Judd Nelson Movies

Want to know the best Judd Nelson movies?  How about the worst Judd Nelson movies?  Curious about Judd Nelson box office grosses or which Judd Nelson movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Judd Nelson 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.

Judd Nelson (1959-) is an American film and television actor.  His IMDb page shows over 120 acting credits since 1983. This page ranks Judd Nelson movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television shows, shorts, video games, documentaries and his many movies not released in North American theaters were not included in the rankings.

Drivel Part of the Page:  I admit it.  I was a huge Judd Nelson fan back in the day.  Me and my friends watched Making the Grade, Fandango and The Breakfast Club all the time back when we were in high school.  Heck back in my video store days….I recommended Nelson’s Blue City all the time….even though one review of that movie said….”It appears to have been edited with a chainsaw”.  So after spending days working on Ray Milland, I figured I would do a page on one of my favorites of yesteryear.

Judd Nelson in 1987’s From The Hip

Judd Nelson Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.

Judd Nelson 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 Judd Nelson movies by co-stars of his movies.
  • Sort Judd Nelson movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort Judd Nelson movies by domestic box office rank
  • Sort Judd Nelson movies how they were received by critics and audiences.  60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
  • Sort by how many Oscar® nominations each Judd Nelson movie received and how many Oscar® wins each Judd Nelson movie won.
  • Sort Judd Nelson 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.
  • Use the search and sort button to make this page very interactive.

Kevin Costner and Judd Nelson in 1985’s Fandango…did you even know they made a movie together?

Possibly Interesting Facts About Judd Nelson

1. Judd Asher Nelson was born in Portland, Maine in 1959.

2. Judd Nelson attended the prestigious Haverford College in Pennsylvania.

3. Judd Nelson studied acting under Stella Adler.

4. The character of Nelson Muntz on the animated series The Simpsons was said to be named after Nelson in honor of his portrayal of John Bender in The Breakfast Club.

5. Was one of the nine original members of the 1980s “brat pack”, along with Andrew McCarthy, Mare Winningham, Anthony Michael Hall, Demi Moore, Rob Lowe, Molly Ringwald, Emilio Estevez and Ally Sheedy

6. Judd Nelson and Breakfast Club Trivia 1:  Nelson and John Hughes did not get along during the film of that now classic movie.  At one point Hughes almost fired Nelson.  Their conflict is one of the reasons a Breakfast Club 2 never got made.

7. Judd Nelson and Breakfast Club Trivia 2:  At the very closing part of the film where Bender raises his fist in defiance, that was actually ad libbed. He was supposed to just walk into the sunset, so to speak, and John Hughes asked him to play around with a few actions. When he was done and they were finishing up, Nelson threw his fist up without running it by anyone. Everyone loved it, and it has become an iconic symbol of the 1980’s.

8. Judd Nelson and Breakfast Club Trivia 3John Cusack and Nicolas Cage were the first choices for the John Bender role.

9. Judd Nelson received a Best Actor Golden Globe® nomination for the mini-series…The Billionaire Boys Club (1987).

10. Check out Judd Nelson’s career compared to current and classic actors.  Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.

Academy Award® and Oscar® are the registered trademarks of the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences.  Golden Globe® is a registered trademark of the Hollywood Foreign Press.

36 thoughts on “Judd Nelson Movies

  1. HI BRUCE

    In tandem with Steve’s Great Brit season there seems to be a Great Bruce season on the go because I appear to be turning up movies about YOUR idols.

    As I told you there was an Archie Leach movie documentary on TV a week or so ago and up and coming on the Box is as said in my other post Sir M’s Harry Brown [though I claim that one for myself too!].

    Now I find that in a week’s time as part of its ongoing season of Christmas movies one of my TV channels is showing 2010’s “Cancel Christmas” starring Judd Nelson as Santa Clause who must teach two children not to be greedy or else Xmas will be cancelled.

    IMDB gives I just a 58% rating but I’ll watch it just to see Judd for Old Time Sake. Judd is said to be worth $8 million at present and although for me “It would do until something better comes along.” [The Yellow Mountain 1954 starring Lex Barker] it is a mere bagatelle compared with the $150 million his old St Elmos Fire Brat Pack partner Gimme More is said to be worth.

    1. Well that is strange….one of the movies in my movie queue is The Night Porter starring Dirk Boragde. As for Cancel Christmas….gotta admit…I have not even heard of that Nelson movie. I guess my Judd Nelson fan card expired a few years ago…lol. $8 million is pretty good total…not thinking those direct to dvd movies pay a whole lot of money. Good stuff.

      1. HI BRUCE

        Thanks for the feedback.

        Cancel Christmas is a made-for-TV-movie. There are numerous production lines across the TV studios churning them out for Christmas each year. The titles are all hyperbolic seasonal novelty ones that invariably work the word “Christmas” or “Santa” into them, such as “Single Santa seeks Mrs Claus” and “The Town that Hated Christmas”!

        1. Hey Bob….thanks for the information on Judd’s Santa movie…..I agree with you about how the TV studios can churn out these Xmas movies. Good feedback.

  2. HI BRUCE

    1 You and I exchanged interesting [at least to me] posts about Judd in Feb this year and since then he has done nothing at the box office according to your chart above and I know you always check for new releases when doing an update.

    2 He seems to have been busy enough though as IMDB list several projects in the pipeline for him. However in none of them does he appear to have more than a secondary role and the film themselves do not seem to be prestige productions. Accordingly I have come to accept that a Sinatra/Brando comeback from the wilderness to the mainstream is on the cards as nobody is likely to offer Judd a Maggio or a Done Corelone part..

    3 Anyway good to see this site still keeps Judd in mind.

    1. Hey Bob. When I saw Judd was 58….I felt the need to share his page again. Being one of the last Judd fans…..I sometimes think I am like Will Smith/Charlton/Vincent Price in I Am Legend/ Omega Man/Last Man on Earth….walking around an empty city….lol

      I agree he has been very very busy. Probably the most active Brat Packer out there…..that is the good news…the bad news is…..his movies are never heard from….even when they are brand new. I bet the budgets are less than $500,000 for most of his movies these days.

      I also agree…there is no Brando/Sinatra comeback coming. Here come the drums…as I end the comment….Simple Minds’ drums starting up…..”Don’t you…..don’t you forget about me”….love that song from the Breakfast club.

  3. GOOD MORNING BRUCE
    1 I think that that in terms of stardom and earnings Demi Moore was the most successful of the so called Brat Pack in movies. People might know Emilio Estevez largely because of his Sheen family connection and TV audiences who watched The West Wing would undoubtedly be familiar with Rob Lowe but possibly not many cinema-goers would know too much about the other Brat Packers mentioned above.

    2 After I had watched The Breakfast Club and St Elmos Fire I could not have said who acted John Bender and Alex Newbary in those films respectively. However I subsequently saw the Relentless movies in the 4 of which Leo Rossi played detective Sam Dietz who hunted down serial killers. In the first of the series in 1989 Nelson was the serial killer and his performance impressed me so I checked out his career and was sorry to see that it had not developed as well as it might have. Accordingly I was pleased at the appearance of this page devoted to Judd.

    3 I should add that I had rented all 4 Relentless movies from the local video library back in the early 1990s and until I saw the table above I never realised that any of the quartet had been given a cinematic release and in fact it seems that the other 3 did go straight to video. Despite its relatively low gross one has to assume that Nelson’s Relentless turned a profit overall or else the 3 Rossi solo sequels are unlikely to have been made.

    1. Hey Bob…..a nice surprise to see you commenting on this Judd Nelson page. Wow ….Relentless is the one that caught your attention….that is even more surprising. Actually despite the low rating here …..it got decent reviews at the time. It was the last starring role for him…at least in movies released in theaters. I actually saw it in theaters….and found it an enjoyable movie. I knew they made part 2….but parts 3 and 4 were unknown to me.

      I agree Demi Moore had the best movie career of that bunch…but most of the brat pack faded quickly. I recently did a tweet about the average age of the Breakfast Club….they are currently almost 53 as a group….I find that shocking… how can that be? Good feedback as always.

      1. BRUCE

        1 Actually although Leo Rossi was the lead actor in the quartet of Relentless/Sam Dietz movies in the 1989 Judd Nelson one Judd got top billing which suggests that at that point at least he was still getting some of the reflected glory from Breakfast Club and St Elmos Fire.

        2 When one sees some of the old Brat Packers these days it is usually on TV in either a series of a made for TV movie. For example I saw Mare Winningham recently in a very minor role in a few episodes of the TV series The Affair. It also had Brendan Fraser in a couple of sporadic cameo turns which suggested to me that he has fallen on hard times since his Mummy and Sir Maurice Micklewhite days.

        1. Hey Bob….yep Relentless was Judd’s Alamo….his last stand….after it struggled he was doomed to low budget movies. Yep the Brat Packers with the exception of Emilio pop up all over the place in tv roles or low budget movies…even Demi is returning to television.

          1. Yep she signed up for a role in season 4 of Empire….which Judd landed a role on as well….I think he appeared on season 1 and 2. Now they need Ally Sheedy….lol.

  4. Hi Bruce
    I was a huge fan of Judd Nelson as well. “Breakfast Club” will always be a favorite of mine but everybody should check out “From the Hip” & “Blue City” – Brings back good memories…
    Judd Nelson was probably the only one I really liked from the original “brat pack”

    1. Hey Søren….glad to see somebody that I agrees with me. Breakfast Club is a classic….and he by far has the best role in the movie. I saw From The Hip a few times in packed theaters….and each time there was major laughter…especially in the courtroom scenes…which seemed crazy were actually based on real life court room events. As for Blue City…I still like the Ry Cooder music…but I acknowledge this is not a good movie…but I found it entertaining. Actually since writing this page…I have had an itch to watch one of the Nelson movies….apparently I never bought Blue City on DVD….so I sadly no longer have it in my house to watch. It went away when I got rid of my massive VHS collection. Glad we have the same “good memories” of the mid 1980s.

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