After Dark, My SweetMovies like After Dark, My Sweet
- Key Features:
- Kidnapping, Film noir, Desperation, Urban crime, Anti-hero, Psychological thriller, Greed, Betrayal, Conspiracy, Moral ambiguity, Neo-noir, Criminality, Violence-moderate
- Tone:
- serious, gritty, cynical
- Target Audience:
- Film noir enthusiasts, Crime thriller fans, Viewers interested in morally complex characters, Indie film aficionados
- Emotional Arc:
- Hope → Anxiety → Despair
After Dark, My Sweet

Three desperados try to kidnap a wealthy child in hope of turning their lives around.
After Dark, My Sweet
A gang of four professional criminals kidnaps a wealthy teenage girl from an airport in Paris in a meticulous plan to extort money from the girl's wealthy father. Holding her prisoner in an isolated beach house, the gang's scheme runs perfectly until their personal demons surface and lead to a series of betrayals.

In the dark landscape of the Mississippi Delta, a former bare-knuckle fighter must win one last fight to pay off his debts to the local mob boss and save his childhood home—the stakes nothing less than life or death.

A recovering gambling addict attempts to reconcile with his family and friends but finds trouble and temptation when caught between feelings for his ex-wife and her dangerous hoodlum boyfriend.

Jimmy Kilmartin's an ex-con who's trying to go straight. But he can't say no to a quick driving job because his so-called friend's life is threatened. The job is for Little Junior Brown, a violent and powerful villain. When things go wrong, Jimmy is left to do the time, and his whole life is turned upside-down, but if that wasn't enough, the cops won't leave Jimmy alone when he gets out... They want Little Junior Brown.

Following a bungled robbery, three violent criminals take a young woman, a middle-aged man, and a child hostage and force them to drive them outside Rome to help them make a clean getaway.

The story centers on paroled white supremacist who has just killed a cop, and takes a black family hostage. Within hours of being released from 14 years of solitary confinement in maximum-security Pelican Bay State Prison, Garrett Tully is on the run again. When he finds a house off a dirt road and takes a family hostage, he thinks the Aryan Brotherhood has his back–and his kidnap victims are black. The family’s patriarch, Mr. Walker, is a jaded ex-con who hates cops so much he disavowed his own son for becoming one. Seeing a familiar desperation in Tully, Walker refuses to call the authorities for help, causing familial tensions to escalate, and soon grave missteps are made.

Recently fired and facing eviction, a new dad has his life turned upside down when he meets a wealthy couple who offer a path to financial security... but at a price.

A drifting ex-soldier turns underground fighter with the help of a just-released ex-con, pitting him against corrupt cops and hired killers now gunning for him and all those he cares about.

A devious femme fatale steals her husband’s drug money and hides out in a small town where she meets the perfect dupe for her next scheme.

After a dispute over a winning lottery ticket turns into a deadly hostage situation, the witnesses must decide exactly how far they’ll go—and how much blood they’re willing to spill—for a cut of the $156 million.

An ex-con's attempts to live a quiet life are derailed when the daughter of the woman sheltering him is the victim of a vicious attack.

A color-blind psychiatrist is stalked by an unknown killer after taking over his murdered friend's therapy group and becomes embroiled in an intense affair with a mysterious woman who may be connected to the crime.

Desperate for income, Emily takes a shady gig buying goods with stolen credit cards supplied by a charismatic middleman named Youcef. Seduced by the quick cash and illicit thrills, they hatch a plan to take their business to the next level.

Mikey and Rose are professional assassins. They are also lovers, and once upon a time Rose also knew Mikey's father. During an elaborate hit job for a malicious gangster, Rose fails to kill the main target, the gangster's pregnant girlfriend. Instead, she delivers her baby and convinces Mikey to help her protect them both. As Rose weakens from cancer, Mikey becomes breadwinner for this unusual family. But tranquility will not last.

A crime syndicate places a hit on a billionaire's daughter, making her the target of an elite assassin squad. A small band of down-and-out mercenaries protects her, fighting tooth and nail to stop the assassins from reaching their target.

After spending time in prison following an assault charge, Connor Bates now works in a library and spends his free time running, swimming, and trying to piece his world back together. When he meets Marilyn Chambers, the wife of a wealthy businessman, they collide into an intense physical and emotional relationship that quickly escalates into idle talk about her husband’s murder.

When a little girl is kidnapped by a trafficking ring, they soon find they messed with the wrong child. Her mother, a notorious former gang leader, is close on their trail and will go to any lengths to bring her child home.

Emile Chenal and his wife, Françoise, leaned on boxing manager Jim Fox Warner to cough up the considerable sum of money that he owes them, with both the police and the mob circling the situation. In the same hotel, Inspector Neveu looks into a murder that took place years before, and his storyline overlaps with the arc of the Chenals.

A man vows to bring justice to those responsible for his wife's death while protecting the only family he has left, his daughter.

Three thugs kidnap Emma, the daughter of a drug kingpin, and have no idea that murderous blood that runs through her veins. As time passes, the unlucky threesome finds themselves in danger from the police, gangsters and their captive.

Career criminal Johnny Clay recruits a sharpshooter, a crooked police officer, a bartender and a betting teller named George, among others, for one last job before he goes straight and gets married. But when George tells his restless wife about the scheme to steal millions from the racetrack where he works, she hatches a plot of her own.

Fresh out of prison, a former debt collector working for a gangland boss is told he has a terminal brain tumour. In an attempt to atone for his past he rescues a young girl from trafficking, forcing him into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with his boss.

Three people from different walks of life find themselves trapped inside a stalled elevator. What at first seems like an inconvenience rapidly escalates into a nightmare.

Ray is a fledgling entrepreneur who specializes in high-end simulated abductions. He jumps at the chance when a mysterious client contracts him for a weekend kidnapping with a handsome payday at the end. But the job isn't all that it seems.

Corky, a tough female ex-convict working on an apartment renovation in a Chicago building, meets a couple living next door, Caesar, a paranoid mobster, and Violet, his seductive girlfriend, who is immediately attracted to her.

A conservative Midwest businessman ventures into the sordid underworld of pornography in search of his runaway teenage daughter who’s making hardcore films in the pits of Los Angeles.

A man who has failed as a father and husband commits a heist to make money for his fledging business, but things become complicated when his wife interferes.

Jackie Cogan is an enforcer hired to restore order after three dumb guys rob a Mob protected card game, causing the local criminal economy to collapse.

When his fiancee is kidnapped by human traffickers, Roman and his ex-military brothers set out to track her down and save her before it is too late. Along the way, Roman teams up with Avery, a cop investigating human trafficking and fighting the corrupt bureaucracy that has harmful intentions.

When three young criminals lose a stash of drugs, they end up owing money to a ruthless drug lord. With time running out, they plan a daring robbery to raise the cash to settle the debt.

Young boxer Michel Maudet is sacked by his manager after a series of match defeats and is forced to look for a new job. He is engaged as secretary to a millionaire named Ferchaux who is in a hurry to flee the country when he discovers he has been implicated in a high-profile fraud.

A sheriff tries to keep the peace when a desperate family man violently robs a pill mill with his brother-in-law, alerting an enforcer for the New Orleans mafia.

An ex-con battles it out in the cage to pay for the operation that would save the daughter of his victim. Along the way he finds fatherly love, and friendship, in the most unlikely of places.

A psychotic small-time criminal realizes that the everyday robberies, rapes and murders he commits aren't profitable enough, so he figures to hit the big time by kidnapping the daughter of a rich man.

A top surgeon is besotted with a beautiful woman who once rebuffed him. Unable to come to terms with life without her, he tries to convince her that they need each other. She has other ideas, but a horrific accident leaves her at his mercy.

A Russian teenager living in London dies during childbirth but leaves clues in her diary that could tie her child to a rape involving a violent Russian mob family.

A father is without the means to pay for his daughter's medical treatment. As a last resort, he partners with a greedy co-worker to rob a casino. When things go awry they're forced to hijack a city bus.

Frank Valken, high-flying robber, has just made a final masterful break. At least that’s what he believes… Ideal suspects, Valken and his gang find themselves involved in a criminal case of thirty years. It seems that the crazy killers are back.

Gambling fever -- along with a brutal bookie -- leads three crooked cops into a double-dealing scheme that lands them in hot water way over their heads.

Drowning in debt as he's about to get married, a bright but meek salesman receives a mysterious phone call informing him that he's on a hidden-camera game show where he must execute 13 tasks to receive a multi-million dollar cash prize.

After a night out with friends, Hyun Jae accepts a late night ride home from a young fire fighter. What begins as a night of promise quickly turns into a nightmare when she is abducted and imprisoned outside Las Vegas as a sex slave.

A former rodeo star, now a motel manager, meets a young man who is responsible for the violence that suddenly has seized his small town.

A vengeful man embarks on a murderous rampage after the kidnapping of a 7-year-old girl.

An ex-convict gets tangled up with a gang after his car is hijacked with his son inside.

At an international school in Jakarta, a philosophy teacher challenges his class of twenty graduating seniors to choose which ten of them would take shelter underground and reboot the human race in the event of a nuclear apocalypse.

After a disease kills 98% of America's children, the surviving 2% develop superpowers and are placed in internment camps. A 16-year-old girl escapes her camp and joins a group of other teens on the run from the government.

Three hooded Eastern-European criminals burst into a home in a Madrid gated community, holding the family hostage in its own home, and forcing the father to empty his credit cards. But the family fights back - brutally.

When an armed, masked gang enter a Manhattan bank, lock the doors and take hostages, the detective assigned to effect their release enters negotiations preoccupied with corruption charges he is facing.

A once-celebrated kid detective, now 31, continues to solve the same trivial mysteries between hangovers and bouts of self-pity. Until a naive client brings him his first 'adult' case, to find out who brutally murdered her boyfriend.

Five different criminals face imminent death after botching a job quite badly.

When the girl of his dreams is kidnapped, everyman Nate turns his inability to feel pain into an unexpected strength in his fight to get her back.

A group of criminals kidnap a teenage ballet dancer, the daughter of a notorious gang leader, in order to obtain a ransom of $50 million, but over time, they discover that she is not just an ordinary girl. After the kidnappers begin to diminish, one by one, they discover, to their increasing horror, that they are locked inside with no normal little girl.

A former Marine and his old war buddy face off against the Mexican cartel behind the disappearance of his daughter.

When a rich man's son is kidnapped, he cooperates with the police at first but then tries a unique tactic against the criminals.

The discovery of an illicit love affair leads two young Angelenos on a violent, sexually charged tour through the dark side of human nature.

Five men plot to steal a large sum of money from the local yakuza, but everything does not go as planned and the men find themselves hunted down by contract killers.

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.

A businessman, on his daily commute home, gets unwittingly caught up in a criminal conspiracy that threatens not only his life but the lives of those around him.

Vincent, a police officer, and his partner Manuel steal a large amount of cocaine from José Marciano, a ruthless crime lord who is quick to seek revenge, endangering Vincent's life, career and family.

Three inner-city losers plan a robbery of a valuable coin in a seedy second-hand junk shop.

A New York nightclub manager tries to save his brother and father from Russian mafia hitmen.

After leaving a life of crime and violence, Ray is a reformed good guy, enjoying a quiet family life in the ‘burbs. But when his past is discovered, Ray is blackmailed into one last job to collect a mysterious package. After a deadly double-cross, he finds himself wounded and on the run from ruthless assassins who will stop at nothing to get what he has. Now, with the lives of his loved ones hanging in the balance and danger at every turn, Ray’s only hope is to draw upon his violent past to survive.

Set in Brazil, three kids who make a discovery in a garbage dump soon find themselves running from the cops and trying to right a terrible wrong.

Without the security of the job he wants or the future he dreamed of, Paul Dynan plans the perfect crime to help his struggling family – abduct the socialite children of three wealthy men and collect a ransom of $3-million dollars. Over the course of one long night, Paul and his accomplices hold the rich kids hostage awaiting the ransom with little idea of the secrets that will surface between the fathers when they are forced to choose between their children and their money.

Gigli is ordered to kidnap the psychologically challenged younger brother of a powerful federal prosecutor. When plans go awry, Gigli's boss sends in Ricki, a gorgeous free-spirited female gangster who has her own set of orders to assist with the kidnapping. But Gigli begins falling for the decidedly unavailable Ricki, which could be a hazard to his occupation.

To bring down a global human trafficking ring, an Interpol agent recruits the help of a brutal criminal with inside knowledge of the yakuza.

A young girl whose father is an ex-convict and whose mother is a junkie finds it difficult to conform and tries to find comfort in a quirky combination of Elvis and the punk scene.

Sang Yu is so exhausted from trying to stay awake. Every time he closes his eyes, a demon chases and kills him in his dreams. One night Sang realizes he has a special power: he can bring treasures from his dreams into reality. Almost overnight, he becomes a rich man. But his wealth also attracts the attention of a ruthless gangster.

Carlo, a former mobster, is abducted by five privileged young men desperate to raise a $2 million ransom to save the sister of a friend. As Carlo plays mind games, however, his captors splinter -- each wondering whether one of their own had a hand in the crime.

Two honeymooners rescue a mysterious car crash survivor in the Las Vegas desert. But their decision to save the man becomes increasingly regrettable when he turns on them, forcing the newlyweds to do the unthinkable.

Master thief Will Montgomery is just released from the State penitentiary after serving a 10 year sentence, is contacted by Vincent, his ex comrade in crime, who is holding Will’s teenage daughter ransom in a hijacked taxi cab. Vincent will only surrender her when Will reveals the whereabouts of the 20 million dollars he contrived to conceal from their last robbery.

When two married business executives having an affair are blackmailed by a violent criminal, they are forced to turn the tables on him to save their families.

With the ambition to start a boutique overseas but without the means to do so, Nathalie finds herself in a desperate situation, where she would do anything to acquire what she needs. Along with her boyfriend, Eric, and his friend Bruno, she concocts a plan where she seduces clueless men and accompanies them to their places, then allows Eric and Bruno to break in. But the three soon encounter trouble after one of their schemes ends in murder.

In the not-too-distant future, as a final response to crime and terrorism, the U.S. government plans to broadcast a signal that will make it impossible for anyone to knowingly break the law.

A young single mother is held captive along with her two children by a violent ex and must plot their escape before it’s too late.

A young boxer is taken under the wing of a mob boss after his mother dies and his father is run out of town for being an abusive alcoholic.

At the end of the Civil War, a Confederate team is ordered to rob a Union payroll train but the war ends leaving these men with their Union loot, until the Feds come looking for it.

Victoria is a young mother trying to put her dark past as a Russian drug courier behind her, but retired cop Damon forces Victoria to do his bidding by holding her daughter hostage. Now, Victoria must use guns, guts and a motorcycle to take out a series of violent gangsters—or she may never see her child again.

After the deadbeat brother of a businessman is assumed to be in on his own kidnapping, his sibling must take action to rescue him.

After a former elite agent rescues a 12-year-old Chinese girl who's been abducted, they find themselves in the middle of a standoff between Triads, the Russian Mafia and high-level corrupt New York City politicians and police.

A naive young man assumes a dead man's identity and finds himself embroiled in an underground world of power, violence, and chance where men gamble behind closed doors on the lives of other men.

A tough undercover cop inadvertently gets involved in a dangerous heroin ring when a young defector of the drug trade leaves his five year-old sister in his care.

A reckless night of indiscretion and lust leads a woman into the dark world of blackmail and murder. When revealing photos of her sexual tryst unexpectedly surface, Katy is forced to submit to whatever her tormentors desire.

Gabriel Caine has just been released from prison when he sets up a bet with a business man who owns most of Diggstown, a boxing-mad town. The bet is that Gabe can find a boxer that will knock out 10 Diggstown men, in a boxing ring, within 24 hours. Roy 'Honey' Palmer is that man that, at 48, many say he is too old.

A hard-luck limo driver struggling to go straight and pay off a debt to his bookie takes on a job with a crazed passenger whose sought-after ledger implicates some seriously dangerous criminals.

A rich industrialist is brutally kidnapped. While he physically and mentally degenerates in imprisonment, the kidnappers, police and the board of the company of which he is director negotiate about the ransom of 50 million euro.

Massimo Sisti is a reputable professional with a nice house, a happy marriage, and two loving daughters, whose life is turned upside down when one day he finds a little girl tied up in his basement.

A small, wealthy family in New York City gets progressively torn apart by secrets, lies, and the theft that orchestrates all of it.

Undercover Las Vegas police officer Vincent Downs, who has a lot of enemies, is caught in a high stakes web of corrupt cops and the mob-controlled casino underground. When a heist goes wrong, a crew of homicidal gangsters kidnap Downs’ teenage son T. In one sleepless night, Downs will have to rescue his son, evade an internal affairs investigation, and bring the kidnappers to justice.

After watching their best friend get murdered, a group of teens struggle to expose a local hero as the vicious killer and keep from becoming his next victims.

A married man who killed the wife of his best friend during a tryst feels compelled to turn himself in.

A group of residents begins to suspect that their strange neighbor might be hiding something dark.

While doing a friend a favor and searching for a runaway teenager, a police detective stumbles upon a bizarre band of criminals about to pull off a bank robbery.

A murderous, flesh-eating undead young girl haunting the remote stretch of woods where she was murdered decades earlier, discovers a kidnapped and abused boy hiding in the trunk of one of her victim’s cars. Her decision to let the boy live throws her aggressively solitary existence into upheaval, and ultimately forces her to re-examine just how much of her humanity her murderer was able to destroy.

Ex-gang member John Henry is a quiet man with a violent past. When two immigrant kids on the run from his former South Los Angeles gang leader stumble into his life, John is forced to reconcile with his past in order to try and give them a future.

A young woman who is getting back on her feet after a mental breakdown, Carol Rivers discovers that her late uncle has left her a rundown nightclub. Carol decides to renovate the venue, but, in the process, uncovers dark secrets about the club and her dead relative. After a series of disturbing events, Carol becomes increasingly unstable, but she finds some measure of comfort in Sharpe, an enigmatic older detective.

Four young men make a risky investment together that gets them into trouble with the mob.

Han, a Filipino-Korean boxer hits the final punch against his opponent at an illegal game and returns home with a few dollars to pay for his mother's surgery.

