Running Scared is a 2006 crime film written and directed by Wayne Kramer and released by New Line Cinema. The film stars Paul Walker, Cameron Bright, Vera Farmiga, Chazz Palminteri and Alex Neuberger. It was released in the United States on February 24, 2006.

The film is rated R by the MPAA for 'pervasive strong brutal violence and language, sexuality and drug content'.

Joey Gazelle (Paul Walker) is a low-level mobster who disposes of guns used in mob crimes. He hides these guns in the basement of his house instead of disposing of them properly. During a botched drug deal his boss uses a distinctive silver .38 to kill a crooked cop. His son Nicky (Alex Neuberger) and Nicky's best friend Oleg (Cameron Bright) witness him hide the gun. Oleg is the stepson of a psychotic Russian mobster, Anzor Yugorsky (Karl Roden), who abuses both Oleg and his mother. Oleg steals the .38 and shoots, but does not kill, Anzor. Later Oleg tells Anzor that he is sorry he missed.

Joey now has the dirty cop (Palminteri) from the botched drug deal hunting him to recover the silver .38 as the weapon changes hands in an underworld of freaks, pimps, hookers and pedophiles. Oleg is also hunted as he can connect Joey to the gun.

Oleg meets a friendly prostitute and is invited into the home of a seemingly normal couple. They take Oleg and two other children to an apartment that they use to film child pornography. The couple have an assortment of knives in a cupboard. Oleg manages to contact Teresa but when she arrives at the house, the couple deny that he is there or that they have ever seen him.

Teresa insists in having a look around the house herself. The couple says that only their own two children are there, and show them sleeping. Teresa notices that there are no photographs of their children on display and finds Oleg in a cupboard, with a bag over his head, slowly suffocating. The child molesters offer her $100,000 to just leave with Oleg, but she does not accept the money. She calls the police to report a shooting, and then kills the couple, saving the other two children who would have been abused and killed.

Oleg is described during the search as a boy who "never smiles". Only at the end, when he is invited to a sports event, does he eventually smile.

The film is heavily influenced by the films of Walter Hill, Brian De Palma, and Sam Peckinpah.

The film is also influenced by the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm and others. The story of a young child trying to escape a dark, terrifying world has been used in such stories as Alice in Wonderland, Little Red Riding Hood and Pinochio.

There are several references to the novels Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass. For example Oleg's terrifying journey begins when a bullet is shot through a window, which the camera moves through often, as if it is a looking glass. The pimp is reminicsent of the Mad Hatter, and the hobo whose smile shines in the darkness; the chesire cat. A prostitute who helps Oleg is similar to the Blue Fairy from Pinochio.

The film opened on 1611 screens in the United States and grossed a total of 3.1 million dollars in its opening weekend. A small majority of critics have praised the film's balls-to-the-wall attitude (especially in the film's first six minutes) and Paul Walker's surprisingly good performance, while the rest hated the film's gratuitous material and lack of sympathetic characters.