Best movies like Wicked City

A young Italian fugitive and his older protective brother hide among the grape pickers at a vineyard in Provence.

Stan is a sailor whose girl gets kidnapped by a rough sea captain. Stan dresses in drag and seduces the captain but the captain's wife catches him. Stan and his girl beat a hasty retreat as the captain's wife fires off a parting shot.

US merchant sailor Alex Walker (Kevin Anderson) is stranded in Mexico, penniless and wanted by the police. He meets and joins up with an unlikely couple - ageing but likeable shit Phillip Mills (John Lithgow) and young sexy, frustated wife Missy (Rosanna Arquette). The three develop a curiously inter-dependent relationship. Meanwhile, Police Captain Diaz and Detective Ortega are closing in and the plot circle is closed at Tapachula rail station amidst a stack of mistakes and wrong decisions.

Featuring candid discussion about hopes and dreams, love and heartbreak, family and friends, this engrossing documentary makes an inspired connection between classic literature and contemporary teen life in modern-day Marseille as one high school class studies the 17th-century novel La princesse de Clèves.

In Marseille, a customs inspector falls in love with a young woman involved in dubious traffic.

A couple of hit men set out to kill an old friend.

Honoré Panisse is dying, cheerfully, with friends, wife, and son at his side. He confesses to the priest in front of his friends; he insists that the doctor be truthful. But, he cannot bring himself to tell his son Césariot that his real father is Marius, the absent son of César, Césariot's godfather. Panisse leaves that to Fanny, the lad's mother. Dissembling that he's off to see a friend, Césariot then seeks Marius, now a mechanic in Toulon. Posing as a journalist, Césariot spends time with Marius and leaves believing tales he is a petty thief. Only after the truth comes out can Marius, Fanny, César, and Césariot step beyond the falsehoods, benign though they may be.

A French sailor, imprisoned for years on false charges of conpiring against the king, escapes and exacts revenge on his accusers.

Edmond Dantés's life and plans to marry the beautiful Mercedes are shattered when his best friend, Fernand, deceives him. After spending 13 miserable years in prison, Dantés escapes with the help of a fellow inmate and plots his revenge, cleverly insinuating himself into the French nobility.

César runs a bar along Marseilles' port, assisted by his 23 year old son, Marius. Colorful characters abound: M. Panisse, an aging widower and prosperous sail maker; Honorine, a fishmonger with a sidewalk stall near the bar; her daughter, Fanny, who helps her sell cockles just outside the bar; and various old salts. Friends since childhood, Fanny and Marius love each other, but Marius has a secret wanderlust: every ship's whistle stirs a longing for foreign lands. When M. Panisse seeks Fanny's hand in marriage and when a departing clipper needs a deckhand, Marius and Fanny must decide who and what they love most. César, with his generous, wise spirit, tries to guide his son.

Séléna is chief of the Marseille police. Respected and feared by his men, his sole enemy seems to be himself, along with his 300 pounds. Strangled by the bursting straight-jacket of his body, tortured by his past, he leads a solitary life in a large isolated house. Séléna is the only person who knows that Elsa was guilty of the murder of her uncle, a wealthy shipowner. Fascinated by the young woman’s beauty, he offers her a strange deal: in exchange for his silence, he demands that she dines with him every night for a year.

A police brigade works in the dangerous northern neighborhoods of Marseille, where the level of crime is higher than anywhere else in France.

A gangster escapes jail and quickly makes plans to continue his criminal ways elsewhere, but a determined inspector is closing in.

Picking up moments after the end of Marius, this film follows Fanny’s grief after Marius’s departure—and her realization that she’s pregnant. Panisse continues courting her and embraces the baby’s impending arrival as a gift, so long as its paternity remains a secret. Fanny and Panisse wed, but after her baby’s birth, Marius returns unexpectedly and demands what he believes is still his.

"Fanny" is the second part of the "Marseille trilogy", made by Marcel Pagnol with the generic name of "Marius, Fanny and César". Fanny falls in love and is abandoned by Marius. Now she discovers she is pregnant. Her mother and Marius's father, César, persuade her to accept the romantic advances of a much older man. To save face, Fanny accepts to marry Honoré Panisse, a rich merchant of the Vieux Port, 30 years her senior who will recognize her son.

"Popeye" Doyle travels to Marseilles to find Alain Charnier, the drug smuggler that eluded him in New York.

Two sailors with a rivalry over chasing women become friends. But when one decides to finally settle down, will this mysterious young woman come between them?

"Marius" takes place in Marseilles' Old Port, at the La Marine Bar, owned by César and his son Marius. Marius' biggest dream is to embark on one of the boats passing by his dad's bar and to set off to a faraway land. Fanny, a young and pretty seafood peddler, has secretly been in love with Marius since her childhood; Marius, never admitting it, has always loved Fanny. One day, a sailor drops by La Marine and offers him a job on an exploratory ship. Trying to hold him off and to make him jealous, Fanny confesses his love to him and provokes a fight between Marius and one of César's old friends, Panisse, a boat merchant, who despite his old age, has been courting Fanny for a while. Torn between the call of the sea and his love for her, Marius abandons his dream to be with Fanny who gives herself to him. As César and Honorine, Fanny's mother, are getting ready for the wedding, Marius changes his mind, drawn back to the call of the sea.

Henri Verneuil was born Achod Malakian of Armenian parentage on October 15, 1920, in Rodosto, Turkey, and his family fled to France and settled in Marseilles when he was a young child. He later recounted his childhood experience in the novel Mayrig, which he dedicated to his mother and made into this 1991 film with the same name.

A film adaptation of the classic Alexandre Dumas novel. Edmond Dantes is falsely accused by those jealous of his good fortune, and is sentenced to spend the rest of his life in the notorious island prison, Chateau d'If. While imprisoned, he meets the Abbe Faria, a fellow prisoner whom everyone believes to be mad. The Abbe tells Edmond of a fantastic treasure hidden away on a tiny island, that only he knows the location of...

A dockworker seeking revenge on the killer of his sister finds himself the object of desire for two women.

Zachary, 17 years old, gets out of jail. Rejected by his mother, he hangs out in the mean streets of Marseille. He falls in love with Shéhérazade, a young prostitute of whom he becomes the pimp without realizing it...

During a walk along the cliffs not far from Marseille, Elisa Langerot sees her husband slip and fall to his death. Inexplicably, Elisa flees the scene of the accident, stops a passing driver and tells him a made-up story about a stolen car, concealing her husband's death. Feeling sorry for the girl, the driver, Philippe Morçot, gives her a lift and later lets her stay at his house. The good deed, however, doesn't go unpunished, and soon Philippe is drawn into Elisa's twilight world of fantasies, lies and paranoia.

Angèle is a 1934 French drama film directed, produced and written by Marcel Pagnol. It stars Orane Demazis as a naive young woman who is seduced and abandoned. It is based on the novel Un de Baumugnes by Jean Giono.

Almost 19-year-old Marius feels himself in a rut in Marseille, his life planned for him by his cafe'-owning father, and he longs for the sea. The night before he is to leave on a 5-year voyage, Fanny, a girl he grew up with, reveals that she is in love with him, and he discovers that he is in love with her. He must choose between an exciting life at sea, and a boring life with the woman he loves. And Fanny must choose between keeping the man she loves, and letting him live the life he seems to want.

Faced with the insistence of his brother Joseph, whom he has not seen for 25 years, Paolo resolves to give up his calm and harmonious life in Canada, to return to Marseilles at the bedside of his rugged father. He left, therefore, with his son under his arm, determined not to linger in that city which he had fled years before, after a tragedy. He does not imagine that the affection of his newfound family, his love affair with a young woman and the joyful and simple solidarity of the Marseillais will reconcile him with this city he would never have wanted to leave...Marseillle.

Karnaval is set against a backdrop of intolerance and hostility in the gloomy Northern French city of Dunkirk. The story is set during carnival time, when the citizens let themselves loose for six weeks of partying, carousing and having a good time. The film centers on Larbi, an Arab youth, and his confrontation with one of the turning points of his life. After a violent argument with his father, Larbi decides to leave the family's business and go to Marseilles for a fresh start. On his last night in the town he grew up in, he sleeps in the hallway of an apartment building, where he is disturbed by Béa and Christian, a couple having fun at the carnival. Larbi is attracted to Béa and decides to stay a few more days to try his luck. In the free atmosphere of the carnival, Larbi discovers a world that he did not know existed, a world which is about to clash with his conservative outlook, and the three lives are changed forever.

A dark tale of working-class life in Marseilles, a city in crisis. Interesting characters include a hard-bitten but compassionate fish market worker with a drug addicted daughter and a moody bartender with a shocking secret life.

Pacos Le Maltais, leader of a gang, lays down the law on the quay of Marseille. He fires one of his henchmen, Le Chinois, who killed a woman during the last bank stickup.

Marseilles, 1919. Georges Sarret is a distinguished and respected lawyer, recently honoured for his services in the First World War. He takes as his lover Philomène Schmidt, a young German woman, who has just lost her job and home. To enable Philomène to remain in France, Georges finds her a husband – who dies conveniently of natural causes a month after the wedding. Georges repeats the trick with Philomène's sister, Catherine – marrying her off to an old man who dies suddenly so that the scheming trio can profit from his life insurance. When an accomplice in the scheme, Marcel Chambon, threatens to blackmail them, Georges and his two lovers have no option but to kill him and his mistress...

Marie-Jo and Her Two Lovers (French: Marie-Jo et ses deux amours) is a 2002 French drama film directed by Robert Guédiguian. It was entered into the 2002 Cannes Film Festival.

In 2014, Tsai Ming-Liang was invited to make a film for the MarseilleFID, Marseille International Film Festival. Since he was not familiar with Marseille, he decided to make a film as tourist, capturing the beautiful Mediterranean sunshine in the late summer of that year. He also invited famous French actor, Denis Lavant, to appear alongside Lee Kang-Sheng playing Xuanzang. "Journey to the West" was invited to be the opening short film at the Berlin International Film Festival the same year.

In an attempt to flee Nazi-occupied France, Georg assumes the identity of a dead author but soon finds himself stuck in Marseilles, where he falls in love with Maria, a young woman searching for her missing husband.

Ariane is having her birthday party but no one comes. She decides to leave at the seaside and take part with her life that disappointed her.

How the mothers of a deprived suburb of Marseille will create a solidarity committee under the aegis of the parish priest. Gathered in assembly, they will invent a solution to the endemic misery of their city.

A "love-'em-and-leave-'em" sailor hooks up with a dance-hall girl in Paris while waiting for his ship to sail. She falls in love with him, and when his ship leaves port she decides to show up at its next stop and reunite with her lover. However, when she arrives at the ship's next destination, she discovers that her "lover" has already found another local girl to spend his time with. Complications ensue.

Mobster Thomas Nagle and his gang take over a ship to use running guns and counterfeit money into Lisbon.

Based on a novel by Jean-Claude Izzo, this melancholic movie focuses on three sailors being the last remaining crew members on their ship which is aground in the harbor of Marseille. After the owner has sold the "Aldébaran", only the Lebanese captain Aziz, the Greek Diamantis and the Turk Nelim are stuck on the boat for a lack of prospects. Aziz doesn't want to return to his wife, Diamantis tries to find a girl he left at the age of 20 and Nelim, young and foolish, just wants to have fun...

The last episode of Pagnol's memories (see also "La Gloire de Mon Père" "le Château de Ma Mère" and "Le Temps des secrets") deals with the teenage years of Marcel. While always spending his Summers in his dear Garrigue, he is now on the way to the Baccalaureat. He 's got a good pal Lagneau (The Lamb) who of course infuriates the teachers when he "bleats"...

Roberto goes to Marseilles to give a hand to his friend Xavier, wrongly imprisoned following a frame-up organized by his associate Villanova. Roberto sets out to seduce Villanova's mistress, but when Villanova is killed, Roberto ends up leader of the band...

A respected gangster, Justin, finds himself in a deadly feud with his rival, the unscrupulous Esposito. The latter plans to steal a cargo of opium bound for China and to have Justin killed.

Pierre Rossi and Béatrice live in the same block of flats in Marseille and love each other. One night, Béatrice leaves her apartment. Pierre knows that his fiancée goes to a rendezvous, but she would not tell him more than just that. Worried, Pierre follows her but he is attacked and stolen his identity papers by two men, Tom and Nasol, on the payroll of Quaglio, one of the city's bosses. Later on, Quaglio kills Nasol and deposits the body in a garage, leaving Pierre's papers nearby. As for Pierre, he manages to follow Tom to a villa where several young women have been invited. Pierre, horrified, realizes that this place is the headquarters for the white slave trade. - Written by Guy Bellinger

In this French crime thriller, you can leave the mob, but the mob won't leave you. Louis (Jean Yanne) has retired to a Thailand plantation with an Asian wife and child. Back in Marseilles, however, because a no-holds-barred gang war has broken out, Louis' large collateral family is wiped out, and he is family are slated for destruction.

To live and to love at the age of 18, immersing yourself in the carefree summer days and nights, losing your best friend suddenly, and realizing that nothing lasts forever. It’s a time of decisive encounters in order to be reborn.

The good guys win out in this sweet tale about a young orphan who is abused for much of her life but who eventually finds happiness when she marries an honest man who extricates her from her situation.

Dedee is a prostitute, working in Monsieur Rene's night club on Antwerp's harbour. The porter is Marco, her pimp. Dedee is not happy, until she meets Francesco, an italian sailorman. They fall in love and Dedee begins to dream about an escape of her daily dullness.

Alan, after quarreling with his girlfriend Sheila, becomes intrigued by Anna, a mysterious widow who's searching for a sailor she had known many years before. Alan and Anna begin the search on board a yacht bound for Greece, but they don't find the sailor. After a stop in Africa, Louis de Mozambique joins the party and suggests that the sailor may never have existed other than in Anna's mind.

Marseille describes an interlude in the life of young Berlin photographer Sophie. Wanting a change, Sophie does an apartment swap, so she can go photograph the city of Marseille, and most of all get away from Berlin.

During a transvestite ball, a young provincial meets Fanny Legrand. A great love is born between them. Later, the young man learns that Fanny was a great coquette. He leaves her, he comes back, he forgives. But when he embarks for America, Fanny does not follow him.