Best Movies Based Off Real Serial Killers
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- DirectorTom McLoughlinStarsCharles S. DuttonJay O. SandersBobby HoseaJohn Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo went on a serial killing spree in October 2002 in Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Maryland.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dc_sniper[/link]
The Beltway sniper attacks took place during three weeks in October 2002 in Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. Ten people were killed and three others critically injured in various locations throughout the Washington Metropolitan Area and along Interstate 95 in Virginia. It was widely speculated that a single sniper was using the Capital Beltway for travel, possibly in a white van or truck. It was later learned that the rampage was perpetrated by one man, John Allen Muhammad, and one minor, Lee Boyd Malvo, driving a blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice sedan, and had apparently begun the month before with murders and robbery in Louisiana and Alabama, which had resulted in three deaths.
In September 2003, Muhammad was sentenced to death. One month later, Malvo was sentenced to six consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole. On November 10, 2009, Muhammad was executed by lethal injection. - DirectorMichael FeiferStarsKane HodderAdrienne FrantzMichael BerrymanThe twisted and murderous appetites of the notorious Ed Gein, whose depredations in his small town of Plainfield come as quite a shock to his neighbors, especially Deputy Mason, whose mother Vera and girlfriend Erica have gone missing.Another film about Ed Gein
- DirectorVernon SewellStarsPaul LutyRoy MacreadyDerren NesbittTwo men go into business supplying medical colleges with cadavers by robbing graves.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burke_%26_Hare[/link]
The Burke and Hare murders (nickname West Port murders) were serial murders perpetrated in Edinburgh, Scotland, from November 1827 to October 31, 1828. The killings were attributed to Irish immigrants William Burke and William Hare, who sold the corpses of their 17 victims to provide material for dissection. Their purchaser was Doctor Robert Knox, a private anatomy lecturer whose students were drawn from Edinburgh Medical College. Their accomplices included Burke's mistress, Helen McDougal, and Hare's wife, Margaret Laird.[1] From their infamous method of killing their victims has come the word "burking", meaning to purposefully smother and compress the chest of a victim, and a derived meaning, to quietly suppress. - DirectorScott L. FlynnStarsPatrick BauchauJack ConleyJohn AylwardObsessive manhunt to identify and capture a despicable serial killer.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Fish[/link]
Hamilton Howard "Albert" Fish (May 19, 1870 – January 16, 1936) was an American serial killer. He was also known as the Gray Man, the Werewolf of Wysteria, the Brooklyn Vampire, the Moon Maniac and The Boogey Man. A child rapist and cannibal, he boasted that he "had children in every state, and at one time put the figure at around 100. However, it is not clear whether he was talking about rapes or cannibalization, less still as to whether he was telling the truth. He was a suspect in at least five murders in his lifetime. Fish confessed to three murders that police were able to trace to a known homicide, and he confessed to stabbing at least two other people. He was put on trial for the kidnapping and murder of Grace Budd, and was convicted and executed by electric chair. - DirectorStephen KayStarsRobert ForsterMichael MicheleMaury ChaykinAfter 31 years at-large, detectives in Wichita, Kansas home in on the serial killer known as BTK.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BTK_Killer[/link]
Dennis Lynn Rader (born March 9, 1945) is an American serial killer who murdered ten people in Sedgwick County (in and around Wichita, Kansas), between 1974 and 1991.
He was known as the BTK killer (or the BTK strangler). "BTK" stands for "Bind, Torture, Kill", which was his famous signature. He sent letters describing the details of the killings to police and to local news outlets during the period of time in which the murders took place.
After a long hiatus in the 1990s through early 2000s, Rader resumed sending letters in 2004, leading to his 2005 arrest and subsequent conviction. He is serving 10 consecutive life sentences at El Dorado Correctional Facility, with an earliest possible release date of February 26, 2180. - DirectorCharles B. PierceStarsBen JohnsonAndrew PrineDawn WellsThe story of a hooded, berserk killer who terrorized the border town of Texarkana, Arkansas in 1946--leaving no fewer than five murder victims in his wake. He was never caught. Based on one of America's most baffling murder cases.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Killer[/link]
The Phantom Killer is an unidentified serial killer thought to be responsible for a series of slayings between February 22 and May 3, 1946. which became known as the Texarkana Moonlight Murders. The murders occurred in and around the city of Texarkana, which sits astride the border between Texas and Arkansas. The attacks took place at approximately three-week intervals. The Phantom Killer was also known as The Texarkana Phantom or simply The Phantom, The Phantom Slayer and The Moonlight Murderer because he often killed late at night. - DirectorAlan MetzgerStarsElizabeth MontgomeryDavid ClennonJohn M. JacksonA woman marries her boyfriend on his deathbed for his money so she can move on to the next guy. When he turns up mysteriously ill the police step in and investigate the strange circumstances.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blanche_Taylor_Moore[/link]
Blanche Kiser Taylor Moore (born February 17, 1933) is a convicted murderer and probable serial killer from Alamance County, North Carolina. She was convicted of killing her boyfriend by slipping arsenic into his food, and is suspected of killing three other people and nearly killing another in the same manner. - DirectorChuck ParelloStarsC. Thomas HowellNicholas TurturroAllison LangeKenneth is obsessed with the police, he moves to LA with his cousin, Angelo convinces him to start a prostitution business. Frustrated decide on revenge, feeling a great pleasure with her death. The two cousins become addicted to death.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillside_strangler[/link]
The Hillside Strangler is the media epithet for two men, cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono, who were convicted of kidnapping, raping, torturing, and killing girls and women ranging in age from 12 to 28 years old during a four-month period from late 1977 to early 1978. They committed their crimes in the hills above Los Angeles, California. - DirectorSkip KiteStarsWalt KissackGary SharkeyAdam LewisThis drama takes you into the mind of one of the UK's most notorious serial killers, while using archive news footage. We are shown his formative years, the biggest manhunt in police history to capture him and finally his time in jail, through actors and newsreels."Peter: Portrait of a Killer"
also about Peter Sutcliffe, The Yorkshire Ripper. - DirectorUlli LommelStarsJeff FrentzenJillian SwansonHeidi RhodesA horror film loosely based on the crimes of Canadian pig farmer Robert Pickton.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Pickton[/link]
Robert William "Willie" Pickton (born October 24, 1949) of Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, Canada is a former pig farmer and serial killer convicted of the second-degree murders of six women. He is also charged in the deaths of an additional twenty women, many of them prostitutes and drug users from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. In December 2007 he was sentenced to life in prison, with no possibility of parole for 25 years —the longest sentence available under Canadian law for murder. - DirectorRobert LynnStarsDonald PleasenceSamantha EggarCoral BrowneThe real-life story of Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen, who was hanged in London in 1910 for poisoning his wife so he could be with his young lover. But was he truly guilty of murder?[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr_crippen[/link]
Hawley Harvey Crippen (September 11, 1862 – November 23, 1910), usually known as Dr. Crippen, was an American homeopathic physician hanged in Pentonville Prison, London, on November 23, 1910, for the murder of his wife, Cora Henrietta Crippen. He was the first criminal to be captured with the aid of wireless communication. - DirectorJulie DelpyStarsJulie DelpyDaniel BrühlWilliam HurtA 17th century Hungarian countess embarks on a murderous undertaking, with the belief that bathing in the blood of virgins will preserve her beauty.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_B%C3%A1thory[/link]
Countess Elizabeth Báthory de Ecsed (Báthory Erzsébet in Hungarian, Alžbeta Bátoriová in Slovak; 7 August 1560 – 21 August 1614) was a countess from the renowned Báthory family of Hungarian nobility. Although in modern times she has been labeled the most prolific female serial killer in history, the number of murders and even her guilt is debated. She is nevertheless remembered as the "Blood Countess."
After her husband's death, she and four collaborators were accused of torturing and killing hundreds of girls, with one source attributing to them over 650 victims, though the number for which they were convicted was 80. Elizabeth herself was neither tried nor convicted. In 1610, however, she was imprisoned in the Csejte Castle, now in Slovakia and known as Čachtice, where she remained bricked in a set of rooms until her death four years later. - DirectorFhiona-LouiseStarsBob FlagMartin Byrne-QuinnGeoffrey GreenhillFictionalized account based on the actions of serial killer Dennis Nilsen.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_Nilsen[/link]
Dennis Andrew Nilsen (born 23 November 1945 in Fraserburgh, Scotland) also known as the Muswell Hill Murderer and the Kindly Killer is a British serial killer who lived in London.
Nilsen killed at least fifteen men and boys in gruesome circumstances between 1978 and 1983, and was known to retain corpses for sex acts. He was eventually caught after his disposal of dismembered human entrails blocked his household drains: the drain cleaning company found that the drains were congested with human flesh and contacted the police.
Owing to the similarities between their crimes, sexuality and lifestyle, Nilsen has been referred to as the "British Jeffrey Dahmer." - DirectorChris FisherStarsBret RobertsJoseph McKelheerRoxanne DayRichard Ramirez, aka the Nightstalker, who terrorized people in Los Angeles during the 1980s, and the police had no clue with him.Another film about Richard Ramirez.
- DirectorRobert DornhelmStarsHayden PanettiereMarcia Gay HardenVincent RiottaBased on the events surrounding the murder of British student Meredith Kercher.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_knox[/link]
Amanda Marie Knox (born July 9, 1987) is an American woman who was accused of the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Umbria, Italy. She served four years of a 26-year sentence before the murder conviction was overturned on October 3, 2011. Raffaele Sollecito, Knox's boyfriend at the time of the murder, was also accused of the murder and had his conviction overturned on appeal. The jury upheld Knox's calunnia conviction for falsely implicating bar owner Patrick Lumumba. For this Knox was sentenced to three years in prison, which she had already served, and was ordered to pay Lumumba's court costs of about 22,000 euros. - DirectorAndrew JareckiStarsRyan GoslingKirsten DunstFrank LangellaDavid Marks, a real estate scion, is suspected of killing his wife Katie, who disappeared in 1982.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Durst[/link]
In 1973, Durst married Kathleen McCormack, who disappeared in 1982. Her case remained unsolved for eighteen years when New York State Police reopened the criminal investigation. On December 24, 2000, Durst's long-time friend, Susan Berman, who was believed to have knowledge of McCormack's disappearance, was found murdered execution-style in her Benedict Canyon California house. Durst was questioned in both cases but not charged.
In 2001, Durst was arrested in Galveston, Texas, shortly after body parts of his senior neighbor, Morris Black, were found floating in Galveston Bay, but he was released on bail. Durst missed his court hearing and was declared the nation's first billion-dollar fugitive. He was caught in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, at a Wegmans Supermarket, after trying to steal a chicken sandwich and a Band-Aid, even though he had $500 cash in his pocket. A police search of his rented car yielded $37,000 in cash, two guns, marijuana, and Black's driver's license. - DirectorScott WalkerStarsNicolas CageVanessa HudgensJohn CusackAn Alaska State Trooper partners with a young woman who escaped the clutches of serial killer Robert Hansen to bring the murderer to justice. Based on actual events.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hansen[/link]
Robert Christian Hansen (born on February 15, 1939) is an American serial killer. Between 1980 and 1983, Hansen murdered between 17 and 21 women near Anchorage, Alaska. - DirectorGus Van SantStarsCasey AffleckMatt DamonA friendship between two young men is tested when they go for a hike in a desert and forget to bring any water or food with them.Based on [link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_David_Coughlin[/link]
David Coughlin was killed in 1999 in the desert of southern New Mexico, in the United States, after he and Raffi Kodikian got lost while hiking. Kodikian later pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and served 16 months. He was released in November 2001. - DirectorRob SchmidtStarsEliza DushkuCary ElwesTimothy HuttonBased on the true story of the double initial killings in Rochester, NY.loosely based on -
[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphabet_murders[/link]
The so-called "Alphabet murders" (also known as the "double initial murders") took place in the early 1970s in the Rochester, New York area; three young girls were raped and strangled. The case got its name from the fact that each of the girls' first and last names started with the same letter (Carmen Colon, Wanda Walkowicz, and Michelle Maenza) and that each body was found in a town that had a name starting with the same letter as each girl's name (Colon in Churchville, Walkowicz in Webster and Maenza in Macedon). - DirectorJoel BenderStarsLaura PreponMisha CollinsPatrick BauchauBased on real events, Paul Bernardo and his wife, Karla Homolka, kidnap, sexually abuse, and murder three young girls.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karla_Homolka[/link]
Karla Leanne Homolka, also known as Karla Leanne Teale (born 4 May 1970 in Port Credit, Ontario, Canada), is a Canadian serial killer. She attracted worldwide media attention when she was convicted of manslaughter following a plea bargain in the 1991 and 1992 rape-murders of two Ontario teenage girls, Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French, as well as the rape and death of her own sister Tammy.
Homolka and Paul Bernardo, her husband and partner-in-crime, were arrested in 1993. In 1995, Bernardo was convicted of the two teenagers' murders and received life in prison, the full maximum sentence allowed in Canada. During the 1993 investigation, Homolka stated to investigators that Bernardo abused her, and that she was an unwilling accomplice to the murders. As a result, she struck a deal with prosecutors for a reduced prison sentence of 12 years in exchange for a guilty plea for manslaughter. However, videotapes of the crimes later surfaced and demonstrated that she was a more active participant than she had claimed. - DirectorKeith WalleyStarsDoug ColeBeverly SoteloStacy CunninghamGruesome true story of murderer Richard Speck who killed eight nursing students in one night in Chicago during the late sixties. The story also follows him to his prison fate and uncovers more of his strange behavoir before his death.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Speck[/link]
Richard Franklin Speck (December 6, 1941 – December 5, 1991) was a mass murderer who systematically tortured, raped, and murdered eight student nurses from South Chicago Community Hospital in Chicago, Illinois on July 14, 1966. - DirectorJon PurdyStarsRobert HaysDean StockwellTobin BellThe stories of three men: one who terrorized the U.S. from 1978 to 1995 by sending bombs through the mail; his brother who suspected him of being the Unabomber; and the postal inspector who investigated the bombings from the beginning.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unabomber[/link]
Theodore John "Ted" Kaczynski,born May 22, 1942), also known as the "Unabomber" (a portmanteau of university and airline bomber), is an American mathematician, social critic, anarcho-primitivist, and Neo-Luddite[2] who engaged in a mail bombing campaign that spanned nearly 20 years, killing three people and injuring 23 others. - DirectorJud TaylorStarsMartin SheenHector ElizondoMatt Clark"Out of the Darkness" is a gripping thriller telling the true story of the hunt and capture of David Berkowitz, a.k.a. "Son of Sam" - the infamous serial killer who stalked New York City in the 1970s.Another film about the hunt for Son Of Sam AKA David Berkowitz.
- DirectorJoyce ChopraStarsHelen HuntChad AllenLarry DrakePamela Smart knows exactly what she wants and is willing to do anything to get it. She is fed up with teaching, and her marriage offers little excitement. Looking for a way out she applies for a job at a local TV station. When her dreams of fame are dashed by rejection, she seduces 15-year-old Billy, one of her students. Pam challenges Billy to prove his love for her by getting rid of her husband. The stakes heat up with a huge insurance policy on her husband's life.[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_Smart[/link]
Pamela Ann Smart (born August 16, 1967) is serving a life sentence for accomplice to first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder and witness tampering in New Hampshire. Smart was convicted for conspiring with her 15-year-old lover, William Flynn, and three friends of Flynn's to kill her 24-year-old husband, Gregory Smart in Derry, New Hampshire in 1990. - DirectorRichard T. HeffronStarsRaul JuliaJohn P. RyanPhillip ClarkOn March 13, 1964, Catherine "Kitty" Genovese was attacked and viciously stabbed to death several times by a psychopath while nearby residents watched but did nothing to help.based on -
[link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese[/link]
Catherine Susan "Kitty" Genovese (July 7, 1935 – March 13, 1964), was a New York City woman who was stabbed to death near her home in the Kew Gardens section of Queens, New York, on March 13, 1964.
The circumstances of her murder and the lack of reaction of numerous neighbors were reported by a newspaper article published two weeks later; the common portrayal of neighbors being fully aware but completely nonresponsive has since been criticized as inaccurate. Nonetheless, it prompted investigation into the social psychological phenomenon that has become known as the bystander effect or "Genovese syndrome" and especially diffusion of responsibility.