10 Best Single Location Movies

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)

This is the gold standard. I love watching the movie, but it's impossible not to think of all the parodies and rip-offs over the years. This movie has 12 jurors in a single, hot room, and it's a masterclass in escalating conflict. The location adds so much; it's stark and forces these people to concentrate on each other. And we never leave the room as these people deliberate.

2. ​Rear Window (1954)

It would be hard to pick a director I admire more than Hitchcock. He knew how to use constraints to his advantage and put them in so many of his movies. In this movie, Jimmy Stewart is stuck in a wheelchair. He can’t act. He can only watch and send his girlfriend out to do his bidding. This creates a terrifying vulnerability, proving the ultimate "show, don't tell," because showing is the only thing he can do.

3. Locke (2013)

This movie shouldn't work. I remember seeing it in theaters and being mesmerized that I was so sucked into the story. It’s JUST Tom Hardy in a car, making phone calls. But writer/director Steven Knight knows a secret: a man’s life can fall apart entirely through his phone and in the ninety minutes of a drive. The car is a confessional booth. Every call raises the stakes.

4. Buried (2010)

Man, I love this movie. It sucks to rewatch it because it is so bleak, but he writing is fantastic. Chris Sparling (friend of the pod) scripted the most contained thriller possible: it's just a man in a coffin. The location is static, so the story must be hyper-dynamic, giving him things to do in order to try to escape. Ryan Reynolds only has a dying cell phone and he has a lighter. Every call, every dwindling battery percentage, is a plot point. And it all builds and builds to its end.

5. The Breakfast Club (1985)

A single location is the perfect catalyst for forced proximity. And this is a movie about people who never hang out together, so you're adding a theme into the story. John Hughes traps five archetypes in a library and lets them loose on each other.

6. Reservoir Dogs (1992)

Okay, so we are out of the warehouse for a few scenes, but ultimately, this is a movie centered in one area. But to make this movie, Tarantino took some interesting steps. He skips the expensive heist and focuses on the cheap-to-shoot, dialogue-heavy aftermath as these robbers deal with the paranoia of "who's the rat?"

7. Rope (1948)

Another Hitchcock movie, and I could have added a few more if I wanted. The real constraint isn't just the "single take" gimmick; it's the weaponized subtext of being stuck in this apartment as more and more people arrive. We open with a murder and then build as the body is hidden. People keep coming in, and the space feels smaller and more dangerous.

8. My Dinner With Andre (1981)

This movie is your proof that you don't need anything but characters. No gun, no bomb, no murder. Just two guys talking at a restaurant. It works because the characters are fascinating and we care deeply about them.

9. Cube (1997)

Such a weird movie, but one I think you kind of have to see to believe. The location is the antagonist. We're trapped inside a puzzle box that actively tries to kill the characters. The script is a masterwork of efficiency, wisely focusing on one question: "How do we get out?" And then the story has stakes you just understand and easily root for people to solve.

10. 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)

This script is all about doubt. The underground bunker is a perfect location for a psychological thriller because it’s both a prison and a sanctuary. Are we safe in here, or is this place really the most dangerous? As our characters pose these questions, we see them play off one another, and then also deal with what's happening outside.

Summing It All Up 

Look, writing a spec is hard. Getting it made is even harder. But you don't need to write a $200 million epic to prove yourself. You just need to prove you can hold an audience's attention for 100 pages.

So, the next time you're stuck, try giving yourself a constraint. Trap your characters in a room, a car, or a coffin. When you force your characters to rely on nothing but their wits and their words, you'll be forced to rely on yours.

And good things will happen.