2023 The Crime List

The Crime List recognizes scripts, books, short stories & stage plays in any genre that feature a crime story.

2023 WINNER

ABSTRACT

written by Joseph Basso

A diligent detective and a former famous artist clash with one another as they hunt an art forger whose latest fake artwork, a Jackson Pollock painting, netted him more than $30 million.

2023 OFFICIAL SELECTIONS

ASSASSIN'S CHOICE by James M. Freeman. A Calcutta gangster must assassinate Mahatma Gandhi, or the gangster’s leader will kill the woman he loves. To choose who must die so that another lives, the gangster tells Gandhi his criminal life story - while debating him over nonviolence, the virtuous life, and the good death.

BLOOD, SCUM & NEON LIGHTS by Brett Howard Nelson (adapted from the award-winning short screenplay). On a rainy Seattle night, an alluring hit man and a mysterious woman meet, not realizing they share a close bond - through vengeance and murder. But clues to her real identity lead him to New York City and its deadly underbelly of organized crime. | BrettHowardNelson.com | Instagram: @BrettHNelson

CANVAS 31 (Pilot) by Jared Doles. When Aiden is caught robbing a museum, he is given the chance to earn his freedom from the owner, a dangerous man with criminal connections, who wants Aiden to retrieve 30 paintings that disappeared from their vaults years before - stealing them back from the businessmen, mobsters and celebrities who'd bought them off the black market. What the museum doesn’t know is that Aiden was the thief who stole the paintings in the first place, and is now stealing them back from his own customers.

DEAD HORSE LAKE (A North Woods Noir) by Michael Graf. A desperate young woman in love with a hit man must walk a delicate line when the hit man’s boss falls for her. | Instagram: @MikeyGraf | Stage32: @MichaelGraf | LinkedIn: @Michael-Graf-988374b

GEMINI (Episode 1: Happy Ever After) by Alex Vickery-Howe. When a teenager goes missing, a mysterious old woman teams up with a young homeless man to solve the crime and expose a conspiracy five decades in the making.

KITTY DOOLITTLE: STAY AT HOME PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR by Jennifer Milne. A middle-aged mom who does part-time private investigator work discovers a major terrorism cell while investigating the new love of a grandmother while keeping her work a secret from her family.

LOOKING OVER MY SHOULDER by John Anthony Ellis. When fifty grand belonging to a ruthless gangster goes missing, Jack Wilson is given three days to make good on the loss or face the consequences.

MAIL ORDER GODMOTHER by Ron Chepesiuk. After the adopted son of a powerful Mafia godfather convinces the godfather’s mail order bride to kill the godfather and collaborate in taking over his criminal empire, she has second thoughts and looks for a way to extricate herself from this treacherous plot; that is, until one word from the godfather changes everything.

MERE MORTALS by Russ Lindway. A series of events in which each perpetrator becomes a victim of the next horrific act drives one woman’s quest to prevent her husband’s murder … which has already happened. | Facebook: @Russ.Lindway | Twitter: @RussLindway | Instagram: @RussLindway

NO ADDRESS by James J. Papa and Julia Verdin. A group of homeless people bond together as a family, struggling to survive the streets while fending off a harassing gang, an unforgiving community, and the local authorities in hopes of finding their humanity again. | NoAddressMovie.com | Facebook: @NoAddressMovie | Twitter: @NoAddressMovie | Instagram: @NoAddressMovie

ONE WAY DOWN A DEAD END STREET by Lanny Grant. A former Army G.I. turned P.I. finds himself embroiled in the murderous scheme of a gangster's girlfriend.

PARTNERS by Jerry Ferrell and Nicholas Ryon Joseph. In the midst of a turbulent year in American history, two former partners reunite for the first time since one of their wives was brutally murdered. As they confront each other, long-buried secrets and hidden agendas are revealed, forcing them to confront their true selves and the darkness that lies within.

PRIVILEGED DECEIT (Pilot: It Starts and Ends with Murder) by Annette C. Hull & Warren R. Hull. When a woman uses a series of relationships with corrupt politicians, influential businessmen, crooked cops, and notorious gangsters she obtains great wealth and social status, then, her world is destroyed when the relationships she uses leads to the murder of a famous gangster and the tragic death of her daughter. Based on a true story. | IMDb | Facebook: @WhoKilledBugsy | Twitter: @WhoKilledBugsy

RETURN TO SPALDING DRIVE by Kevin Brunner. A lover of film noir movies, screenwriter, Nick Steele, finds himself trapped in the 1930s Los Angeles mob scene, and discovers how far he is willing to go for the love of a gangster moll guarding an enormous secret. | BrunnerKevin.com | Facebook: @Brunner.Kevin

RIGHTEOUS SIDE OF HELL by Lee Lucero. When a returning Navy Seal and his L.A. cop sister find themselves on opposing sides of a dangerous gang war, they struggle to maintain secrets as they fight to save their city and protect the ones they love. | Instagram: @505LeeLucero505 | Review on Hollywood Gold Awards

SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE CASE OF THE SUSSEX SKULL by Staton Rabin (inspired by the Sherlock Holmes stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle). Sick of his "penny dreadful" literary creation Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle gleefully kills off the Great Detective in "The Adventure of the Final Problem". But when Doyle is falsely accused of committing a scandalous crime - "The Sussex Skull Hoax" - in real life, and is desperate to find the real culprit in order to clear his good name, he's forced to accept coaching from the resentful "ghost" of Sherlock Holmes - who simply refuses to stay dead. | StatonRabin.com | ScreenplayMuse.com | Austin Film Festival article in Variety Magazine

SORRY CITY by Louise Schwarz. When Bess return to the city where she grew up to work a thankless temp job while helping her elderly mother recover from knee surgery, the man who crushed her, now middle-aged and hardened, heart as a young woman turns up dead. First assumed to be an accident, the death quickly becomes a preoccupation of a group of Bess's former high school friends. | LouiseSchwarz.org

THE CCO by Loyall Wilson. The people in a small town, love and trust their home grown, investment advisor - but what they don't know is all their investments are fake and he has stolen $20 million dollars of their money. Based on a true story.

THE GAMBLER by John J. Lynch. A compulsive sports gambler has until the end of the night to pay his tab. | TheGamblerShortFilm.com

THE NORTHUMBERLAND RAMPAGE by Michael Yorke. When a decorated veteran cop and his rookie partner pursue two ex-cons terrorizing a small mining community, the senior cop comes face-to-face with his war trauma and his dubious law-enforcement tactics which put everyone involved in jeopardy. Based on a true 1937 story.

THE PRINCE OF THE BLACK HAND (Pilot) by Danny Range. In pursuit of an ordinary existence, the heir to an Italian mafia organization becomes an accountant, but family loyalties, past crimes, and a mind tortured by mental illness threaten to derail his plans. | Instagram: @WarrensFinest

THE PROVIDENCE by David Garegnani (concept by David Garegnani and Christopher Guy Thorn). When the headless body of a young woman is discovered in a 19th century Kentucky town, a no-nonsense sheriff struggles to solve the bizarre case while the local preacher warns that a satanic cult is to blame. Inspired by the true story of the murder of Pearl Bryan. | Facebook | Twitter: @DavidGaregnani | LinkedIn: @DavidGaregnani

THE SECOND by Mark Anthony Wallinger. An aging boxing trainer risks all he knows, and is, to fix a boxing match for one last chance to cash out of the sport - and the life - he loves.

THEY SHALL NOT MIX by Mark R. Coast. When a former Marine, who is now a DEA Agent operating in Mexico, records a Taliban commander, who he swore he killed years earlier in Afghanistan, enforcing for a cartel kingpin, he enlists his Marine buddy, now a CIA operative, for assistance - resulting in the U.S. and Mexican president each covertly sending Marines to take out the terrorists before the story goes public.