Desert DawnMovies like Desert Dawn
- Key Features:
- Small town corruption, Murder investigation, Cartel, Sheriff, Sheriff, Web of lies, Mystery, Law enforcement, Crime, Betrayal, Secrecy, Conspiracy
- Tone:
- serious, gritty, suspense-driven
- Target Audience:
- Crime thriller enthusiasts, Suspense fans, Viewers interested in law enforcement stories, Fans of neo-noir
- Emotional Arc:
- Intrigue → Suspense → Revelation
Desert Dawn

A newly appointed small-town sheriff and his begrudging deputy get tangled up in a web of lies and corruption involving shady businessmen and the cartel while investigating the murder of a mysterious woman.
Desert Dawn
When the skeleton of his murdered predecessor is found, Sheriff Sam Deeds unearths many other long-buried secrets in his Texas border town.

A small southwestern town sheriff finds a body in the desert with a suitcase and $500,000. He impersonates the man and stumbles into an FBI investigation.

Llewelyn Moss stumbles upon dead bodies, $2 million and a hoard of heroin in a Texas desert, but methodical killer Anton Chigurh comes looking for it, with local sheriff Ed Tom Bell hot on his trail. The roles of prey and predator blur as the violent pursuit of money and justice collide.

A former Marine confronts corruption in a small town when local law enforcement unjustly seizes the bag of cash he needs to post his cousin's bail.

Banks is a hit man, the best, usually working for Latin American drug cartels. He picks up solitary women, uses them briefly for a job, then kills them. He's in the Southwest, headed toward Mexico, when he picks up Bennie, a woman leaving an abusive marriage, going to Paradise, Arizona. The film follows three tracks: Banks's slow recruitment of Bennie, the set-up for the hit at a swank resort in Mexico, and the FBI's close pursuit of Banks, whom they want alive in hopes he'll rat out his bosses. Bennie may not be who she seems, and there may be a chink in Banks's tough-guy armor. Guns, money, and a chance at Paradise.

A Gulf War veteran with PTSD heads to a small town to find his friend. When he arrives his friend and his family have vanished and the townsfolk afraid to answer questions about their disappearance. He soon discovers that the town is owned and controlled by one man, and he doesn't like people asking questions.

In the desert area of Hat Creek, cows are found partially devoured and the farmers believe that a wolf is attacking the cattle. The alcoholic Sheriff Annie Flynn is called by the local farmer Rob Horn to witness the remains of an animal to request reimbursement from the government and for an accident with a tank truck that is blocking the road.

A Texas cop battles ex-navy seals who are trying to traffic drugs from Mexico into the USA.

In a seaside California town, best friends Mac and Nick are on opposite sides of the law. Mac is a former drug dealer trying to clean up his act, while Nick is a high-profile detective trying to take down a Mexican drug lord named Carlos. Soon Nick's loyalties are put to the test when he begins an affair with restaurateur Jo Ann -- a love interest of Mac's -- unwittingly leading his friend into a police-orchestrated trap.

The owner of a seedy small-town Texas bar discovers that one of his employees is having an affair with his wife. A chaotic chain of misunderstandings, lies and mischief ensues after he devises a plot to have them murdered.

In May of 2020, a standoff between a small-town sheriff and mayor sparks a powder keg as neighbor is pitted against neighbor in Eddington, New Mexico.

Kyle and Swin live by the orders of an Arkansas-based drug kingpin named Frog, whom they've never met. But when a deal goes horribly wrong, the consequences are deadly.

Two Texas border guards find a jeep buried in the desert, with a skeleton, a scoped rifle, and a box with $800,000 in cash. Before they decide whether to keep the money or report it, they privately investigate the clues and unravel a decades old mystery.

Police Lieutenant Lon McQ investigates the killing of his best friend and uncovers corrupt elements of the police department dealing in confiscated drugs.

Two men, both hiding a deadly secret, are on a murderous rampage through the desert.

A district attorney is involved in a 24-hour showdown with a gang leader and is, at the same time, being manipulated by an attractive assistant district attorney and a cryptic stranger.

An idealistic FBI agent is enlisted by a government task force to aid in the escalating war against drugs at the border area between the U.S. and Mexico.

In a post-apocalyptic world, a warrior wandering through the desert comes upon a group of settlers who are being menaced by a murderous gang that is after the water they control.

Cole Thornton, a gunfighter for hire, joins forces with an old friend, Sheriff J.P. Harrah. Together with a fighter and a gambler, they help a rancher and his family fight a rival rancher that is trying to steal their water.

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

An elite team of DEA agents are assigned to protect a dangerous drug lord and take refuge in a luxury hotel while they await extraction. They soon find themselves at the center of an ambush as the drug lord's former associates launch an explosive assault on the hotel.

A group of hard up bounty hunters must survive the night in a desert motel against a horde of savage cartel killers. They soon realize that their fugitive, a mysterious Chinese woman, is much more than she lets on.

A leader of a drug cartel sends his two toughest henchmen to investigate why a shipment was botched.

A small-town sheriff in the American West enlists the help of a disabled man, a drunk, and a young gunfighter in his efforts to hold in jail the brother of the local bad guy.

Agent Matt Graver teams up with operative Alejandro Gillick to prevent Mexican drug cartels from smuggling terrorists across the United States border.

After finding his brother murdered after returning from duty, Webster searches for the perpetrators, but discovers a conspiracy that cuts deep inside the U.S. government.

In the not-too-distant future, two drifters traveling through the desert stumble across the biggest gold nugget ever found and the dream of immense wealth and greed takes hold. They hatch a plan to excavate their bounty, with one man leaving to secure the necessary tools while the other remains with the gold. The man who remains must endure harsh desert elements, ravenous wild dogs, and mysterious intruders, while battling the sinking suspicion that he has been abandoned to his fate.

Follows a police officer who must retrieve an eyewitness and escort her after a cartel shooting leaves several DEA agents dead, but then he must decide who to trust when they discover that the attack was executed by American forces.

John 'Breacher' Wharton leads an elite DEA task force that takes on the world's deadliest drug cartels. When the team successfully executes a high-stakes raid on a cartel safe house, they think their work is done – until, one-by-one, the team members mysteriously start to be eliminated. As the body count rises, everyone is a suspect.

Mike Kendall, a disgraced ex-cop, is fighting a losing battle with the bottle. When he finds a woman left for dead at the side of a road, Kendall turns private eye to track down her killers, taking one last shot at redemption.

When a promised job for Texan Michael fails to materialize in Wyoming, Mike is mistaken by Wayne to be the hitman he hired to kill his unfaithful wife, Suzanne. Mike takes full advantage of the situation, collects the money, and runs. During his getaway, things go wrong, and soon get worse when he runs into the real hitman, Lyle.

For three US Border Patrol agents, the contents of one car reveal an insidious plot within their own ranks. The next 24 hours may cost them their lives.

A young district attorney seeking to prove a case against a corrupt police detective encounters a former lover and her new protector, a crime boss who refuses to help him.

A stranger stumbles into the desert town of Absolution with no memory of his past and a futuristic shackle around his wrist. With the help of mysterious beauty Ella and the iron-fisted Colonel Dolarhyde, he finds himself leading an unlikely posse of cowboys, outlaws, and Apache warriors against a common enemy from beyond this world in an epic showdown for survival.

Jonathan Cold returns, this time he goes Undercover to stop a group of Terrorists before they bomb Los Angeles.

A drug cartel boss is arrested in a raid and coerced into betraying his former accomplices as part of an undercover operation.

Dan Ballard, a respected citizen in the western town of Silver Lode, has his wedding interrupted by four men led by Ned McCarty, an old acquaintance who, as a US Marshal, arrests Ballard for the murder of his brother and the theft of $20,000. Ballard seeks to stall McCarty while tracking down evidence that will prove his innocence.

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.

Ten years after their casino heist, four escaped convicts trace their former partner to a desert town, where he is now a lawman with no memory of his criminal past.

Los Reyes County, Arizona. Leland, a retired lawman, works with Wallace, the new sheriff who replaces him, when a vicious hit man, sent by a Mexican drug cartel, threatens their border small town.

A man on the run from his own sins, finds himself in a small border town in Texas, impersonating a reverend. The town are quickly drawn to the man's unorthodox sermons, but so is a police chief who has his suspicions.

A corrupt CIA agent Sands hires hitman El Mariachi to assassinate a Mexican general hired by a drug kingpin attempting a coup d'état of the President of Mexico.

In the Texas bayous, a local homicide detective teams up with a cop from New York City to investigate a series of unsolved murders.

When big city detectives refuse to further investigate his kid brother's gang related murder, small town Sheriff Michael Spencer drops the badge and goes undercover to find his brother's killer and avenge his death.

Tensions erupt within an Arizona cattle baron's household when his three sons vie for control of the ranch.

The story of the rise and fall of the first American-born drug lord in Mexico, this tale of power, money, greed and betrayal amongst rival members of the drug cartels finds American gangster Erik Vasquez scheming to become the top dog in the Mexican underworld, only to find himself making enemies out of both the powerful cartels and his own allies.

A small-town marshal who hasn't carried a gun since he left the Texas Rangers after a tragic shooting must pick up his gun again to do battle with a gang of outlaw bikers that has invaded the town to pull off a brazen and violent heist.

When two youngsters meet and fall for each other, they must go on the run from the girl's corrupt father, who is also the sheriff of the town.

A retired detective accepts a simple task, unaware that it will tear open old, forgotten, but deadly wounds.

A bank-robbing gang of misfits heads to Mexico with the blueprints for the perfect million-dollar heist, but when one of the crooks wanders into the wrong bar, the thieving cohorts develop a thirst for blood.

When Vetter's wife is killed in a botched hit organized by Diablo, he seeks revenge against those responsible. But in the process, Vetter and Hicks have to fight their way up the chain to get to Diablo but it's easier said than done when all Vetter can focus on is revenge.

Three detectives in the corrupt and brutal L.A. police force of the 1950s use differing methods to uncover a conspiracy behind the shotgun slayings of the patrons at an all-night diner.

Erstwhile Special Forces operative Doc Alexander is asked to broker a truce with the Mexican drug cartel in secrecy. When Oklahoma Governor Richard Jeffs celebrates the execution of a high-ranking cartel member on TV, his Chief of Staff and Doc inform him about the peace he just ended. But it’s too late, as Cuco, the cartel’s hatchet man, has set his vengeful sights on Doc’s daughter Dixie.

A man implicated in the triple homicide of three Hollywood starlets begins his own investigation. Needing assistance, he enlists the two detectives on his tail in order to expose a conspiracy more explosive than any of them imagined.

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.

Detective Breslin crosses paths with Calloway, a ruthless hacker desperate to find his wife, who has been kidnapped by a drug cartel. When Calloway escapes police custody, Breslin joins forces with a no-nonsense female cop to reclaim his prisoner. But is Calloway’s crime-boss father somehow involved in this explosive situation?

Mysterious cell phone messages promise a young American engineer untold wealth - then make him the target of a deadly international plot. Dangerous security operatives chase the engineer across the globe, while a powerful government official pursues a mysterious agenda that threatens the stability of the entire world.

A dicey murder investigation. A fuming best friend. A chaotic living situation. Village police officer Franz Eberhofer has a lot on his plate right now.

A young woman is driving through the desert alone when she is drawn into a dangerous game of cat and mouse with a psychopathic Sheriff. The chase escalates to deadly levels, and she must use her street-smarts to turn the tables against him.

A gang of criminals and corrupt cops plan the murder of a police officer in order to pull off their biggest heist yet across town.

A parolee teams up with his old crew determined to find a buried bag of cash stolen a decade ago from a DEA bust gone bad, while being tracked by a retired Sheriff.

Left for dead in the remote Southwest, Frank is found clinging to life and in a state of amnesia. As he recovers, ominous memories begin to flash back...

Two wealthy businessmen are about to get away with $5 million in ill-gotten money until their plans are revealed by an uninvited house guest.

When an ex-cop named Fallon returns to the scene of a horrific crime, the residents of a rural town soon discover that this dark visitor is really a vampire who feeds on blood and fear. After he is befriended by a kind immigrant family, the instinctive killer is faced with a choice between revenge and redemption.

After going to extremes to cover up an accident, a corrupt cop's life spirals out of control when he starts receiving threats from a mysterious witness.

Young police officer Shane Cooper's first day on duty, after relocating to the small town of Red Hill, rapidly turns into a nightmare. News of a prison break, involving convicted murderer Jimmy Conway, sends the local law enforcement officers - led by the town's ruling presence, Old Bill - into a panic and leads to a terrifying and bloody confrontation.

When brash Texas border officer Mike Norton wrongfully kills and buries the friend and ranch hand of Pete Perkins, the latter is reminded of a promise he made to bury his friend, Melquiades Estrada, in his Mexican home town. He kidnaps Norton and exhumes Estrada's corpse, and the odd caravan sets out on horseback for Mexico.

After murdering an undercover DEA agent, two corrupt cops scramble to cover up what they've done.

Old Mexican-American sheriff Bob Valdez has always been a haven of sanity in a land of madmen when it came to defending law and order. But the weapon smuggler Frank Tanner is greedy and impulsive. When Tanner provokes a shooting that causes the death of an innocent man and Valdez asks him to financially compensate the widow, Tanner refuses to do so and severely humiliates Valdez, who will do justice and avenge his honor, no matter what it takes.

A city in Washington state awakens to the surreal sight of foreign paratroopers dropping from the sky—shockingly, the U.S. has been invaded and their hometown is the initial target. Quickly and without warning, the citizens find themselves prisoners and their town under enemy occupation. Determined to fight back, a group of young patriots seek refuge in the surrounding woods, training and reorganizing themselves into a guerrilla group of fighters.

Two corrupt cops in New Mexico set out to blackmail and frame every criminal unfortunate enough to cross their path. Things take a sinister turn, however, when they try to intimidate someone who is more dangerous than they are. Or is he?

A down-on-his-luck PI is hired by his old flame to investigate a murder. But while the case at first appears routine, it slowly reveals itself to be a complex interwoven web of crimes, suspects and dead bodies.

Jake Wade breaks Clint Hollister out of jail to pay off an old debt, though it's clear there is some pretty deep hostility between them. They part, and Jake returns to his small-town marshal's job and his fiancée only to find he has been tracked there by Hollister. It seems they were once in a gang together and Jake knows where the proceeds of a bank hold-up are hidden. Hollister and his sidekicks make off into the hills, taking along the trussed-up marshal and his kidnapped bride-to-be to force the lawman to show them where the loot is.

Amid the dust storms and economic depression of Dust Bowl Era Oklahoma, Eugene Evans finds his family farm on the brink of foreclosure. Discovering fugitive bank robber Allison Wells hiding in his small town, he is torn between claiming the bounty on her head and his growing attraction to the seductive criminal.

Deceit and betrayal rise to the surface after newlyweds survive a deadly car accident in the Moroccan desert.

A short Arizona motorcycle cop gets his wish and is promoted to Homicide following the mysterious murder of a hermit. He is forced to confront his illusions about himself and those around him in order to solve the case, eventually returning to solitude in the desert.

A troubled man runs away to Mexico and is recruited to join a paramilitary group of teens fighting the drug cartels. He proves himself to the group, but questions their motive.

Following a series of drug deals and murders, three criminals -- Fantasia, Ray Malcolm and Pluto -- travel from Los Angeles to Houston, finally arriving in a small Arkansas town to go into hiding. Two detectives from the LAPD, who are already on the case, contact the town's sheriff, Dale Dixon, to alert him of the fugitives' presence in the area. Underestimating Dixon, the criminals have no idea what they are about to face.

Brian Barnes (Johnny Messner) wakes up in the desert wounded and with no memory and no idea why he's surrounded by eight bodies, a van with four million in cash and a van full of cocaine. Brian is pursued by not only notorious drug lord Danny Perez (Danny Trejo) who desperately want his money back, and DEA Agent Rooker (Dolph Lundgren), but also a by the corrupt Sheriff Olson (Michael Pare) who will stop at nothing to get his hand on the new found fortune. On the run, Brian discovers the more he remembers the less he wants to know about who he really is.

Paramilitary operative David Wolfe stumbles upon an international conspiracy connecting presidential cabinet members to a Middle Eastern terrorist plot. Wanting to expose the truth, Wolfe defies orders and returns to the US as an army of one fighting for American security and integrity

A convict is released from prison in a small town in New Mexico. 18 years ago he killed a deputy. The then-and-now sheriff seeks revenge.

When a small town near the Arizona-Mexico border is wiped out overnight, suspicion falls on the lone survivor. But a roll of photos the survivor took that night tells a different story.

When mysterious Russian gunslinger Ivan Turchin rides into a small Texas town, he runs afoul of a bloodthirsty outlaw gang known as The Hellhounds. Outmanned and outgunned, the town must put their trust in Turchin to protect them from annihilation at the hands of the bandits. The gunslinger finds allies in the form of Marshal Austin Carter and Sheriff Vernon Kelly, and together the three must make a desperate stand against impossible and violent odds.

After avenging the murder of his family, a former soldier is sprung from prison and recruited by a shadowy government agency.

Frank Gannon, a veteran cop, is being hunted by his fellow police officers after they learned he has betrayed the brotherhood and exposed to the feds wide scale corruption of the LAPD. He has one day left to prove his case and survive.

A group of people who feel betrayed by their government and let down by their police force form a modern-day outlaw posse in order to right what they see as the wrongs of society.

When a Midwest town learns that a corrupt railroad baron has captured the deeds to their homesteads without their knowledge, a group of young ranchers join forces to take back what is rightfully theirs. They will become the object of the biggest manhunt in the history of the Old West and, as their fame grows, so will the legend of their leader, a young outlaw by the name of Jesse James.

Earl and Baby, two young lovers with a plan to escape their small Texas town. But when Baby's dim-witted cousin Junior gets tangled up in a whole heap of trouble, Earl has just 48 hours to save the day, rescue Junior and keep his promise to get his Baby to Los Angeles in time for sweeps.

A rogue soldier turned outlaw is thrust into a relentless fight with a corrupt sheriff, his obedient deputies, and a dangerous drug cartel in order to protect his sister and her young daughter.

The archetypical renegade Texas Ranger wages war against a drug kingpin with automatic weapons, his wits and martial arts after a gun battle leaves his partner dead. All of this inevitably culminates in a martial arts showdown between the drug lord and the ranger, and involving the woman they both love.

Two detectives are tasked to investigate the murder of an old man, found bludgeoned to death in a Tokyo rail yard.

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.

A gang of cold-blooded outlaws narrowly escapes a blood-soaked bank robbery in a grimy frontier town. With a notorious bounty hunter hot on their trail, these nefarious criminals desperately need a place to hide out before night falls. Fate brings them to the home of the Tildons, a seemingly innocent family with two feisty daughters. As the men settle in, an impetuous game of cat and mouse plays out during the cold, black night. Come morning, nothing will ever be the same.

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.

All bets are off when shady homicide cop Rick Santoro witnesses a murder during a boxing match. It's up to him and lifelong friend, Naval intelligence agent Kevin Dunne, to uncover the conspiracy behind the killing. At every turn, Santoro makes increasingly shocking discoveries that even he can't turn a blind eye to.

A group of Mexican emigrants attempts to cross the Mexican-US border. What begins as a hopeful journey becomes a harrowing, bloody and primal fight for survival when a deranged, rifle-toting vigilante and his loyal Belgian Malinois dog chase the group of unarmed men and women through the treacherous borderland. In the harsh, unforgiving desert terrain, the odds are stacked firmly against them as they discover there’s nowhere to hide from the unrelenting, merciless killer.



