Carlito’s Way.
It’s currently a comic book, but I hear it’s being adapted to the TV:
Cassidy the vampire from Preacher.
Man On Fire. Redemption and sacrifice all rolled into one.
About Schmidt is another one. Jack Nicholson does such a beautifully understated job. Posts on the IMDB board suggest that the last few minutes of the film aren’t to everyone’s liking, but, in fact, it’s the only moment in the entire film that Nicholson lets something else emerge from behind the composure.
This is one of the best movies on Redemption anywhere. It doesn’t matter if you were good or bad, what matters is whether you are going to get busy living, or get busy dying.
His judgment cometh, and that right soon.
I see what you did there.
The Mission
Schindler’s List
Empire of the Sun (the boy is redeemed, he is such a shit at the beginning)
The African Queen
True Grit (especially the newer version)
The Searchers
Warlords. Lynda Weismeier’s character, broken by the bad guys and reduced to begging to have sex with his minions for food, stabs a bad guy in the crotch and then runs out into machine gun fire, and despite being mortally wounded, manages to crawl to the switch that connects to the bomb that will blow up the bad guys’ defenses and push it, allowing the heroes to defeat them.
The interesting thing about her is, she’s never portrayed as evil or even slutty, what she has to redeem herself from is succumbing to the psychological effect of repeated, prolonged gang rapes and beatings.
I’ve always thought that was a really weird storyline to throw into a Roger Corman cheap-ass B-movie that otherwise had literally nothing going for it.
There’s a film version of The Rake’s Progress?
Also, what about Cars? It’s makes fun of the genre, and plays it straight at the same time. I love that movie.
In Gone with the Wind, both Scarlet and Rhett sort of find redemption, in that they became less shallow, and Scarlet becomes self-sufficient, but the ending is a downer.
There’s a film that isn’t quite what you are asking about, in that it isn’t an adventure, but it is about a person without direction finding purpose, called A Child is Waiting, with Judy Garland and Burt Lancaster. It was very topical when it was made; now, the propaganda aspect is dated, but emotionally, the film is very effective. It also features a young Steven Hill-- Adam Schiff from* Law & Order*.
Ikiru really goes after your tear ducts with pliers.
(I could have sworn I’d posted in this thread in 2003 to mention In Cold Blood, because of the pop bottles.)