Best Jail Movies & TV Shows

Since they met the first time in boarding school as little kids, it was obvious that the orphans Kay and Dave would become a couple. But at sixteen, Dave foolishly attempted to rob a bank with a water pistol, and ended up in jail for eight years. Meanwhile Kay was sent to foster parents, where she met the successful business man Mike, whom she married and bore two kids. Now Frank is released from prison and immediately starts wooing Kay again. Although she's happy with Mike, she can't withdraw herself completely. Old memories and her husband's jealousy make her spend more and more time with him.

Cassie, the last remaining member of the original Gang of Roses, is sitting in a small Mexican jail holding the written code to a US military safe. It s here that she meets Collette (Eurika Pratts), a young gambler looking for her next con. Kate (Rocsi Diaz) attempts to break her out, and Cassie is killed. Upon their return, Kate and Collette meet up with outlaws Candi (Teyana Taylor) and Mimi (Claudia Jordan). After some lengthy planning, the four women head to the Mexican town of San Juevo and prepare for the robbery, which will take place in the town church. But unbeknownst to them, they are being followed by Lee (Gabriel Casseus) and his posse of bandits, looking to ambush the women before they can make their big score.

A group called The Knights Of Avalon are unhappy with the justice system so are taking the law into their own hands by executing criminals using medieval methods such as jousting.

Leon Watkins runs a community helpline in South Central LA, where anyone in need of help is welcome. One of his most frequent visitors is local gang leader, John Wesley Hunter, otherwise known as “Joker” to the streets. After a day of hustling and almost losing his life in a shoot-out, Joker goes to the one place where he knows he can get help. All in a typical day’s work for Leon until an unlikely woman shows up insisting on aiding him in his fight for his community. This unlikely team defies social constructs by working together to actively fight oppression and gain nation-wide recognition for a hidden reality of many. Along their way they experience the deep-seeded hatred that has plagued America, great love, and tragedy as they leave behind a legacy.

A cowboy comes to a town at Christmas time. He eats at a cafe but was unable to pay for his meal, so the owner throws him in jail. The town wants to alleviate their guilt over a Mexican family, who has pregnant woman with them, who lives on top of a mountain called Christmas mountain. They bail out the cowboy and tells to bring some old clothes and food to them. While there the young boy of the family feels sorry for him and prays that god will send him some help. It comes in the form of an old friend of his who died years ago. He tells him that he is not exactly living a proper life but he has a chance to turn things around, first by telling the townsfolk that their so called charity towards the Mexicans is not enough.

A supernatural tale set on death row in a Southern prison, where gentle giant John Coffey possesses the mysterious power to heal people's ailments. When the cell block's head guard, Paul Edgecomb, recognizes Coffey's miraculous gift, he tries desperately to help stave off the condemned man's execution.

Based on the adventures of Jack Sheppard, the thief and jail-breaker who became a folk hero in 1720s London.

1952: Bishop Bilodeau visits a prison to hear the confession of Simon, a boyhood friend jailed for murder 40 years ago. However, once there, Bilodeau finds himself forced to watch a play put on by Simon and the other inmates depicting the two men's youths. As the play progresses, the tragic truth of Simon's crime comes to light.

Derek Vineyard is paroled after serving 3 years in prison for killing two African-American men. Through his brother, Danny Vineyard's narration, we learn that before going to prison, Derek was a skinhead and the leader of a violent white supremacist gang that committed acts of racial crime throughout L.A. and his actions greatly influenced Danny. Reformed and fresh out of prison, Derek severs contact with the gang and becomes determined to keep Danny from going down the same violent path as he did.

True story of an abusive husband's obsession with his wife and daughter.

The Tramp struggles to live in modern industrial society with the help of a young homeless woman.

Tony Lip, a bouncer in 1962, is hired to drive pianist Don Shirley on a tour through the Deep South in the days when African Americans, forced to find alternate accommodations and services due to segregation laws below the Mason-Dixon Line, relied on a guide called The Negro Motorist Green Book.

A mysterious story of two magicians whose intense rivalry leads them on a life-long battle for supremacy -- full of obsession, deceit and jealousy with dangerous and deadly consequences.

An unfiltered look at police departments in action.

Will Hunting has a genius-level IQ but chooses to work as a janitor at MIT. When he solves a difficult graduate-level math problem, his talents are discovered by Professor Gerald Lambeau, who decides to help the misguided youth reach his potential. When Will is arrested for attacking a police officer, Professor Lambeau makes a deal to get leniency for him if he will get treatment from therapist Sean Maguire.

Based on the true life experiences of poet Jimmy Santiago Baca, the film focuses on half-brothers Paco and Cruz, and their bi-racial cousin Miklo. It opens in 1972, as the three are members of an East L.A. gang known as the "Vatos Locos", and the story focuses on how a violent crime and the influence of narcotics alter their lives. Miklo is incarcerated and sent to San Quentin, where he makes a "home" for himself. Cruz becomes an exceptional artist, but a heroin addiction overcomes him with tragic results. Paco becomes a cop and an enemy to his "carnal", Miklo.

A dying man frames himself for murder so his widow can collect the reward.

Life for Dee Stanton is improving at every turn. Her legal career is blossoming and her boyfriend Dominic unexpectedly proposes to her. Things were very different 11 years ago when her husband Paul was jailed for the brutal murders of four girls and Dee was hounded from her home. Dee has kept all this a secret from her 15-year-old son Jamie. Now he has discovered the truth about his father and demands to see him.

One day, Risa Gallagher gets home and finds her husband murdered. Everybody thinks she did it and she gets sentenced to lifetime in jail. She manages to escape and in order to survive, she has to find out who the real killer is without getting caught by the police. But which of her friends can she trust?

Stories of women who live in an all-women hotel. One (Bari) works hard and marries a millionaire; another (Hughes) cheats and goes to jail.

A retired lawman gets back into action to fight political corruption.

The 1930s outlaw teams up with Pretty Boy Floyd, Baby Face Nelson and Homer Van Meter.

A New York City probation officer, noted for his sympathy with delinquents, put to a severe test when his daughter falls for a boy whom circumstances force into breaking the law.

A teenage high school drop-out Bobby McLaughlin is accused of the murder of a local drug dealer he says he didn’t commit. When he is convicted with little evidence, his father begins a fierce struggle to free his son from prison.

A foul-mouthed stripper who is caught for drunken driving is legally obligated to teach a group of kids. What started as a community service ends up becoming a means to turn her life around.

Filmmaker Robb Leech attempts to understand his stepbrother's journey from middle-class white boy in Weymouth to convicted terrorist. In 2010 Robb spent a year filming his stepbrother Rich after he turned his back on the world in which he grew up to become a fundamentalist Muslim called Salahuddin. Robb began filming with his stepbrother as he entered a strange new world where everyone talked about fighting jihad and implementing Sharia law. The result was Robb's acclaimed BBC Three documentary, My Brother the Islamist. When, in 2013, Salahuddin is convicted of preparing terrorism acts and jailed for six years, Robb is desperate to know what triggered his stepbrother, and others like him, to cross the line. Robb seeks out imam and psychologist Alyas Karmani to understand what drives young British-born men and women into radical jihadism. And he confronts Anjem Choudary, the man who converted Rich, about his role in Salahuddin's radicalisation

Fallen Champ: The Untold Story of Mike Tyson is a 1993 film made by acclaimed American documentary filmmaker Barbara Kopple. Though Tyson was in jail serving a sentence for rape, Kopple used existing interviews with the boxer, as well as her own extensive interviews with those closest to Tyson, to explore the man's history. The film traces Tyson's story from his troubled and tumultuous upbringing, through his rapid ascendancy in the ranks of the boxing world and his subsequent struggle with the trappings of fame. Fallen Champ earned Barbara Kopple a Directors Guild of America award as Best Documentary Director of 1993.

The St. Valentine's Day massacre is the stuff of American legend, and the tale is familiar to nearly everyone. But the story of that bloody day in Chicago has never been told, or seen, like this before. Cutting-edge graphics and frenetic recreations accompany Johnny Fratto, son of onetime Al Capone-associate Louis "Lew" Fratto, back to Chicago, where he uncovers massacre myths and learns more about the life his father and uncles led when they roamed those lawless streets in the 1920s. Johnny gets guidance and opinions from a team of renowned Chicago gangster experts, and bridges the gap between the stories he heard as a little boy and the reality he lived growing up in a mob family. Johnny's take about what happened on Feb. 14, 1929 will surprise you.

Josephine Spiggins is thinking of marrying John Spear, the stuffed-shirt son of a department store owner. When John's free-spirit brother Tony returns from touring the South Seas in his boat, the "Vagabond Lady," Jo is attracted to him instead.

Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law features ex-superhero Harvey T. Birdman of Birdman and the Galaxy Trio as an attorney working for a law firm alongside other cartoon stars from 1960s and 1970s Hanna-Barbera cartoon series. Similarly, Harvey's clients are also primarily composed of characters taken from Hanna-Barbera cartoon series of the same era. Many of Birdman's nemeses featured in his former cartoon series also became attorneys, often representing the opposing side of a given case.

Greedy diamond mine owner Eli Snedeker, resentful that his ex-foreman John Gamble stopped him from taking over kindly, but drunken, mine owner Roger Smythe's mine just as he was about to strike it rich, kills Smythe and blames it on Gamble. Grabbing the diamonds, Gamble flees Africa to England where he changes his name and begins a new life. What he hasn't counted on, though, is meeting and falling in love with Smythe's daughter Katherine, who falls in love with him but can't marry him until she can deal with her hatred of John Gamble, the man she believes killed her father.

Fast-talker extraordinaire Tracy gives one of his quintessential wiseguy performances as a conniving ambulance chaser who falls in love with Evans, unaware she's a special investigator for a streetcar company he's repeatedly victimized.

An in-depth look at the prison system in the United States and how it reveals the nation's history of racial inequality.

After a night of partying with a female stranger, a man wakes up to find her stabbed to death and is charged with her murder.

William Munny is a retired, once-ruthless killer turned gentle widower and hog farmer. To help support his two motherless children, he accepts one last bounty-hunter mission to find the men who brutalized a prostitute. Joined by his former partner and a cocky greenhorn, he takes on a corrupt sheriff.

A small time thief from Belfast, Gerry Conlon, is falsely implicated in the IRA bombing of a pub that kills several people while he is in London. He and his four friends are coerced by British police into confessing their guilt. Gerry's father and other relatives in London are also implicated in the crime. He spends fifteen years in prison with his father trying to prove his innocence.

A headstrong young girl in Afghanistan, ruled by the Taliban, disguises herself as a boy in order to provide for her family.

Selma, a Czech immigrant on the verge of blindness, struggles to make ends meet for herself and her son, who has inherited the same genetic disorder and will suffer the same fate without an expensive operation. When life gets too difficult, Selma learns to cope through her love of musicals, escaping life's troubles - even if just for a moment - by dreaming up little numbers to the rhythmic beats of her surroundings.

The sheriff of a small town in southwest Texas must keep custody of a murderer whose brother, a powerful rancher, is trying to help him escape. After a friend is killed trying to muster support for him, he and his deputies must find a way to hold out against the rancher's hired guns until the marshal arrives. In the meantime, matters are complicated by the presence of a young gunslinger - and a mysterious beauty who just came in on the last stagecoach.

A World War I veteran’s dreams of becoming a master architect evaporate in the cold light of economic realities. Things get even worse when he’s falsely convicted of a crime and sent to work on a chain gang.

A man befriends a fellow criminal as the two of them begin serving their sentence on a dreadful prison island, which inspires the man to plot his escape.

Semi-retired Michigan lawyer Paul Biegler takes the case of Army Lt. Manion, who murdered a local innkeeper after his wife claimed that he raped her. Over the course of an extensive trial, Biegler parries with District Attorney Lodwick and out-of-town prosecutor Claude Dancer to set his client free, but his case rests on the victim's mysterious business partner, who's hiding a dark secret.

Tom Joad returns to his home after a jail sentence to find his family kicked out of their farm due to foreclosure. He catches up with them on his Uncle’s farm, and joins them the next day as they head for California and a new life... Hopefully.

Ricardo Fuentes (Carlos Gardel) leaves Buenos Aires after loosing in horse races to go to Barcelona, where he plans to open a tango bar, a new concept of tango dance show and dance saloon. On the ship he meets Laura Montalván (Rosita Moreno) who happens to be a thief working with a thief pal. Ricardo watches them robbing a lady's bracelet aboard but decides not to report them because he has fallen in love with Laura. Once in Barcelona, he opens the tango bar but Laura's partner tells him he sold the bracelet and now needs to recover it to avoid both Laura and him going to jail.

Filmed over 10 years, this real-life thriller follows a DNA exoneree who, while exposing police corruption, becomes a suspect in a grisly new crime.

The unlikely friendship between Merlin, a young man gifted with extraordinary magical powers, and Prince Arthur, heir to the crown of Camelot.

When a car bomb explodes on the American side of the U.S./Mexico border, Mexican drug enforcement agent Miguel Vargas begins his investigation, along with American police captain Hank Quinlan. When Vargas begins to suspect that Quinlan and his shady partner, Menzies, are planting evidence to frame an innocent man, his investigations into their possible corruption quickly put himself and his new bride, Susie, in jeopardy.

Jack Sparrow, a freewheeling 18th-century pirate, quarrels with a rival pirate bent on pillaging Port Royal. When the governor's daughter is kidnapped, Sparrow decides to help the girl's love save her.

Doctor Henry Morgan, New York City’s star medical examiner, has a secret. He doesn't just study the dead to solve criminal cases, he does it to solve the mystery that has eluded him for 200 years—the answer to his own inexplicable immortality. This long life has given Henry remarkable observation skills which impresses his new partner, Detective Jo Martinez. Each week, a new case and their budding friendship will reveal layers of Henry’s long and colorful past. Only his best friend and confidant, Abe knows Henry’s secret.

Schoolteacher Bertram Cates is arrested for teaching his students Darwin's theory of evolution. The case receives national attention and one of the newspaper reporters, E.K. Hornbeck, arranges to bring in renowned defense attorney and atheist Henry Drummond to defend Cates. The prosecutor, Matthew Brady is a former presidential candidate, famous evangelist, and old adversary of Drummond.