Want to know the best Shirley Temple movies? How about the worst Shirley Temple movies? Curious about Shirley Temple’s box office grosses or which Shirley Temple movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Shirley Temple movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which ones got the worst reviews? Well you have come to the right place…. because we have all of that information and much more.
Shirley Temple (1928-2014) was easily the most popular and famous child star of all time. On American Film Institute’s Top 50 Screen Legends list, Temple is ranked as the 18th best actress. Right behind #17 Lillian Gish and right before #19 Rita Hayworth. That is an outstanding accomplishment for somebody that never made another movie after turning 21. In the mid 1930s she was the biggest star in Hollywood. In the 1940s her starring roles with the exception of 1945’s Kiss and Tell all flopped. From 1944 to 1949 as a supporting actress she appeared in some of her most successful movies of her career. After the sequel to Kiss and Tell (1949’s A Kiss For Corliss) flopped Shirley Temple retired from making movies. From 1950 to her death in 2014 she never appeared in another movie.
Her IMDb page shows 60 acting credits from 1932-1963. This page will rank 37 Shirley Temple movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television appearances, shorts, and bit parts were not included in the rankings.
Shirley Temple Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
Shirley Temple 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 Shirley Temple movies by co-stars of her movies
- Sort Shirley Temple movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Shirley Temple movies by yearly domestic box office rank
- Sort Shirley Temple movies by how they were received by critics and audiences. 60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
- Sort by how many Oscar® nominations each Shirley Temple movie received.
- Sort by how many Oscar® wins each Shirley Temple movie received.
- Sort Shirley Temple movies by Ultimate Movie Ranking (UMR) Score. UMR puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
- Use the sort and search buttons to make this table very interactive.
Possibly Interesting Facts About Shirley Temple
1. Shirley Temple was born Shirley Jane Temple in Santa Monica, California.
2. Shirley Temple’s road to stardom Cliff Notes style….Temple’s mother encouraged her infant daughter’s singing, dancing, and acting talents, and in September 1931 enrolled her in Meglin’s Dance School in Los Angeles. At Meglin’s she was discovered by casting director Charles Lamont. She signed a movie contract with Fox Films in 1932. 1934 was Temple’s coming out party. In May she appeared in a small part in Stand Up And Cheer but her role brought Temple her first notoriety. In May, Little Miss Marker was released to box office success. In June she appeared opposite Spencer Tracy in Now I’ll Tell and opposite James Dunn in Baby Take A Bow. In August, she appeared with Gary Cooper and Carole Lombard in Now and Forever. Fox quickly developed a movie for Temple….Bright Eyes opened up in December was a smash hit and Temple was officially a phenomenon at six years old!
3. Shirley Temple was given a Juvenile Oscar® at the 1935 Oscar® ceremony. “In grateful recognition of her outstanding contribution to screen entertainment during the year 1934.”
4. Shirley Temple was voted as the Top Box Office Star for 1935, 1936, 1937 and 1938. Three of those years Clark Gable was the number two Box Office Star.
5. Some things we found interesting about Shirley Temple and Fox Films.
- Fox did not realize they were sitting on a gold mine…as they loaned her out to other studios many many times from 1932 to 1934.
- It seems Fox only really noticed Temple when Paramount tried to buy her contract from Fox for $50,000 after they used her in Paramount’s Little Miss Marker.
- The success of the Shirley Temple movies saved Fox from bankruptcy.
- When MGM was making The Wizard of Oz they wanted to use Temple in the Dorothy role. Fox refused to loan her out even though her popularity was diminishing.
- When Temple’s two movies in 1940 flopped…..Fox dropped her from her contact. A serious case of what have you done for me lately.
6. According to the American Film Institute, Shirley Temple is the 18th greatest female star of all-time.
7. Shirley Temple was married two times in her life. She was married to actor John Agar from 1945 to 1950….they had one child. She was married to Charles Black from 1950 until his death in 2005…they had two children.
8. Shirley Temple and her appointments. She was a United States Delegate to the United Nations in 1969. She was Ambassador to Ghana in 1974. She was United States Chief of Protocol in 1976 and she was appointed United States Ambassador to Czechoslovakia in 1989.
9. A non-alcoholic cocktail, “The Shirley Temple”, was created in her honor. It consists of ginger ale (or 7-Up), grenadine and orange juice, topped with a maraschino cherry and a slice of lemon.
10. Check out Shirley Temple’s movie career compared to current and classic stars on our Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time page.
Shirley has been my #1 celebrity,
for ALMOST 30yrs. I own (and
already watched) MOST of her movies/shorts on VHS/DVD;
and found few more online.
I love MOST of them, but my
FAVs are Heidi, Little Princess
and Little Colonel.
YESTERDAY, I start to work on my
“♡ Shirley Temple ♡” photo album
for my Facebook.
Hey Jose…..glad Shirley is your top celebrity. Heidi is one of my favorites too. Your Shirley Temple photo album should be a good one to check out….let me know when you are done.
I like the site. I watched the movies on television when I was a little girl. I loved them. mother told me that she went to the movie theater to see the movies. she said because it was in the depression and movies were reasonable, $.25, I think, (maybe only $.10) that they were a real uplifting escape from reality. my kids did not see them because they were no longer on tv and dvd’s had not been invented, I don’t know if they were on tapes. I hope my grandchildren like them.
Hey mini, thanks for checking out my Shirley Temple site. The girls were lukewarm to the Temple movies you got them….but we did watch her Heidi movie after reading the book…..and that one went over well. That is cool about Nanaw and the Temple movies…thanks for sharing that information.
Hi
Shirley Temple was an incredibly talented little girl. During those peak years from 36 to 38, she was totally enchanting. My favourite would be Wee Willy Winkie and Heidi. In fact most of her films from that period hold up well. I recently watched The Bluebird, I can see why it bombed at the box office. It was too similar to The Wizard of Oz and there weren’t many likeable characters. Of course by this time her stardom was starting to fade.
I think the huge success of Since You Went Away was more to do with Claudette Colbert and Jennifer Jones who had just won the Oscar. I recently watched Fort Apache and she was superb in it, but by that time her career was nearly over.
But the wonderful thing is that she went into other areas, ambassadorship and politics and done extremely well. But that brief moment of time as a child, she just magic on the screen.
Hey Chris….I agree she was a very talented girl. Movies will probably never see anybody come close to repeating that success…especially for somebody under the age of 10. Heidi is one of my favorite Temple movies….I thought Wee Willy Winkie was ok….I know she had to save the day…but stopping a war…come on….that was pushing things a Wee bit…lol. I have not seen the Blue Bird….but it is sitting on my desk as I type this comment….I might watch it later today. She gave back….as she got older…..which was very impressive too. I read that she was more impressed with her appointments than she was about her movies. Thanks for checking out my latest page.
I have seen so many of Shirley Temple’s old movies on TCM – she was a wonderful child actress. I really enjoyed her in HEIDI. She was a real sweetheart. Thanks for all the information. It was unfortunate that she did not make any films after reaching the old age of 21…
Hey Bern1960….thanks for stopping by and commenting. I enjoyed Heidi as well. Katie, Scotty and Bryan would be done if they followed her career path….21 and retired….that had to be strange for her.
Hi, Bruce.
I see Steve answered Shirley Temple after all.
I bumped up my total of Shirley Temple films during TCM’s Star of the Month last month, but there were some they could not air in Canada and which I watched depended a lot upon the costar and whether I’d seen them before. They advertised they were going to air Fort Apache and then they aired Adventure in Baltimore instead. I found it a bit boring. Temple filmes I’ve seen I have seen because I think you should see Shirley Temple films. But I’ve never been one to enjoy watching children be cutsey and so I’ve rarely seen one of hers multiple times.
Fort Apache remains on my to-see list, as well as I’ll Be Seeing You for Joseph Cotten which didn’t air here either.I had seen seen Since You Went Away by finding a copy here.
My totals for her rankings are:
The highest film I have seen is number 1. The lowest film I’ve seen is number 32.
I have seen 4 of the top 5, 7 of the top 10, 12 of the top 20, and 14 overall.
Over half of these films I have seen only since she died and because she died. The only film of hers I watch on a regular basis is The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer.
Cheers,
Flora Breen Robison
Hey Flora….thanks for the visit and the comment.
1. Tally count…..me 16, you 14 and Steve 3….my mother-in-law bought my little girls a 18 movie Temple collection…the girls had no interest in the movies….but I have watched 13 of those movies so far.
2. Yep Steve decided not to boycott my Temple page….that was a pleasant surprise.
3. That is strange that TCM would do a switch like that…Fort Apache is a classic….while Adventure in Baltimore is almost unknown….John Agar her first husband starred in both movies with her.
4. Of her “cutsey” movies that I have seen….I enjoyed Heidi and The Little Colonel the rest have become a blur in my memory…..she is an orphan…she sings she dances and finds parents by the end of the movie….pretty much describes most of those movies.
5. Looking at my DVD collection….I should probably watch The Blue Bird and Bright Eyes in the near future…that would put me over the 50% mark of watching her movies.
6. Your % is always interesting…..and always goes down….from 80% to 70% to 60% of the Top 20….to only 11% of her bottom 17 movies….I think UMR did well in the rankings based on those %.
7. Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer is a fun movie to watch.
8. As always thanks for checking out my latest movie page.