Best Spy Film

“Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation” details Ethan Hunt’s confrontation with a newly formed global syndicate of rogue spies. The film expands the IMF’s universe and introduces compelling new characters like Ilsa Faust. It is significant within the franchise for its scale and action sequences while a...

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol is a 2010 espionage thriller centered on a team of IMF operatives investigating a breach at the Kremlin’s nuclear launch control center. The film gained attention for Tom Cruise's daring Burj Khalifa climb and explores themes of international security and covert...

The Spy Gone North details the true story of Park Chae-seo, a South Korean intelligence officer who infiltrated North Korea in the 2010s. Her undercover operation, undertaken to rescue her kidnapped brother, highlights the significant challenges and risks involved in covert operations within the hea...

The film Night Train to Munich depicts a perilous 1940s mission during World War II. British intelligence operative Alec Carey is tasked with extracting a captured scientist from Berlin before Nazi forces can exploit his knowledge. Starring Michael Redgrave and Alastair Kelland, the story highlights...

Madras Cafe depicts events surrounding India’s involvement in Sri Lanka’s civil war during the early 2000s. The film explores the political complexities and consequences of Rajiv Gandhi's actions leading up to the assassination of Tamil leader Sivarasan. It is notable for its realistic portrayal of...

Vishwaroopam is a 2013 Indian spy thriller film written, directed by, and starring Kamal Haasan. The film was simultaneously shot in Tamil and Hindi and features Haasan as Vishwanath, a Kathak dance teacher in New York who is actually a RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) intelligence agent. The narrat...

The Man Who Never Was is a 1956 British World War II spy film directed by Ronald Neame. Based on the nonfiction book by Ewen Montagu, the film meticulously dramatizes the real-life Operation Mincemeat. This 1943 British military deception involved planting fictitious classified documents on a deceas...

Carve Her Name with Pride is a 1958 British war film directed by Lewis Gilbert and starring Virginia McKenna. The narrative dramatizes the true story of Violette Szabo, a Special Operations Executive (SOE) agent who was parachuted into occupied France during World War II. Captured by German forces,...

Funeral in Berlin is a 1966 British spy film directed by Guy Hamilton and based on the 1964 novel of the same name by Len Deighton. The film features Michael Caine reprising his role as the working-class British intelligence officer Harry Palmer. Set against the backdrop of a divided Cold War-era Be...

The Deadly Affair is a 1967 British espionage film directed by Sidney Lumet, adapted from John le Carré's debut novel Call for the Dead. Starring James Mason as a veteran intelligence officer whose investigation into a foreign diplomat's suicide uncovers a complex web of betrayal, the film alters th...

Cliff Walkers is a 2021 Chinese spy thriller directed by Zhang Yimou. The film is set in the 1930s puppet state of Manchukuo and follows a team of four Communist Party of China agents who parachute into the region on a covert extraction mission. It was selected as China's official entry for the Best...

Confessions of a Nazi Spy is a 1939 American espionage drama directed by Anatole Litvak and starring Edward G. Robinson as an FBI agent. Inspired by a real espionage investigation, it depicts a German-American spy network gathering military information inside the United States. Released before the c...

Traitor is a 2008 American espionage thriller directed by Jeffrey Nachmanoff and starring Don Cheadle and Guy Pearce. Cheadle plays Samir Horn, a former U.S. military operative whose apparent involvement with an international terrorist organization places him under FBI investigation. The film combin...

"The Berlin File" is a 2013 South Korean spy action film written and directed by Ryoo Seung-wan. The story follows a North Korean intelligence agent stationed in Berlin who is betrayed by his superiors after a clandestine weapons deal goes wrong. While attempting to uncover the conspiracy, he become...

"13 Rue Madeleine" is a 1947 American espionage thriller directed by Henry Hathaway. The plot centers on a group of agents trained by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) who are dispatched on a dangerous mission into Nazi-occupied France during World War II. The film stars James Cagney as a deter...

The Assignment is a 1997 spy thriller directed by Christian Duguay, starring Aidan Quinn as Annibal Ramirez, a naval officer who bears a striking resemblance to the notorious terrorist Carlos the Jackal. Donald Sutherland plays a CIA operative who recruits Ramirez to participate in an elaborate oper...

A Call to Spy is a 2019 historical drama centered on women recruited into Britain's Special Operations Executive (SOE) during the Second World War, focusing on handler Vera Atkins and agents Noor Inayat Khan and Virginia Hall. The film dramatizes the SOE's efforts to deploy operatives into occupied...

Cloak and Dagger is a 1946 American spy film directed by Fritz Lang. Gary Cooper plays Alvah Jesper, an American scientist recruited by the Office of Strategic Services to contact European scientists involved in Germany's wartime nuclear research. The mission takes him through Switzerland and Italy,...

Secretly, Greatly is a 2013 South Korean spy action comedy-drama adapted from Hun's webtoon Covertness. Its premise centers on North Korean infiltrators sent undercover in South Korea, combining espionage with comic and dramatic situations created by their concealed identities. The film belongs to t...

The Riddle of the Sands is a 1979 British spy film adapted from Erskine Childers's 1903 novel of the same name. It is an early invasion-scare espionage story, using a maritime setting and concerns about Germany to build tension before the First World War. The film is associated with naval and prewar...

Scorpio is a 1973 American spy thriller directed by Michael Winner. Burt Lancaster plays Cross, a veteran CIA operative caught in an internal Cold War struggle and marked for elimination, while Alain Delon plays Scorpio, the French assassin assigned to pursue him. The film treats espionage as a conf...

O.S.S. is a 1946 American spy film set in occupied France during World War II. It follows agents of the Office of Strategic Services as they carry out clandestine missions involving resistance networks, intelligence, and danger behind German lines. Released shortly after the war, the film belongs to...

Above Suspicion is a 1943 American spy thriller directed by Richard Thorpe and starring Joan Crawford and Fred MacMurray. Adapted from Helen MacInnes's 1941 novel, it follows newlyweds Richard and Frances Myles as they undertake a British intelligence mission while traveling through Europe on the ev...

Khufiya is a 2023 Hindi-language Indian spy thriller directed by Vishal Bhardwaj. It adapts Amar Bhushan's espionage novel Escape to Nowhere and follows an intelligence operative investigating a suspected mole within India's Research and Analysis Wing, commonly called RAW. The film combines an inter...

A Dandy in Aspic is a 1968 British spy film adapted from Derek Marlowe's novel. Laurence Harvey plays Alexander Eberlin, a British intelligence officer secretly working for the Soviet Union, whose assignment places him inside a conflict involving rival agents and divided Cold War Europe. The film wa...

Our Kind of Traitor is a 2016 British spy thriller directed by Susanna White and adapted from John le Carré's novel. Ewan McGregor and Naomie Harris play a British couple who meet Dima, a Russian money launderer portrayed by Stellan Skarsgård, while on holiday. Dima asks them to carry information to...

Naam Shabana is a 2017 Indian Hindi-language spy action thriller directed by Shivam Nair. The film follows Shabana Khan, played by Taapsee Pannu, as she is recruited and trained for an intelligence operation. It is a spin-off and prequel to the 2015 film Baby, expanding the fictional Indian intellig...

Bell Bottom is a 2021 Indian Hindi-language spy thriller directed by Ranjit M. Tewari and starring Akshay Kumar. The story follows an Indian intelligence officer involved in an operation to rescue passengers after an aircraft hijacking. It is set against the backdrop of hijacking incidents affecting...

Tiger 3 is a 2023 Indian Hindi-language spy action film directed by Maneesh Sharma and produced by Yash Raj Films. Salman Khan reprises his role as Avinash Singh Rathore, an Indian intelligence agent known by the code name Tiger, with Katrina Kaif returning as Zoya. The film continues the Tiger seri...