Down by LawMovies like Down by Law
- Key Features:
- Prison escape, New Orleans, Black and white cinematography, Independent film, Friendship, Misfits, Existentialism, Deadpan humor, Road movie, Underdog, Quirky
- Tone:
- humorous, deadpan, restrained, witty
- Target Audience:
- Independent film lovers, Fans of quirky comedies, Those who appreciate deadpan humor, Viewers interested in character-driven stories
- Emotional Arc:
- Despair → Hope
Down by Law

A disc jockey, a pimp and an Italian tourist escape from jail in New Orleans.
Down by Law
Three convicted criminals escape from prison carrying only a güiro, a tambor and an accordion. During their journey, they meet with a bunch of interesting characters and are forced to use their musical skills to help them get home.

A recently paroled ex-con who has trouble adjusting to the wacky normalcy of life outside of prison. He has spent the last three years behind bars after getting caught committing a crime and taking the rap for his much more dangerous pal.

After a friend overdoses, Spoon and Stretch decide to kick their drug habits and attempt to enroll in a government detox program. Their efforts are hampered by seemingly endless red tape, as they are shuffled from one office to another while being chased by drug dealers and the police.

Con man Aldo breaks out of jail and seizes a car at gunpoint, taking its passengers—bumbling police officer Giacomo and nitpicking civilian Giovanni—hostages. An unlikely friendship blossoms.

Three lovable party buds try to bail their friend out of jail. But just when the guys have mastered a plan, everything comes dangerously close to going up in smoke.

Jamie, an uninhibited free spirit bemoaning yet another breakup with a girlfriend, and her demure friend Marian desperately needs to loosen up. In search of a fresh start, the two embark on an impromptu road trip to Tallahassee, but things quickly go awry when they cross paths with a group of inept criminals along the way.

A story of friendship between a young convict who is forced to work in a retirement home and a group of crazy old people. Together they organize their escape.

Two men in 1930s Mississippi become friends after being sentenced to life in prison together for a crime they did not commit.

The lawyer is visiting a prison to meet with a violent criminal who has been condemned to death. During the visit, things turn bad, there is a riot where prisoners escape and the criminal escapes taking a lawyer hostage.

Uptight lawyer Peter Sanderson wants to dive back into dating after his divorce and has a hard time meeting the right women. He tries online dating and lucks out when he starts chatting with a fellow lawyer. The two agree to meet in the flesh, but the woman he meets — an escaped African-American convict named Charlene — is not what he expected. Peter is freaked out, but Charlene tries to convince him to take her case and prove her innocence. Along the way, she wreaks havoc on his middle-class life as he gets a lesson in learning to lighten up.

After losing their family home in Algeria in the 1920s, three brothers and their mother are scattered across the globe. Messaoud joins the French army fighting in Indochina; Abdelkader becomes a leader of the Algerian independence movement in France and Saïd moves to Paris to make his fortune in the shady clubs and boxing halls of Pigalle.

In the deep south during the 1930s, three escaped convicts search for hidden treasure while a relentless lawman pursues them.

A young, inexperienced public defender is assigned to defend an inmate accused of committing murder while behind bars.

After escaping from prison, Joe and Terry go on a crime spree, robbing banks through Oregon and California in order to finance their scheme for a new life south of the border. Unfortunately, things get more complicated when they meet Kate, who runs into them with her car. She joins the bandits on their cross-country spree, and eventually she steals something, too: their hearts.

After winning the lottery, a convict must chase down the warden who has his winning ticket.

In Memphis, Tennessee, over the course of a single night, the Arcade Hotel, run by an eccentric night clerk and a clueless bellboy, is visited by a young Japanese couple traveling in search of the roots of rock; an Italian woman in mourning who stumbles upon a fleeing charlatan girl; and a comical trio of accidental thieves looking for a place to hide.

After ex-con Joe Braxton violates his probation, he is given a second chance. All he has to do is drive a group of special kids across the country.

A dachshund passes from oddball owner to oddball owner, whose radically dysfunctional lives are all impacted by the pooch.

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.

On the run after committing murder, an accountant encounters a strange Native American man who prepares him for his journey into the spiritual world.

Michael Lynch is a notorious criminal with two wives and a flair for showmanship. He's also a huge embarrassment to the local police, who are determined to bring him down once and for all.

Brian Hooks plays a character who is just released from jail. And the state adopts a "3 strikes" rule for felons that involves serious penalties. Hooks has 2 strikes, and wants to change his life for the better. When a friend picks him up, they are pulled over, and his friend shoots at police officers, and Hooks escapes. Now Hooks, a wanted man, must clear his name of having nothing to do with the shooting.

Four friends become stranded in Eastern Europe and have to become hit men, prostitutes, corrupt cops, smugglers and more to make it home.

After their bank heist goes wrong, a desperate criminal, his out-of-control brother, and their motley crew of ex-marines must escape New Orleans, United States.

Escaped convict Sam Gillen single-handedly takes on ruthless developers who are determined to evict a widow with two young children.

He's a low level criminal with no future and just out of prison. She's a low level lawyer never noticed by others, a lost soul without a life. Their anger and hostility makes them serious criminals. Love happens in the strangest of places.

An unemployed pot-smoking slacker and amateur drummer, Anthony Stoner ditches his strict parents and hits the road, eventually meeting kindred spirit Pedro de Pacas. While the drug-ingesting duo is soon arrested for possession of marijuana, Anthony and Pedro get released on a technicality, allowing them to continue their many misadventures and ultimately compete in a rock band contest, where they perform the raucous tune "Earache My Eye."

Downtrodden writer Henry and distressed goddess Wanda aren't exactly husband and wife: they're wedded to their bar stools. But, they like each other's company—and Barfly captures their giddy, gin-soaked attempts to make a go of life on the skids.

Philo Beddoe is your regular, easygoing, truck-driving guy. He's also the best bar-room brawler west of the Rockies. And he lives with a 165-pound orangutan named Clyde. Like other guys, Philo finally falls in love - with a flighty singer who leads him on a screwball chase across the American Southwest. Nothing's in the way except a motorcycle gang, some cops, and legendary brawler Tank Murdock.

A repressed gay man develops an unlikely friendship with a young masseur who teaches him to embrace life.

A man befriends a fellow criminal as the two of them begin serving their sentence on a dreadful prison island, which inspires the man to plot his escape.

After Doug picks up hitchhiking Rosco with his truck, they are mistaken for two bank robbers by the traffic police. They manage to escape only to be confused for two secret agents while trying to take a flight at the airport.

A New Yorker's life is thrown into a tailspin when his younger cousin surprise-visits him, starting a strange, unpredictable adventure.

The story of Ivan and Josh, two dimwitted ex-security guards who love music videos. Out of work, with no job prospects, they form a music video production company. They soon learn the ins and outs of the business in LA, and with some help from Mo Fuzz, they soon become hot property. But not all goes smoothly when they try to resurrect the career of their favorite R&B duo, the Swanky Modes.

Bob Muldoon and Ruth Guthrie, an impassioned young outlaw couple on an extended crime spree, are finally apprehended by lawmen after a shootout in the Texas hills. Although Ruth wounds a local officer, Bob takes the blame. But four years later, Bob escapes from prison and sets out to find Ruth and their daughter, born during his incarceration.

Bruno Stroszek is released from prison and warned to stop drinking. He has few skills and fewer expectations: with a glockenspiel and an accordion, he ekes out a living as a street musician. He befriends Eva, a prostitute down on her luck and they join his neighbor, Scheitz, an elderly eccentric, when he leaves Germany to live in Wisconsin.

When a former detective learns of the murder of his estranged son, he ventures back to the darkened streets he once knew so well. Armed, dangerous and with nothing to lose, he must take on the ruthless local mob in his mission for revenge.

A spoof of buddy cop movies where two very different cops are forced to team up on a new reality based T.V. cop show.

Dan Saxon is an undercover cop who infiltrates a biker gang to nail the scum behind a drug-smuggling operation. In order to maintain the trust of the gang's leader, he must commit ever more dangerous and heinous crimes. Just how far 'beyond the law' will Saxon go?

Two competing lawyers join forces to sue a prestigious law firm for AIDS discrimination. As their unlikely friendship develops their courage overcomes the prejudice and corruption of their powerful adversaries.

Mac, the two-fisted, savvy cop finds that he's being saddled with a new partner, a known burnout, to work with him on a new and difficult case. The new partner is Ellis, an amazing detective, one who puts Sherlock Holmes to shame with his lightning-fast deductions. But he keeps assuming the personalities of entire casts of Television shows. This can be a problem when people begin shooting at them.

A tough police detective escapes from custody after being framed and arrested for the murder of his ex-wife, and must now find the real killer and prove his innocence.

A family man convicted of killing an intruder must cope with life afterward in the violent penal system.

A man eager to serve his country but rejected by the Marines pairs up with a young runaway to form an unlikely team on a misguided adventure.

Young lovers Sailor and Lula hit the road to start a new life together away from the wrath of Lula’s deranged, disapproving mother, who has hired a team of hitmen to cut the lovers’ surreal honeymoon short.

Detective Nick Blades is a New Orleans cop on trial for corruption. Assistant District Attorney Theo Gold is the man in charge of putting him behind bars. When these two unlikely partners from opposite sides of the law stumble onto a criminal plot, they’ll need to rely on luck – and patience – to take down a dangerous killer without killing each other first.

Three criminals escape from prison and embark on a robbery spree across USA. Along the way, one of them falls in love while they plan a final heist before going their separate ways.

What started as a simple escort mission will soon turn to chaos as the prisoners of Koh Kla take over the prison grounds. A special task force gets trapped in the prison will have to fight their way out for survival, to protect a key witness.

An ethical Baltimore defense lawyer disgusted with rampant legal corruption is forced to defend a judge he despises in a rape trial under the threat of being disbarred.

A bounty hunter pursues a former Mafia accountant who is also being chased by a rival bounty hunter, the F.B.I., and his old mob boss after jumping bail.

A hippie radical, Huey Walker has been a fugitive for decades, accused of a crime that he may not have committed. Finally apprehended, Walker is escorted to trial by uptight 20-something FBI agent John Buckner. While the two seem to be polar opposites, it turns out that Buckner may have more in common with Walker than is initially apparent, a point that is driven home when the pair faces off against a sinister small-town sheriff.

Karim and Nono, two "disguises" from Marseille's neighborhoods, are locked up in a military recovery camp after a burglary. They manage to escape and go on the roads of France to find Karim's girlfriend in Saint-Tropez. Their trip will be made of meeting more delirious than the others.

A deranged prison warden with a nasty habit of killing escapees forces the boyfriends of his teenage twin daughters into a shotgun wedding, after they claim to be pregnant. All hope seems lost, until the husbands hatch a madcap plan to rob a money train to freedom.

A group of careless and unlucky drivers are sentenced to attend traffic school to keep their records clean.

Maurice and Dave sell high-end cuts of beef, but after hitting a patch of no sales, they're facing being fired. Maurice needs money to enroll in his final semester of acupuncture school, and the recently-separated Dave needs money for his daughter's birthday gift. Their final client card—a beautiful woman—is attracted to Maurice, but a desperate call from a suicidal friend interrupts her signing the contract. Still hoping to close the sale, they offer to drive her to the friend's house—where their troubles multiply.

Four stoners, five vegans, three mobsters, four hunters and a million reasons to free one junkie elephant.

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.

When a straight-laced couple that has fun with a rowdy couple on vacation in Mexico return to the States, they discover that the crazy couple they met in Mexico followed them back home and decide to play tricks on them.

Four female cons who have formed a band in prison get a chance to play at a police ball outside the walls. They take the chance to escape. Being on the run from the law they even make it to sell their music and become famous outlaws.

A disgraced former cop, fresh off a six-year prison sentence for attempted murder, returns home looking for redemption but winds up trapped in the mess he left behind.

Having both lost their jobs, two strangers become unlikely friends after a run in with a would be robber, who is actually a hitman with a grudge against the two.

Monty is a mechanic struggling to make ends meet as he raises his three young daughters. When the court awards custody of his daughters to his shady ex-wife, Monty desperately tries to win them back with the help of Julia, a beautiful, Ivy League-educated attorney. Monty and Julia couldn't be less alike, but a flame is ignited... touching off a firestorm of love and conflict.

A reticent piano player Percival, along with Rooster, his flamboyant lead performer and manager, struggle to keep their speakeasy, in the Prohibition-era South, out of the hands of gangsters who want to take it over.

A race car driver tries to transport an illegal beer shipment from Texas to Atlanta in under 28 hours, picking up a reluctant bride-to-be on the way.

Zia, distraught over breaking up with his girlfriend, decides to end it all. Unfortunately, he discovers that there is no real ending, only a run-down afterlife that is strikingly similar to his old one, just a bit worse. Discovering that his ex-girlfriend has also "offed" herself, he sets out on a road trip to find her.

A down-on-his-luck crab fisherman embarks on a journey to get a young man with Down syndrome to a professional wrestling school in rural North Carolina and away from the retirement home where he’s lived for the past two and a half years.

Set in the Mojave Desert, the film follows a broken-down comedian playing clubs across the Southwest, working his way to Los Angeles to meet his estranged daughter.

When petty criminal Luke Jackson is sentenced to two years in a Florida prison farm, he doesn't play by the rules of either the sadistic warden or the yard's resident heavy, Dragline, who ends up admiring the new guy's unbreakable will. Luke's bravado, even in the face of repeated stints in the prison's dreaded solitary confinement cell, "the box," make him a rebel hero to his fellow convicts and a thorn in the side of the prison officers.

Jack is caught with the wife of his employer, a Vegas thug. The thug sends goons after Jack, who convinces his best friend, Pilot, to flee with him. Pilot insists that they head for Seattle, but doesn't tell Jack why. The goons learn from Pilot's drug source where the youths are headed, and they follow, hell bent on breaking Jack's feet. On the road, Jack and Pilot give a ride to Cassie, a distressed young woman. She and Jack hit it off. They pick up an aging stoner headed to Seattle for Kurt Cobain's memorial, and they help a circus sideshow family. Why is Pilot so set on Seattle, will the goons catch Jack, and is there any way the friends' competing needs can be resolved?

Taking a break from their dreary lives, close friends Thelma and Louise embark on a short weekend trip that ends in unforeseen incriminating circumstances. As fugitives, both women rediscover the strength of their bond and their newfound resilience.

With help from his friends, a Memphis pimp in a mid-life crisis attempts to become a successful hip-hop emcee.

A young boy whose parents just divorced finds an unlikely friend and mentor in the misanthropic, bawdy, hedonistic, war veteran who lives next door.

An unlikely friendship kindles between a struggling stand-up comedian from L.A. — forced to move back home to Eastern Long Island with his tail between his legs — and a tragically flawed, but charming and charismatic, alcoholic dermatologist. Discovering to be kindred spirits, each helps the other find healing, in addition to the confidence to face the "failures" in their lives.

When lawyer Charlie is sent to a small Nevada town to file a continuance request for a client, his actor friend Richard turns up to throw a surprise bachelor party celebrating his upcoming marriage to the boss's daughter. When Charlie is too hung-over to make it to court for the hearing, Richard fills in, inadvertently committing felony fraud, and Charlie is left with no choice but to coach the clueless Richard through the whole trial.

Craig and Smokey are two guys in Los Angeles hanging out on their porch on a Friday afternoon, smoking and drinking, looking for something to do.

A struggling screenwriter inadvertently becomes entangled in the Los Angeles criminal underworld after his oddball friends kidnap a gangster's beloved Shih Tzu.

The rise and fall of the pirate mixtape empire of three brothers from Naples, Italy, during the '80s.

Three handicapped losers who form a band ask famous writer Dries to be their drummer. He joins the band and starts manipulating them.

Slacker duo Beavis and Butt-Head wake to discover their TV has been stolen. Their search for a new one takes them on a clueless adventure across America, during which they manage to accidentally become America's most wanted.

Mike Hoolihan is an unconventional New Orleans cop investigating the murder of renowned astrophysicist Jennifer Rockwell, a black hole expert found shot to death in her observatory. As Mike tumbles down the rabbit hole of the disturbing, labyrinthine case, she finds herself grappling with increasingly existential questions of quantum mechanics, parallel universes, and exploding stars. The hunt for a killer draws a detective into an even larger mystery: the nature of the universe itself.

California teen Anita Minteer struggles in the face of an absentee mother, her mom's abusive boyfriend, Rooney, and a lack of respect from her classmates. This all changes when a pen-pal school project connects her with convict Howard. Anita secures Howard's parole and violently squares off against Rooney after he rapes her. Soon enough, the gun-crazy teen is on the run with Howard, with his parole officer in pursuit.

With the aid of his girlfriend, Phyllis Potter, and best friend, Loomis, Grimm enters a Manhattan bank dressed as a clown, creates a hostage situation and executes a flawless robbery. The only thing left for the trio to do is make their getaway out of the city and to the airport. It sounds simple enough, but it seems that fate deserts them immediately after the bank heist. One mishap after another conspires to keep these robbers from reaching freedom.

Three women are sent by steamboat to an undisclosed jungle prison called "The Home of Lost Souls". Here they experience the usual beatings, whippings, cat fights and humiliations. The butch warden has a deal on the side with a local pimp who forces them to dance in bikinis at a nightclub and sexually service the patrons. Tired of cages, rape, torture and rats, the girls kill the resident snitch and escape into the jungle.

After a violent encounter, Roy finds Rocky and sees something in her eyes that prompts a fateful decision. He takes her with him as he flees to Galveston, an action as ill-advised as it is inescapable.

Two movie producers who owe money to the mob set up their aging movie star for an insurance scam to try and save themselves. But they wind up getting more than they ever imagined.

Teenager Deacon works at a video shop, and his buddies, Fred and Matt, sell the bootleg porno films he acquires. Deacon gets fired, but the pals have the bright idea of filming their own Internet porn flick in order to make money and become more popular at school. Hijinks ensue as they cast and create their movie, but porn industry player Vic Ramalot grows jealous of their burgeoning success and tries to put a stop to the project.

A streetwise man flees South Central Los Angeles, heading to the suburbs and his lottery-winner uncle and cousin, to avoid a neighborhood thug with a grudge who has just escaped from prison.

Three friends, whose lives have been drifting apart, reunite for the funeral of a fourth childhood friend. When looking through their childhood belongings, they discover a trunk which contained details on a quest their friend was attempting. It revealed that he was hot on the trail of the $200,000 that went missing with airplane hijacker D.B. Cooper in 1971. They decide to continue his journey, but do not understand the dangers they will soon encounter.

Straight-arrow policewoman Cooper is excited and thrilled about her next assignment. Her task is to escort Daniella Riva, a wisecracking Colombian beauty, from San Antonio to Dallas so both she and her husband can testify against a drug lord. Plans go awry when Mr. Riva gets ambushed, leaving Daniella a widow. Cooper and her witness must now use their wits to escape from crooked cops and murderous gunmen, while not killing each other in the process.

A mentally disabled man gets help from a sociopath when he tries to reunite with his dying father, who years earlier disowned him.

Billy is released after five years in prison. In the next moment, he kidnaps teenage student Layla and visits his parents with her, pretending she is his girlfriend and they will soon marry.

In dreamlike mountain scenery, Toshiko makes a daring escape from her sexually warped Uncle Sonezaki. Fortunately, she met Samehada as she runs for her life, which is also escaping from some slayers. What follows is a wild chase that leads the audience into a comically violent world.

Meet Jack Foley, a smooth criminal who bends the law and is determined to make one last heist. Karen Sisco is a federal marshal who chooses all the right moves … and all the wrong guys. Now they're willing to risk it all to find out if there's more between them than just the law.

A small time crook and a newly-orphaned teenage boy team up to perform a string of robberies.

A young man becomes convinced that the solution to all his problems is to live in jail, and he will do whatever it takes to get it.

Milo Boyd, a down-on-his-luck bounty hunter, thinks he's seeing an upswing in fortune when he gets a call to bring in his bail-jumping ex-wife, a reporter named Nicole. Milo considers the job an easy payday, but Nicole quickly escapes to chase a lead on a murder case. The former spouses play an escalating game of one-upmanship, until they suddenly find themselves on the run for their lives.

Max and Riton, 2 thieves make plan to steal money in a train station office. They will operate through the wall in the public toilets.


