High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Alex Cross is a 2012 American crime thriller film starring Tyler Perry as the titular character and Matthew Fox as villain Picasso. The film is directed by Rob Cohen based on an adapted screenplay by Marc Moss and Kerry Williamson. This is the third film appearance of the character Alex Cross, the main character of a series of novels by James Patterson. Cross was previously portrayed by Morgan Freeman in Kiss the Girls (1997) and Along Came a Spider (2001). In 2010, Idris Elba was attached to star, but he was replaced by Perry. Filming took place in 2011. The film was released on October 19, 2012 in the United States and Canada.