Want to know the best Humphrey Bogart movies? How about the worst Humphrey Bogart movies? Curious about Humphrey Bogart ’s box office grosses or which Humphrey Bogart movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Humphrey Bogart movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which got the worst reviews? Well you have come to the right place….because we have all of that information.
Did you know that the American Film Institute ranked Humphrey Bogart as the greatest male star in the history of American cinema? Bogart however did not find an easy road to the title of greatest male star ever. After trying numerous jobs including playing chess for money he turned to acting in 1921. He found regular work on Broadway through the rest of the 1920s. When the Great Depression reduced the demand for plays, he turned his attention to movies. His first full length film was 1930’s Up the River which was directed by a very young John Ford and co-starred Spencer Tracy (also his first film). His first movie contract with Fox Films was terminated when they concluded he was not star material. Shortly there after he signed with Warner Brothers. Warner Brothers gave Bogart plenty of work from 1936 to 1940.
He appeared in twenty movies in that time frame, almost all the movies were low budget B movies. He did manage to get strong notices from two of the movies made during this time….1936’s The Petrified Forest and 1937’s Dead End. So by the end of the 1930s, Bogart either appeared as the one of stars in horrible low budget film, or as the 3rd or 4th lead in a higher budgeted movie. In the higher budgeted movies he would usually get the cowardly bad guy role and many times killed by James Cagney.
Two films in 1941 changed everything for Bogart. High Sierra was a surprise hit, it did very well at the box office and critics loved the movie and proved Bogart could carry a film. Later that year The Maltese Falcon was released to even bigger box office and an Oscar® nomination for Best Picture. After the success of those two films, Bogart found himself in better movies. In 1942 he made his greatest film, Casablanca. Bogart’s role of Rick in Casablanca would cement his trademark film persona, that of the hard-boiled cynic who ultimately shows his noble side. Bogart would appear in 29 more movies from 1943 to 1956, all of which were big budget and he was always the star. Some of his greatest success during this time would include 1944’s To Have and Have Not (his first film with 4th wife Lauren Bacall), 1951’s African Queen (won Oscar® for this movie), 1954’s The Caine Mutiny (his biggest box office hit) and 1956’s The Harder They Fall (his final movie). Humphrey Bogart passed away in early 1957 after a battle with cancer. John Huston’s eulogy says it all… “He is quite irreplaceable. There will never be another like him.”
His IMDb page shows 85 acting credits from 1928-1956. This page will rank Humphrey Bogart movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television appearances, shorts, cameos and uncredited movies that were included in the rankings.
Humphrey Bogart Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
Humphrey Bogart Movies Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.
- Sort Humphrey Bogart movies by co-stars of his movies
- Sort Humphrey Bogart movies by actual domestic box office grosses
- Sort Humphrey Bogart movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost
- Sort Humphrey Bogart movies how they were received by critics and audiences. 60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie
- Sort by how many Oscar® nominations and how many Oscar® wins each Humphrey Bogart movie received.
- Sort Humphrey Bogart movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score. UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
Humphrey Bogart Adjusted World Wide Box Office Grosses
Let’s take a quick moment to look at two of Bogart’s worst movies. Don’t worry you Bogart fans he thought these two movies were horrible too.
1937’s Swing That Lady: Bogart plays a wrestling promoter who brings his wrestler Joe, to the Ozarks, to wrestle a female hillbilly Amazon named Sadie Hills….naturally Bogart falls in love with Sadie and they all live happily ever after in this musical comedy…..Bogart’s thoughts on this movie….”It’s a stinker”
1938’s The Return of Dr. X: Bogart’s only science fiction movie….he plays a mad evil genius doctor who figures out a way to bring the dead back to life. For some reason Bogart refused to talk about this movie later in his life.
Check out Humprey Bogart‘s career compared to current and classic actors. Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.
AFI’s Top 25 Screen Legend Actors….with links to our movie pages on the Screen Legend
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Humphrey Bogart is in 34 movies that 100 million on your list. Sadly there are only 2 movies he made that still have people on the current top 1000 of the Oracle of Bacon’s 2016 Center of the Hollywood Universe. You are right with Gable and same for Bogie at Warner’s, too many pictures with the same people.
Action in the North Atlantic (1943) – 809 Robert MItchum
The Harder They Fall (1956) – 112 Rod Steiger, 912 Arthur Tovey
Hey Dan….so only Mitchum, Steiger and Arthur Tovey left standing….I wonder how far away from the Top 1000 Lauren Bacall is….because it would seem she would have lots of connections during her 60 plus year career. Bogart passed away 59 years ago…..so it makes sense most of his co-stars are not around anymore. Even a child actor of 10…would be almost 70 today if he appeared in Bogart’s last movie. Appreciate these fun looks at stars and their Oracle standings.
Lauren’s last year on was 2014 when she was 903. In 2000 she was 545.
Hey Dan….I figured she would have had to been close to the Top 1000……2014 is not too long ago….maybe she can bounce back
Stunned! This is an incredible source. Is it pretty new? As I have never seen it before and I am a huge Bogart fan. Just spent about a hour going through this.
1 As Bogie is my 6th favourite actor this is one of the updates most eagerly awaited by me since you commenced the updating exercise
2 However objectivity would suggest that perhaps fans of Wayne and Gable would have a respectable case for refuting AFI’S contention that Humph, though among the very greatest, is THE greatest.
3 Bogie’s star years were 1941-1956 during which he made 35 films (excluding cameos and the ensemble Thank Your Lucky Stars). I feel that those 35 are the true ‘Humphrey Bogart’ films.and their total adjusted box office gross is by my reckoning 4.95 Bn.
4 That’s a splendid figure for 35 movies. Also Bogie had no box office responsibility for the pre-1941 films; and when they are excluded the average of a ‘true’ Bogart movie is a whopping 142 million.
5 However the 4.95 is less than half of the individual box office totals for both Wayne and Gable.The King was a star from almost the beginning of his career and the Duke, although he did not become a Giant until 1948, was nevertheless starring in full-length lead roles in the 20 or so years up until 1948
6 A few long forgotten very-B movies apart Humph was on the other hand just a supporting actor (albeit a marvellous one) for the first decade of his career when he was simply the foil for Cagney, Robinson, Davis and Raft, and even the East Side Kids..
7 It was different when he became a star. A Journalist who had been invited to the set of The Harder They Fall watched filming of a Bogart/Steiger scene and reported that Rod was on fire and his electrifying acting seemed to dominate proceedings whereas Bogie appeared to be hanging about doing little of interest.
8 The Journalist said that he felt sorry for Bogie as the star of the film because it looked as if Rod was going to humiliate him in front of cinema audiences. However when the same journalist later watched the actual finished film he said Rod seemed almost like a background noise.and the reporter could not take his eyes off Bogie. [“Every now and again you look around and are amazed that another one of those special people has seemed to have come out of nowhere.” – Sir Anthony Hopkins.]
8 Apparently Bogie had a compulsion to seriously needle people for whom he didn’t care. On the set of Sabrina he repeatedly taunted Golden Holden with remarks such as “Done any more of your Smiling Jim roles recently?” It came to a head when Golden challenged Humph to a fight from which Bogie backed off. Ironically around that time Bogie’s publicists used to have him described as The Screen’s Toughest Guy’.
9 Anyway thanks again Bruce for a most detailed and comprehensive update that amazingly includes grosses for 8 extra early Bogie movies. That leads me to another request. A few years ago I saw on the Internet a separate AFI list of the greatest all-time ACTORS as distinct from LEGENDS. There were some marked differences between the legends and the actors lists in relation to selections and ranking orders. Also I think the actors’ list may have included modern stars such as DeNiro.
10. Try as I might I have never been able to turn up that list again. But you are The Man when it comes to research; so any chance that you can find the time to see if you can unearth it and
reproduce it for your readers?
Best wishes BOB
Hey Bob.
1. Glad you found the updated page…your 6th favorite actor really benefited from the new box office numbers…as he is now in the Top 10 when looking at career box office….he is currently in 9th place. Not thinking two people will pass him when the updates are done…though I guess Spencer Tracy and Bing Crosby have a chance to do that.
2. I think a good argument for both men can be made…..although I think I can make a good argument for Cary Grant as the greatest…and Steve for Charlton Heston….lol.
3. I agree about his star years….after years of not including Thank Your Lucky Stars….I finally decided to include that movie here. I am sure they used the fact that he was in the movie to promote…so he should get some credit for it.
4. $142 is pretty impressive…..as is $113 for all of his movies.
5. I think it is a better comparison with Gable than Wayne…Wayne’s career was so long….while Bogart’s tragically ended before he could get another 10 years of prime acting.
6. Yep…his 1930s career was very frustrating for him….but I think appearing in so many movies…helped audiences get to know him.
7. I have read that Steiger and Bogart did not get along at all on the set off The Harder They Fall….I imagine that Bogie had alot on his mind while filming his last movie.
8. That Hopkins quote is well placed.
9. So Golden Holden and Bogie did not get along….interesting.
10. Hmmmm I will see what I can find on that separate list….sounds like it might be interesting to see.
Thanks for the detailed comment…especially the breakdown of “True Bogie” movies….good stuff to know.
BRUCE:
1 Apparently few got on with Rod Steiger; and he in turn despised virtually everybody from Brando to Elia Kazan. Karl Malden thought Rod possibly lived in a fantasy world..
2 The underlying,indeed hidden beef between Golden and Humph was reportedly over political differences. Conversely Bogie was very deferential to Edward G Robinson on the set of Key Largo as Eddie’s politics would have been nearer to his own.
3 In his autobiography Edward G tells how, although Bogie had by the time of Key Largo eclipsed him in terms of stardom, Humph would not go onto the set until “Mr Robinson” had arrived there first. If Eddie was late Bogie would often go to his dressing room and accompany him onto the set.
4 I agree with you about Grant being a [to use Bud’s expression] contender for No 1; and I take your point about the Duke and The King in terms of longevity. However whilst the former is not in my own Top 10 objectivity forbids my mind to go past the concept that Big John might well be the true No 1.[Do you think my Dad would argue with me here?] Apart from Duke’s enormous box office and his domination of Quigley in his star years he appears to be seen by many worldwide to epitomise what are supposed to be American ideals, particularly in relation to the Old West.
5 This point was I think well illustrated during the visit to the US by Breznev the Russian Leader when Richard Nixon was US President. . Nixon took him on a whirlwind helicopter
tour over several of the States and they were accompanied by a TV crew inside the copter.
At one point they were flying over a vast prairie with large herds of buffalo roaming the expanse. Breznev, who I don’t think could speak much English, tapped Nixon on the shoulder and pointed down. “John Wayne!” he chuckled.
6. However I suppose if a star was on that legends list at all he/she was obviously Hollywood ‘Royalty’ and the fine-tuning of the rankings might have been a moot exercise.
It is still a mystery to me though that at the expense of for example ‘my’ Richard, Welles as a STAR should have been anywhere on the list; he should I feel have been on some other list of for example directors or general film producers. Indeed the late Roger Ebert ** opined that the screen legends lists were “full of talent but empty of meaning.”
7. Anyway it’s all great fun. So thanks again – CARD !
**Ebert was film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times. He was the first critic to (a) be given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (b) be awarded the Pulitzer Prize for criticism.
Hey Bob.
1. Interesting about Steiger….I had not heard that before….but living in a fantasy world…is probably helpful for an actor….lol.
2. I am sure the Robinson/Bogart relationship had some huge power swings from their first work together in the mid 1930s and the latter work together in the late 1940s.
3. As for who is number one…..I think it just depends on who you ask….I did a little project that gave points for things like box office hits, critical hits and Oscar love……when looking at the total points….Wayne, Cooper, Stewart, Streep and Tracy were the Top 5. When looking at average points per movie (35 movie minimum) Streep, Tracy, Brando, Nicholson and Hanks made up the Top 5.
4. The power of John Wayne….on the minds on people thousands and thousands of miles away.
5. So glad to see you quoting Roger Ebert….my favorite critic of all time.
Thanks for the great comment.
1 Charlton Heston made the same point as you about the Bogie/Edward G power swings. All great minds think alike !!
2 I saw an interview with Steiger in which he did nothing but ‘bitch’ about his fellow movie makers; he had nothing positive to say about anybody. Malden was speaking in his capacity of, I think, President of the Actors’ Union/Association; and indeed he stopped just short of calling Steiger a liar..
3 Many of the taglines in movies the 50s were designed to promote the American macho image that Wayne very successfully personified. For example:
[Run for the Sun (1956)
WIDMARK A TIGER OF A MAN IN A SAVAGE NEW ROLE
[Alan Ladd’s 1954 Drumbeat]
JOHNNY McKAY THEY CALLED HIM INDIAN LOVER
BUT NEVER TO HIS FACE
[During the Cold War years with the old Soviet Union]
REDS LOOK OUT LADD’S ABOUT
4 Some historians reckon that Bogie owes his stardom to the unfortunate outbreak of the 2nd World War. Audiences identified Bogie, rather than the Cagney/Raft/Robinson of the 30s, as the man to take on Hitler.
5 You’re certainly churning out the updates. I transcribe most of them to my own databases*** and I can barely keep up with you !
Best wishes BOB
*** I have separate.ones for different aspects of the grosses. For example even where you don’t give the actual gross before inflation adjustment I can usually work it out reasonably well from your adjusted gross and information you have provided elsewhere; and that enables me to do my corresponding purchasing power/CPI calculations. A few months ago by doing pro rata adjustments related to your past updates, I did a for-fun provisional anticipation of your Bogie update and I got within a mere $110,000 of your updated almost 5$ Billion for Bogie’s 1941-56 35 movies. Indeed the only movie that I seriously miscalculated was Caine Mutiny, which I gave a much higher gross than you. I was pleased with myself; but of course I would have gotten nowhere without the historical data that you had worked on and provided. To paraphrase Spencer Tracy: it was still a Cogerson picture !.
Hey Bob
1. Life is way too short for someone like Steiger to be so unhappy with so many people he worked with. Seems to me he had a dream job…..that is why I like people like Tom Hanks and Chris Pratt…they are big stars…..yet seem to realize how lucky they are. I love Bruce Willis….but I do not think he feels that way at all.
2. Interesting taglines. I like the one for Run For The Sun the best.
3. Makes sense about Bogie and World War 2….he picked a good time to become a superstar….as I imagine many people had great memories of how he helped them forgot some of the troublesome news during World War 2. I really feel that is why my dad was such a war movie fan….he was 10 when the war ended….it had to have been a huge influence on his childhood.
4. There is actually a method to my madness for my updates….on my $100 million dollar page…I have picking people I know that are highly ranked when you sort by career box office….if you do that sort you will see other than Harrison Ford….the Top 25 (actors and actresses) are updated …with Spencer Tracy and Bing Crosby being the next ones to do.
5. I think I can explain why The Caine Mutiny was so different…..one of the issues with putting all the information on one line…is re-issues are a problem….so some movies look better because all their rental numbers go to the year they got released….a hit like The Caine Mutiny was rolled out a few times….those some of its rental numbers happened after its original list. For movies like that I have to manual change the number….if I did not….it would have been right there with your number you calculated.
Had to search for the comment section to start a brand new comment.
Saw that you had updated this page.
Well, I’ve seen some more Bogart films for the first time since I last commented on this page, so I’ll just give my totals.
I’ve seen 51 movies here now. Movies I saw for the first time within the last year include but are not limited to:
Black legion
The wagon Rolls at Midnight
Hey Flora…thanks for checking out our latest update. 51 for a tally count…that is pretty impressive. Looking at the previous comments…it looks like this page was first written before our tally contest started. Steve wrote he had 35 movies in his collection….so we will go with 51 for you….35 for Steve and…..counting…22 for me. Not thinking Steve has watched an additional 16 new Bogart movies in the last 5 years.
Worldwide Box Office Grosses For Select Humphrey Bogart Movies
Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) $291.60
The Roaring Twenties (1939) $204.90
Dark Victory (1939) $205.30
Thank Your Lucky Stars (1943) $269.70
Action in the North Atlantic (1943) $277.10
Passage to Marseille (1944) $321.30
Crime School (1938) $180.30
High Sierra (1941) $144.20
The Oklahoma Kid (1939) $240.60
They Drive By Night (1940) $136.90
All Through The Night (1941) $191.00
Kid Galahad (1937) $196.50
Marked Woman (1937) $149.40
Virginia City (1940) $170.30
Across the Pacific (1942) $197.70
The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (1938) $151.80
Bullets or Ballots (1936) $124.60
The Big Shot (1942) $148.00
King of the Underworld (1939) $51.40
Stand-In (1937) $79.50
Excellent Cogerson – great Update on the number 1 male movie star of all time.
Thanks Flora….calling it a night. Good day for UMR.com….lots of views and comments.
1 A long list of classic era worldwide grosses such as the Bogart ones is truly a collector’s item given the general scarcity of information about grosses other than domestic. It will go into my own database asap because, like your WW grosses for other classic stars, it demonstrates some interesting factors.
2 By my reckoning the 20 figures combined give an overall gross of 3,655,000,000 (rounded)
That is comprised of 2,490,000,000 domestic (as per your domestic grosses chart) and 1,165,000,000 foreign. So foreign gross is just approx 32% of overall gross.
3 That broadly reflects the pattern that was in the other worldwide grosses that you have provided. Frankly some of for example Joan Crawford’s worldwide grosses are abysmal.
Judy Garland’s ratio on the basis of your not -yet- updated chart were I think about 70% domestic/30% overseas.
4 That contrasts sharply with today’s market where many of the big stars, overseas grosses
exceed their domestic ones. If I recall correctly your Bruce Willis chart demonstrates that.
5 All of which suggests that the overseas market has expanded enormously since the classic era. However movies were relatively cheap to make in those days and they were churned out in large volumes. So the collective grosses of even the foreign markets were probably nothing to be sneezed at.***
6 In our exchanges about Wallace Ford you mention that Gable had got enough top billing in his time and I really laughed. That aspect of the matter never occurred to me [though I am sure it would have to Spencer Tracy].
Best wishes BOB
*** Chuck Heston opined that the routine movies that he made in the 50s other than his blockbusters would be so expensive to finance for the cinema today that they would probably have to be given to TV to produce. Tony Curtis amusingly recounted in an interview how he worked on three films simultaneously at Universal and they gave him a bike to commute around the sets, riding here in pirate’s costume and there in a cowboy outfit!
Hey Bob
1. My Warner’s Brother Ledgers only had about half of his movies listed…sadly they (the versions I have) end in 1943…just as Bogart was reaching his peak. So the amount of movies with worldwide box office is not too impressive.
2. So Bogie….had a 68/32 split for these movies….interesting…some times when I only have a worldwide total….I use 62.5% as the multiplier to calculate domestic gross…..his % is much higher than the average I calculated using 1000s of movies.
3. Joan was not the worldwide star that Greta Garbo was….or for that fact your girl Deanna was….I wish I had found some Durbin grosses.
4. I read that China would soon pass America as the biggest movie market in the world…so I agree the times are changing. I think the recent Warcraft movie is a great example of that…it struggled here…but broke records in China. In the old days the franchise would be dead….but now they have green lighted 2 more sequels based on the oversea market.
5. Glad you found my Ford tombstone comment humorous.
6. I can picture Curtis biking around in a pirate suit….that movie making process is sadly a thing of the past.