Joe MacBeth is a 1955 British gangster film directed and co-written by Ken Hughes and starring Paul Douglas, Ruth Roman and Bonar Colleano. It is a modern retelling of Shakespeare's Macbeth, set in a 1930s American criminal underworld. The film's plot closely follows that of Shakespeare's original play. It has been called "the first really stand out movie" of Hughes' career.

Mob trigger man Joe "Mac" MacBeth assassinates Tommy, second-in-command to crime boss "Duke" Duca, on Duke's orders and then proceeds to his own wedding, where his bride Lily scolds him for being two hours late. As they celebrate their marriage that night at Duke's nightclub, fortune teller Rosie declares that Joe's destiny is to become the kingpin of the mob. The ruthlessly ambitious Lily is convinced of the fortune's inevitability, but Joe brushes it off. Almost immediately after Rosie leaves, however, Duke arrives and rewards Joe with a promotion to Tommy's old position and his prized lakeside mansion.

Duke's mob soon goes to war with a rival outfit run by the gluttonous Big Dutch. After Big Dutch's men turn the tables and make inroads on Duke's territory, Joe pays the rival boss a personal visit at a restaurant and secretly poisons a dish. Once Joe departs, Big Dutch devours the tainted food, then dies on the spot.

During an overnight party at the lakeside mansion to celebrate Big Dutch's demise, Lily continues to goad Joe into going after Duke, but Joe hesitates. The festivities end with Duke inviting Lily to go for a swim. Once in the water, Joe stabs his boss in the back and holds him under until he is dead, but he is shaken by the act and fails to remove the knife, forcing Lily to dive in and recover the murder weapon. In the morning, when Duke's bodyguards come to pick him up and he cannot be found, Lily claims to have discovered Duke's robe by the lake and suggests he drowned while swimming. Joe is immediately elevated to kingpin and he promotes his friend Banky to his right-hand man.

Banky's son Lennie resents Joe's rapid rise, asserting that his father served Duke long before Joe came along. He also openly casts suspicion on Duke's death. The loyal Banky beats Lennie for the insubordination, but urges Joe to set his son up with a small business so that his family can leave the criminal life. Later, Joe and Banky come across Rosie again, and she claims Joe is being overshadowed by his friend. The men laugh off Rosie's words, but shortly after, Joe hires a pair of hitmen from out of town to eliminate Banky and Lennie; Banky dies, but Lennie escapes, and Lily berates Joe for not doing the job himself.

At a banquet where Lennie unexpectedly shows up, Joe begins to be haunted by nightmares and visions of the men he betrayed. Lennie entertains plans of usurping Joe as the latter's erratic behavior disturbs the rank-and-file members. Meanwhile, Joe sends the hitmen to kidnap Lennie's wife, Ruth, and their daughter to rein the upstart in, but they botch the job. Lily discovers the bodies when she visits Ruth's house and is traumatized. The brutal act also alienates Marty, Joe's last ally in the mob.

That night, Marty warns Joe that Lennie is coming for him. Joe orders the hitmen to guard the mansion while he tends to Lily, but the mercenaries decide to make a run for it and are gunned down by Lennie. Panicked and paranoid, Joe closes himself in a dark room with a machine gun and starts shooting wildly at the slightest movements. When the doors to the room open, he fires at them and kills Lily. As Joe rushes to his wife's side, Lennie then personally executes Joe. Angus, the mansion's longtime butler, suggests that Lennie is the new master of the mansion and therefore the mob, but Lennie disagrees and tells Angus to look for a new job.

In 1941, it was announced Philip Yordan had written a play Joe MacBeth which updated Shakespeare's play to the Chicago gang wars. Arthur Vinton was considering producing.