Best movies like Tales of the Grim Sleeper

Time Is Illmatic is a feature length documentary film that delves deep into the making of Nas' 1994 debut album, Illmatic, and the social conditions that influenced its creation.

An idealistic rookie cop joins the LAPD to make ends meet while finishing law school, and is indoctrinated by a seasoned veteran. As time goes on, he loses his ambitions and family as police work becomes his entire life.

A tough homicide cop is assigned to track down a serial killer who is murdering prostitutes.

An attorney is terrorized by the criminal he put away years ago when he was a cop.

In April 1992, following the notorious Rodney King verdict, the streets of Los Angeles became a battlefield, the backdrop to four personal intertwined stories.

A documentary film that highlights two street derived dance styles, Clowning and Krumping, that came out of the low income neighborhoods of L.A.. Director David LaChapelle interviews each dance crew about how their unique dances evolved. A new and positive activity away from the drugs, guns, and gangs that ruled their neighborhood. A raw film about a growing sub-culture movements in America.

British documentarian Nick Broomfield creates a follow-up piece to his 1992 documentary of the serial killer Aileen Wuornos, a highway prostitute who was convicted of killing six men in Florida between 1989 and 1990. Interviewing an increasingly mentally unstable Wuornos, Broomfield captures the distorted mind of a murderer whom the state of Florida deems of sound mind -- and therefore fit to execute. Throughout the film, Broomfield includes footage of his testimony at Wuornos' trial.

Time passes and tension mounts in a Florida police station as an estranged interracial couple awaits news of their missing teenage son.

The story of Jody, a misguided, 20-year-old African-American who is really just a baby boy finally forced-kicking and screaming to face the commitments of real life. Streetwise and jobless, he has not only fathered two children by two different women-Yvette and Peanut but still lives with his own mother. He can't seem to strike a balance or find direction in his chaotic life.

Chris O'Brien, devote Catholic and rookie cop with LAPD, is assigned to partner with the hard-edged, street-smart Nora Hugosian. A serial killer is loose, and all the victims are low-life guys whom Nora has dealt with. So, when the tire tracks of a police car are found at a murder scene, she's the prime suspect of internal affairs investigator Simon Hertzel...

Bumper Morgan is a veteran Los Angeles Police Department street cop. He is due to retire after 20 years on the job, but is not letting up on the criminal element on his beat.

Boyz n the Hood is the popular and successful film and social criticism from John Singleton about the conditions in South Central Los Angeles where teenagers are involved in gun fights and drug dealing on a daily basis.

When a mafia accountant is taken hostage on his beat, a police officer – wracked by guilt from a prior stint as a negotiator – must negotiate the standoff, even as his own family is held captive by the mob.

Hondo Harrelson recruits Jim Street to join an elite unit of the Los Angeles Police Department. Together they seek out more members, including tough Deke Kay and single mom Chris Sanchez. The team's first big assignment is to escort crime boss Alex Montel to prison. It seems routine, but when Montel offers a huge reward to anyone who can break him free, criminals of various stripes step up for the prize.

A young street hustler attempts to escape the rigors and temptations of the ghetto in a quest for a better life.

Black police officer Russell Stevens applies for a special anti-drug squad which targets the highest boss of cocaine delivery to LA—the Colombian foreign minister's nephew. Russell works his way up from the bottom undercover, until he reaches the boss.

Longinotto's documentary is about Brenda Myers-Powell, who fights against sexual exploitation and supports prostitutes in Chicago. Brenda knows what she is talking about: her own story, involving teenage prostitution and a life of violence and abuse, is in stark contrast to her dauntless energy and optimism.

Two young officers are marked for death after confiscating a small cache of money and firearms from the members of a notorious cartel during a routine traffic stop.

A tale of an inner city drug dealer who turns away from crime to pursue his passion, rap music.

Two broke buddies feel lucky when they come upon a truckload of cellular phones and begin selling them out of the back of their van. Trouble arises though, when the phones develop faults. The two friends then not only have to deal with unsatisfied customers but also the FBI.

Spike Lee's take on the "Son of Sam" murders in New York City during the summer of 1977 centering on the residents of an Italian-American South Bronx neighborhood who live in fear and distrust of one another.

From neighborhood ciphers to the most notorious MC battles, "Freestyle: the Art of Rhyme" captures the electrifying energy of improvisational hip-hop--the rarely recorded art form of rhyming spontaneously. Like preachers and jazz solos, freestyles exist only in the moment, a modern-day incarnation of the African-American storytelling tradition. Shot over a period of more than seven years, it is already an underground cult film in the hip-hop world. The film systematically debunks the false image put out by record companies that hip-hop culture is violent or money-obsessed. Instead, it lets real hip-hop artists, known and unknown, weave their story out of a passionate mix of language, politics, and spirituality.

FREEWAY: CRACK IN THE SYSTEM tells the story of broken dreams, drug dealers, dirty cops, and government complicity—more compelling than fiction, it’s the real story behind America’s longest war. This documentary by award-winning filmmaker Marc Levin (SLAM, Mr. Untouchable, Brick City) exposes how the infiltration of crack cocaine destroyed inner-city neighborhoods across the country. At the center of it all is the rise, fall and redemption of Freeway Rick Ross, a street hustler who became the King of Crack, and journalist Gary Webb, who broke the story of the CIA’s complicity in the drug war. Featuring exclusive interviews with Freeway Rick Ross, not to be confused with the rapper who took his name Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Gary Webb, his source Coral Baca, and wife Susan Webb former Los Angeles Deputy Sheriff Roberto Juarez drug trafficker Julio Zavala and many more.

“White Boy Rick”, as he was called, was a novelty: A white teenager seemingly running a major inner-city drug operation. In May of 1987, 17-year-old Richard Wershe Jr. was charged with a non-violent, juvenile drug offense. By the time of his arrest he was already a Detroit legend, frequently making front-page headlines and leading the local television news. In this film, gangsters, hit men, journalists and federal agents struggle to explain why he remains in prison at nearly 50 years old. The possible explanation is more stunning than the crimes Wershe was alleged to have committed.

The heroes in The Black Godfather are members of an African-American criminal organization. Like Brando in The Godfather, they're not averse to robbery and murder, but they do draw the line at narcotics. When the Mafia infiltrates the 'hood with dangerous drugs, the Black Godfather (Rod Perry) orders his minions to put an end to this perfidy.

A senator arranges for his son, a rich white kid who fancies himself black, to be kidnapped by a couple of black actors pretending to be murderers to try and shock him out of his plans to become a rapper.

The Police Tapes is a 1977 documentary about a New York City police precinct in the South Bronx. The original ran ninety minutes and was produced for public television; a one-hour version later aired on ABC. Filmmakers Alan and Susan Raymond spent three months in 1976 riding along with patrol officers in the 44th Precinct of the South Bronx, which had the highest crime rate in New York City at that time. They produced about 40 hours of videotape that they edited into a 90-minute documentary.

During a 10-year sentence for murdering the leader of a rival South Central Los Angeles gang, Bobby Johnson finds religion and rehabilitation with the help of Muslim inmate Ali. Upon his release, Bobby returns home to find that his young son, Jimmie, has joined the Deuces, his old crew. Tensions rise as Bobby struggles to convince Jimmie to leave the gang that was his only family during the painful years his absent father spent behind bars.

In Los Angeles, two rival gang leaders are also trying to be music producers. When DJ's equipment shorts out and Lonzo is cut out of the action by a record producer, the two join forces, which also requires a tentative peace between gangs. With backing from Gator, a smooth New Orleans drug king, DJ and Lonzo start dealing, organizing their gangs into pushers. Just as their finances are looking up, one of Gator's team pulls a double cross and two of DJ and Lonzo's gang bangers start a shooting war. Can the erstwhile music producers salvage anything of their bond or their plans?

A group of ghetto kids try to find out who killed a popular police officer.

Shelby Coles (Halle Berry) is engaged to marry talented white jazz musician Meade Howell, but the pair face opposition from both Meade's family, who object to an inter-racial marriage, and Shelby's parents, who want her to marry a professional. As Shelby is afflicted by pre-marital doubts, handsome Lute McNeil arrives on the scene, determined to make Shelby his at any cost.

Chinese kid Julian, who was adopted by the black family of Joe and Annabelle Lee and Asian exchange student May-Ling, who is housed with a black family, are trying to adapt to their mostly black neighbourhood of South Central.

In crime ridden New York of the seventies two cops has had enough. They decide to take justice into their own hands. Things turn exciting and humorous. No hoodlum goes safe.

A family man and a mob witness hunt for a hit-man who has mistakenly kidnapped the family man's son.

In 1997, rap superstars Tupac Shakur and Christopher Wallace (aka Biggie Smalls, The Notorious B.I.G.) were gunned down in separate incidents, the apparent victims of hip hop's infamous east-west rivalry. Nick Broomfield's film introduces Russell Poole, an ex-cop with damning evidence that suggests the LAPD deliberately fumbled the case to conceal connections between the police, LA gangs and Death Row Records, the label run by feared rap mogul Marion "Suge" Knight.

The hardest group you've never heard of is back. Gangsta Rap is a mockumentary based on a group of over the hill gangster rappers (circa NWA), trying to make a comeback. Its a hilarious look at the soft underbelly of hard core hip hop.

Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer (1993) is a documentary film about Aileen Wuornos, made by Nick Broomfield. It documents Broomfield's attempts to interview Wuornos, which involves a long process of mediation through her adopted mother Arlene Pralle and lawyer, Steve Glazer.

In the summer of 2013, three internet bloggers went missing in the remote forests of Wisconsin. This video was their final recording.

A mad serial killer is spreading terror throughout the 'hood, slitting people's throats and causing mass hysteria. A group of friends decides it's up to them to take on the maniac, even though they're risking their lives.

A young girl stuck in a horrific cycle of familial violence finds the power to build her own future from the place she least suspected in an inspiring tale of friendship and devotion starring Ossie Davis and Della Reese, and directed by Bruce Pittman. For years Jo Ann Foley (Madeline Zima) has suffered under the cruel hand of her ruthless grandfather. A chance meeting with kindly neighbors Honey (Reese) and her husband Too Tall (Davis) finds things looking up, however, as the nurturing couple provides Jo Ann with the support needed to break free of her grandfather's tyrannical grip. As the future lies before her ready to be molded however she sees fit, Jo Ann must now find the courage to let go of the past and seek the redemption needed to start life anew.

A serial killer is after hookers and strippers. A male detective and his female partner are assigned to stop him.

Ed Marinaro is Malcolm "Mace" Douglas, a street-tough detective who's out for justice-no matter what the cost. While investigating the mysterious suicidal heroin overdoses of four beautiful exotic dancers, Mace puts together the pieces of a deadly puzzle, infiltrating a violent ring of shadowy drug and weapons dealers, Mace methodically tracks a serial killer (Rick Washburn) with murderous ties to a ruthless foreign diplomat (Harry Goz). Mace won't stop until he gets some answers. The FBI and KGB have them, but now they're talking back with bullets.

Andre the Butcher will make sure you pay for your sins.

"Half Moon" tells the story of a city gripped with fear because of a man killing prostitutes. When down on her luck prostitute Rose (Shellie Chapman aka Tori Black) goes to a hotel to meet a man who seems like the perfect guy things soon change and she suspects he could be the killer ...or worse a Werewolf!

The complete story of Henry Louis Wallace and the panic he unleashed in the city of Charlotte has never been told on television before," says Henry Schleiff Group President of Investigation Discovery, Travel Channel, Destination America and American Heroes Channel. "'Bad Henry' showcases the fearless tenacity of Garry McFadden and his team in their efforts to capture this killer, providing justice, and most importantly, closure to the victims and their families

After a botched robbery escalates to homicide, a north Philly gun runner has to escape or outsmart the south Philly Italian mob as they close in for vengeance.

Documentary film exploring the lives of the people at the flashpoint of the LA riots, 25 years after the uprising made national headlines and highlighted the racial divide in America.

Successful architect Taylor Scott is poised for a promotion and a move to Paris but before that’s decided, her boss tasks her with creating a life-sized gingerbread house for a holiday competition. She partners with pastry chef Adam Dale, and though their styles are different, they form a deep connection working together.

When Jennifer Pan calls 911 to report that her parents have been shot, she becomes the primary focus of a captivating criminal case.

Twenty-five years after the verdict in the Rodney King trial sparked several days of protests, violence and looting in Los Angeles, LA 92 immerses viewers in that tumultuous period through stunning and rarely seen archival footage.