Movies like Once Upon a Dead Man (1971)
The best movies like Once Upon a Dead Man (1971) are Prescription: Murder (1968), Mr. Monk's Last Case: A Monk Movie (2023) and Basic Instinct (1992). If Once Upon a Dead Man hooked you with its mystery and tv movie, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedVertigo (1958)8.1/10 from 6,617 votes
- NewestI Know What You Did Last Summer (2025)Released 2025
Prescription: Murder (1968)
In Columbo's first outing, a psychiatrist uses a patient he is having an affair with to help him kill his wife, but his perfect alibi may come apart at the hands of a seemingly befuddled LAPD lieutenant.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMr. Monk's Last Case: A Monk Movie (2023)
Monk steps out of retirement as his stepdaughter's wedding turns tragic when her fiancé dies in a bungee jumping accident.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBasic Instinct (1992)
Catherine, a novelist with an insatiable sexual appetite, becomes a prime suspect when her boyfriend is brutally murdered -- a crime she had described in her latest story.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGone Girl (2014)
With his wife's disappearance having become the focus of an intense media circus, a man sees the spotlight turned on him when it's suspected that he may not be innocent.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMan from Reno (2014)
A mystery outside of San Francisco brings together small-town sheriff Paul Del Moral, Japanese author Aki Akahori, and a traveler from Reno who soon disappears, leaving behind his suitcase and a trail of questions.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPacific Heights (1990)
A couple works hard to renovate their dream house and become landlords to pay for it. Unfortunately one of their tenants has plans of his own.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWoman on the Run (1950)
Frank Johnson, a sole witness to a gangland murder, goes into hiding and is trailed by Police Inspector Ferris, on the theory that Frank is trying to escape from possible retaliation. Frank's wife, Eleanor, suspects he is actually running away from their unsuccessful marriage. Aided by a newspaperman, Danny Leggett, Eleanor sets out to locate her husband. The killer is also looking for him, and keeps close tabs on Eleanor.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Maltese Falcon (1941)
A private detective takes on a case that involves him with three eccentric criminals, a beautiful liar, and their quest for a priceless statuette.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisA Fall from Grace (2020)
When a law-abiding woman gets indicted for murdering her husband, her lawyer soon realizes that a larger conspiracy may be at work.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Conversation (1974)
A paranoid, secretive surveillance expert has a crisis of conscience when he suspects that the couple he is spying on will be murdered.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFarewell, My Lovely (1975)
Private eye Philip Marlowe is hired by ex-con Moose Malloy to find his girlfriend, a former lounge dancer. While also investigating the murder of a client and the theft of a jade necklace, Marlowe becomes entangled with seductress Helen Grayle and discovers a web of dark secrets that are better left hidden.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDead Again (1991)
In 1949, composer Roman Strauss is executed for the murder of his wife. In 1990s Los Angeles, a detective comes across a mute amnesiac woman who is somehow linked to the Strauss murder.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlackwater Lane (2024)
An American school teacher in England drives past an abandoned car late one night, unaware that the driver was the victim of a murder. As she comes to terms with the realization, seemingly supernatural events start to affect the gothic manor she lives in with her husband.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisI See You (2019)
When a 12-year-old boy goes missing at a local park, a detective investigates the case to help the boy's family find answers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAmerican Gigolo (1980)
Julian makes a lucrative living as an escort to older women in the Los Angeles area. He begins a relationship with Michelle, a local politician's wife, without expecting any pay. One of his clients is murdered and Detective Sunday begins pumping him for details on his different clients, something he is reluctant to do considering the nature of his work. Julian begins to suspect he's being framed. Meanwhile Michelle begins to fall in love with him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJodi Arias: Dirty Little Secret (2013)
True story based on Jodi Arias, a seductive 28-year-old aspiring photographer found guilty of killing her former lover, Travis Alexander, who was found nude in his home shower with a slit throat, 27 additional stab wounds and a bullet to the head. While investigating the violent killing, Mesa, Arizona police retrieved a digital camera from Alexander’s washing machine, revealing shocking images authorities claim Arias took during their sexual escapades, as well as during and after his murder. While Jodi pled not guilty and contends she killed Alexander in self-defense, police concluded that when he broke off their relationship, she stalked her ex-boyfriend and seduced him one final time before murdering him in cold blood. Her subsequent trial has been grand theater, dominating the cable news networks as she testified in her own defense and offered explicit insight into the sex, lies and obsession that led up to Alexander’s murder.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChina Moon (1994)
Detective Kyle Bodine falls for Rachel Munro who is trapped in a violent marriage. After she shoots her husband, Kyle relucantly agrees to help hide the body, but his partner is showing an unusual flair for finding clues.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDeceiver (1997)
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.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisVertigo (1958)
A retired San Francisco detective suffering from acrophobia investigates the strange activities of an old friend's wife, all the while becoming dangerously obsessed with her.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMurder, My Sweet (1944)
After being hired to find an ex-con's former girlfriend, Philip Marlowe is drawn into a deeply complex web of mystery and deceit.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Wrong Babysitter (2017)
A recent kidnapping has single mom Susan worried about leaving her daughter Christy at home for an out-of-town trip - until neighbor Teri offers to "babysit," looking in on Christy and spending the night. But Susan rushes home when Christy goes missing, under circumstances reminiscent of her police detective husband's death. Susan will have to open the past wound of her husband's death in order to rescue the only family she has left.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Hereditary (2018)
When the matriarch of the Graham family passes away, her daughter begins to unravel cryptic and increasingly terrifying secrets about her ancestry.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTruth and Lies: The Menendez Brothers (2017)
A Hollywood movie executive and his wife, a one-time beauty queen, were brutally slain in the den of their Spanish-style mansion. The special uncovers the hidden clues of the Menendez family's descent into hell including never-before-seen home movies and photos from the family vault and testimony from members of the Menendez inner circle. The brothers' best friends and neighbors, the lead detectives, lawyers and jurors from the case, and the family members profile the intimate details of the Menendez family, including Erik's secret life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
Beck 35 - Your Own Blood (2018)
A man is beaten to death in the Middle East. In Stockholm, a young woman disappears on her way home from work. These two events will prove to be related. Since Martin Beck has quit, Steinar Hovland leads the search for the missing girl. But Martin is drawn into the case when he decides to help the national Security Police investigate a suspected terrorist. They soon realize that they are in a race against time to stop a catastrophe.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
Run Like a Thief (1954)
Alexander has been a faithful employee of Madame Pollard as maitre d' at her elegant resort. Eager to introduce his protege Rob, things go wrong when his wife Della finds an expensive bracelet lost by Pollard and begs to keep. The police are called and Alexander's dreams of his future begin to crumble.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
6 Souls (2010)
A female forensic psychiatrist discovers that all of one of her patient's multiple personalities are murder victims. She will have to find out what's happening before her time is finished.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisScream 4 (2011)
Fifteen years after the original Woodsboro murders, Sidney Prescott returns home to promote her new book about surviving trauma, only for a new Ghostface killer to emerge, targeting a new group of teens.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisI Know What You Did Last Summer (2025)
When five friends inadvertently cause a deadly car accident, they cover up their involvement and make a pact to keep it a secret rather than face the consequences. A year later, their past comes back to haunt them and they're forced to confront a horrifying truth: someone knows what they did last summer…and is hell-bent on revenge.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
SnoozefestMovies like thisWitch Hunt (1994)
Magic and murder connect an actress, a private eye, a senator and a witch in 1950s Hollywood.
Why it matches: Similar story and style
SnoozefestMovies like thisA Stranger Among Us (1992)
Detective Emily Eden is a tough New York City cop forced to go undercover to solve a puzzling murder. Her search for the truth takes her into a secret world of unwritten law and unspoken power, a world where the only way out is deeper in.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery
SnoozefestMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Once Upon a Dead Man?
The closest matches to Once Upon a Dead Man are Prescription: Murder (1968), Mr. Monk's Last Case: A Monk Movie (2023) and Basic Instinct (1992). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Once Upon a Dead Man?
Start with Prescription: Murder (1968), the closest match to Once Upon a Dead Man.
What is the highest-rated movie like Once Upon a Dead Man?
Vertigo (1958), rated 8.1/10 by 6,617 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Once Upon a Dead Man?
I Know What You Did Last Summer (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Once Upon a Dead Man?
Yes: Prescription: Murder (1968), Mr. Monk's Last Case: A Monk Movie (2023) and Basic Instinct (1992).
How are movies similar to Once Upon a Dead Man chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Once Upon a Dead Man, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.