)
R | 111 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
Two escaped convicts and a female railway worker find themselves trapped on a speeding train with no brakes and nobody driving.
Director: Andrey Konchalovskiy | Stars: Jon Voight, Eric Roberts, Rebecca De Mornay, Kyle T. Heffner
Votes: 32,949 | Gross: $7.94M
17. Natural Born Killers (1994)
R | 119 min | Action, Crime, Romance
Two victims of traumatized childhoods become lovers and psychopathic serial murderers irresponsibly glorified by the mass media.
Director: Oliver Stone | Stars: Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Tom Sizemore, Rodney Dangerfield
Votes: 251,569 | Gross: $50.28M
18. Oldboy (2003)
R | 120 min | Action, Drama, Mystery
After being kidnapped and imprisoned for fifteen years, Oh Dae-Su is released, only to find that he must track down his captor in five days.
Director: Park Chan-wook | Stars: Choi Min-sik, Yoo Ji-tae, Kang Hye-jeong, Kim Byeong-Ok
Votes: 634,797 | Gross: $0.71M
19. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
R | 99 min | Adventure, Comedy, Crime
A writer encounters the owner of an aging high-class hotel, who tells him of his early years serving as a lobby boy in the hotel's glorious years under an exceptional concierge.
Director: Wes Anderson | Stars: Ralph Fiennes, F. Murray Abraham, Mathieu Amalric, Adrien Brody
Votes: 885,592 | Gross: $59.10M
20. Speed (1994)
R | 116 min | Action, Adventure, Thriller
A young police officer must prevent a bomb exploding aboard a city bus by keeping its speed above 50 mph.
Director: Jan de Bont | Stars: Keanu Reeves, Dennis Hopper, Sandra Bullock, Joe Morton
Votes: 391,410 | Gross: $121.25M
21. Dead Man Walking (1995)
R | 122 min | Crime, Drama
A nun, while comforting a convicted killer on death row, empathizes with both the killer and his victim's families.
Director: Tim Robbins | Stars: Susan Sarandon, Sean Penn, Robert Prosky, Raymond J. Barry
Votes: 101,688 | Gross: $39.39M
22. Alien³ (1992)
R | 114 min | Action, Horror, Sci-Fi
Returning from LV-426, Ellen Ripley crash-lands on the maximum-security prison Fiorina 161, where she discovers that she has unwittingly brought along an unwelcome visitor.
Director: David Fincher | Stars: Sigourney Weaver, Charles S. Dutton, Charles Dance, Paul McGann
Votes: 319,080 | Gross: $55.47M
23. Split (IX) (2016)
PG-13 | 117 min | Horror, Thriller
Three girls are kidnapped by a man with a diagnosed 23 distinct personalities. They must try to escape before the apparent emergence of a frightful new 24th.
Director: M. Night Shyamalan | Stars: James McAvoy, Anya Taylor-Joy, Haley Lu Richardson, Jessica Sula
Votes: 551,626 | Gross: $138.29M
24. A Perfect World (1993)
PG-13 | 138 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A kidnapped boy strikes up a friendship with his captor, an escaped convict on the run from the law, while the search for him continues.
Director: Clint Eastwood | Stars: Kevin Costner, Clint Eastwood, Laura Dern, T.J. Lowther
Votes: 86,826 | Gross: $31.16M
25. The Longest Yard (1974)
R | 121 min | Comedy, Crime, Drama
A sadistic warden asks a former pro quarterback, now serving time in his prison, to put together a team of inmates to take on (and get pummeled by) the guards.
Director: Robert Aldrich | Stars: Burt Reynolds, Eddie Albert, Ed Lauter, Michael Conrad
Votes: 21,399 | Gross: $7.13M
26. Unbroken (I) (2014)
PG-13 | 137 min | Action, Biography, Drama
After a near-fatal plane crash in WWII, Olympian Louis Zamperini spends a harrowing 47 days in a raft with two fellow crewmen before he's caught by the Japanese navy and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp.
Director: Angelina Jolie | Stars: Jack O'Connell, Miyavi, Domhnall Gleeson, Garrett Hedlund
Votes: 182,584 | Gross: $115.64M
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