AFI Top 50 Screen Legends

Katharine Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart and Grace Kelly just 3 of the AFI Top 50 Screen Legends

Sometime in 2011 we decided it would be fun to do a Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) movie page on the AFI Top 50 Screen Legends.  The AFI list of the top 50 greatest screen legends in American film history, included 25 male and 25 female stars. The list was unveiled by the American Film Institute on June 15, 1999.  The American Film Institute defined an “American screen legend” as an actor or a team of actors during the classic film era with a significant screen presence in American feature-length films whose screen debut occurred in or before 1950, or whose screen debut occurred after 1950 but whose death has marked a completed body of work.

When we started doing these pages 6 of the 50 Screen Legends were still alive.  Sadly Elizabeth Taylor, Shirley Temple and Lauren Bacall passed away before we could finish our quest.  Kirk Douglas, Sidney Poitier and Sophia Loren are still alive and well.  Douglas will be 100 later this year…and just last week we received an autograph from that screen legend…but that is another story.  After spending the last 5 years looking at the AFI list…we can say we like the list…BUT….there is one massive injustice.  How Olivia de Havilland did not make the list makes no sense to us….ok done ranting.

The first AFI screen legend we researched and wrote about was Clark Gable….the last AFI screen legend we did was Mary Pickford.  Between the Gable and Pickford pages….5 years passed, we changed our website home 2 times, we took a statistical look at 2,267 movies and we saw our classic movie pages become the most popular on our website….easily kicking our current movie star pages to the curb.  So we decided to put all 50 of our AFI Screen Legends on one page.  Each link below will take you to that star’s UMR page….where you will find box office grosses, reviews and awards for every single movie that star made during their career.  John Wayne and Robert Mitchum are tied with the most movies (83) while James Dean has the least (3 movies).

afi top 25 actors

AFI’s Top 25 Screen Legend Actors….with links to our movie pages on the Screen Legend

1.   Humphrey Bogart  58 Movies Ranked….from Casablanca (1942) to Swing Your Lady (1938)
2.   Cary Grant 58 Movies Ranked… from North by Northwest (1959) to Born To Be Bad (1934)
3.   James Stewart 73 Movies Ranked Mr. Smith Goes to Washington(1939) to Big Sleep(1978)
4.   Marlon Brando 37 Movies Ranked….from The Godfather (1972) to Christopher Columbus (1992)
5.   Fred Astaire 39 Movies Ranked The Towering Inferno (1974) to The Amazing Dobermans (1976)
6.   Henry Fonda 81 Movies Ranked… On Golden Pond (1981) to City on Fire (1979)
7.   Clark Gable 63 Movies Ranked….from Gone With The Wind (1939) to Parnell (1937)
8.   James Cagney 61 Movies Ranked….from Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) to Boy Meets Girl (1938)
9.   Spencer Tracy 53 Movies Ranked….from Boy’s Town (1938) to Up the River (1930)
10. Charles Chaplin 12 Movies Ranked….from The Kid (1921) to A Countess from Hong Kong (1967)
11. Gary Cooper 67 Movies Ranked….from Sergeant York (1941) to Fighting Caravans (1931)
12. Gregory Peck 53 Movies Ranked To Kill a Mockingbird(1962) to Amazing Grace & Chuck(1987)
13. John Wayne 83 Movies Ranked….from True Grit (1969) to Brannigan (1975)
14. Laurence Olivier 48 Movies Ranked….from Rebecca (1940) to Inchon (1982)
15. Gene Kelly 40 Movies Ranked….from Anchors Aweigh (1945) to Viva Knievel! (1977)
16. Orson Welles 75 Movies Ranked….from Citizen Kane (1941) to Treasure Island (1972)
17. Kirk Douglas 71 Movies Ranked….from Spartacus (1960) to Diamonds (1999)
18. James Dean 3 Movies Ranked….from East of Eden (1955) to Giant (1956)
19. Burt Lancaster 67 Movies Ranked From Here to Eternity (1953) to Executive Action (1973)
20. Marx Brothers 18 Movies Ranked….from Horse Feathers (1932) to The Story of Mankind (1957)
21. Buster Keaton 28 Movies Ranked….from The Cameraman (1928) to The Intruder (1936)
22. Sidney Poitier 46 Movies Ranked….from In the Heat of the Night (1967) to Fast Forward (1985)
23. Robert Mitchum 83 Movies Ranked….from The Longest Day (1962) to Matilda (1978)
24. Edward G. Robinson 67 Movies Ranked 10 Commandments(1956) to BiggestBundleofAll(1968)
25. William Holden 66 Movies Ranked….from The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) to Ashanti (1979)

afi

America Film Institutes’ Top 25 Screen Legend Actress and UMR’s Links That Rank All Of Their Movies.

1.  Katharine Hepburn  43 Movies Ranked..On Golden Pond (1981) to Grace Quigley (1985)
2.  Bette Davis 79 Movies Ranked…from All About Eve (1950) to Wicked Stepmother (1989)
3.  Audrey Hepburn 24 Movies Ranked…from My Fair Lady (1964) to The All Laughed (1981)
4.  Ingrid Bergman  32 Movies Ranked..Gaslight(1944) to Files of Mrs. Basil E.Frankweiler(1973)
5.  Greta Garbo 24 Movies Ranked.. from Ninotchka (1939) to Torrent (1928)
6.  Marilyn Monroe 23 Movies Ranked…from Some Like It Hot (1959) to Ladies of the Chorus (1948)
7.  Elizabeth Taylor 47 Movies Ranked..Who’s Afraid of Va.Woolf?(1966) to A Little Night Music(1977)
8.  Judy Garland 31 Movies Ranked…from A Star Is Born (1954) to I Could Go On Singing (1963)
9.  Marlene Dietrich 30 Movies Ranked…from Shanghai Express (1932) to Just A Gigolo (1978)
10. Joan Crawford 72 Movies Ranked…from Mildred Pierce (1945) to The Law of the Range (1928)
11. Barbara Stanwyck 72 Movies Ranked.. Double Indemnity (1944) to The Bride Walks Out (1936)
12. Claudette Colbert 48 Movies Ranked..It Happened One Night(1934) to Royal Affairs(1954)
13. Grace Kelly 11 Movies Ranked.. from The Country Girl (1954) to Green Fire (1954)
14. Ginger Rogers 54 Movies Ranked.. from Kitty Foyle (1940) to The Groom Wore Spurs (1951)
15. Mae West 12 Movies Ranked.. from She Done Him Wrong (1933) to Sextette (1978)
16. Vivien Leigh 15 Movies Ranked.. from Gone With The Wind (1939) to Dark Journey (1937)
17. Lillian Gish 31 Movies Ranked.. from Intolerance (1916) to Hambone and Hillie (1983)
18. Shirley Temple 37 Movies Ranked.. from Since You Went Away (1944) to Honeymoon (1947)
19. Rita Hayworth 35 Movies Ranked.. from Gilda (1946) to The Naked Zoo (1970)
20. Lauren Bacall 36 Movies Ranked.. from To Have and Have Not (1944) to Diamonds (1999)
21. Sophia Loren 29 Movies Ranked.. from El Cid (1961) to Firepower (1979)
22. Jean Harlow 22 Movies Ranked.. from The Public Enemy (1931) to Riffraff (1936)
23. Carole Lombard 39 Movies Ranked from My Man Godfrey (1936) to It Pays To Advertise(1931)
24. Mary Pickford 31 Movies Ranked.. from The Little Princess (1917) to Rosita (1923)
25. Ava Gardner 40 Movies Ranked.. from The Killers (1946) to City on Fire (1979)
The amount of hours that went into this quest is mind boggling....but now that it is over....gotta admit...damn glad I did it. Of course that brings out the question...What Now?

The amount of hours that went into this quest is mind boggling….but now that it is over….gotta admit…damn glad we did it. Of course that brings out the question…What Now?

174 thoughts on “AFI Top 50 Screen Legends

  1. Mr Cogerson,
    Your site is incredible; been visiting it for years. Not much I can’t say about movies from directors to stars to editors to cinematographers to scores and I find your index incredible.

    However….

    Robert Taylor

    1. Hey Marcel…..thanks for the kind words. The upcoming schedule of pages….Peter Sellers next….then a modern star….and then….drumroll….we will get a Robert Taylor published. Thanks again for a great comment…glad you have enjoyed our website for so long.

      1. Sounds like I will have lots to say about the next and third pages coming up. Must say that as a fan of Hitch and The Birds that when I see R.Taylor I think Rod taylor first and not Robert. But that is okay.

        1. Yep Flora….Peter Sellers is almost done….had to do that one a little different….because he has so many British films that barely got released in North America. I am thinking after I do a page on Robert Taylor…I will stop getting Taylor and Robert Montgomery mixed up anymore One day we will do a page on Rod….but Rob will be here soon.

          1. Robert Montgomery is the FATHER OF ELIZABETH MONTGMORY – Star of the TV show Betwitched. They look EXACTLY alike.

            Robert Taylor looks like Montgomery only had dark hair.

            Remember how I keep talking about Hollywood families?

            Well, Robert and Elizabeth Montgomery are my favourite father and daughter.

          2. Thanks Flora. I did not realize that Bewitched’s Elizabeth was the daughter of Robert’s…interesting stuff. They are a great father and daughter team. Thanks for shedding the light on them.

  2. If there is a living ledgend list, I would suggest number one on the list should be, singer,dancer and actress, Doris Day.

    1. Hey Johnny….I have been toying with doing my very own list…that would cover the years 1950 to 2010…..and Doris Day would easily have one of those spots. She was a class act….so glad that she is alive and well. Thanks for stopping by.

  3. Well, I can say that I know many names on the list. However, I have a great appreciation for Cary Grant. And all that is thanks to you. Well done sir! Very nice page. A great collection of work. Did you find it hard to stay focused over 5 years?

    1. Thank you Bryan…..for checking out the end of my 5 year project. Glad you have an appreciation for Cary Grant. Focused? Not really….granted doing some of the silent stars were pretty frustrating….I though finding box office stuff for the 1930s was bad….that was nothing compared to the search for box office grosses for movies the 1910s and 1920s. Appreciate you stopping by.

    1. Hey Guil….I agree with you 100%…everytime I see her I wonder why her beauty is not more known amongst current movie fans….she practically jumps off the screen….she has a very modern look….even in movies that are almost 80 years old. Thanks for the comment.

    1. Hey Terrie G. I have a page on Irene Dunne….she makes a great case to be on the AFI Top 25. I think the actor list makes more sense than the actress list. Thanks for checking out my AFI page.

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