British Actors Smörgåsbord

British Actor 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 British Actor movies by his co-stars
  • Sort British Actor movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort British Actor movies by adjusted worldwide box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort British Actor 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 and how many Oscar® wins each British Actor movie received.
  • Sort British Actor movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score.  UMR puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.

Steve Lensman’s John Gielgud You Tube Video

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203 thoughts on “British Actors Smörgåsbord”

  1. November 3, 2018 at 6:09 am
    STEVE As an appetite wetter for your upcoming Great Brit series in Part 2 are the 20 perceived greatest stars box office in the British cinema throughout the 1950s [1950-59 inclusive]. The placings are based on annual Top 10 lists which have been reproduced by Wikipedia and a points system is used for the overall ranking of the stars across the decade– 10 points for no 1 position in a year, 9 points for no 2 etc down to 1 point for no 10. The lists are confined to British stars in the British cinema, Jean Simmons being classed as British before she “went Hollywood”

    Interestingly Guinness was listed as just Alec pre 1957 but after Kwai and his knighthood in 1959 he was called Sir Alec Guinness in the lists from 1960 onward! Sir Ben Kingsley would have liked that! You will see that Britain was rather chauvinistic back then, females not getting much of a look-in. Two are worth highlighting

    1/ Diana Dors was Britain’s would-be Monroe who traded on sex. She was hyped to the point that we thought she was Britain’s greatest star with movie magazines giving her a column of her own [One was called Open Dors]. She wrote saucy real-life pieces such as the story of how she would come home from filming to find the husband SHE KEPT [Denis Hamilton] had beautiful women lined up on her patio, waiting their turn to get inside to make love to him. You Brits lapped it up! Sadly she died young of ovarian cancer at 52 years of age. In her 1958 raunchy comedy I Married a Woman the Duke had an uncredited cameo role

    2/Belinda Lee was another wannabe Marilyn though to me she was the most attractive of them all. She went to the States and tragically died out there in a car accident at just 25 years of age

    Now Steve over to you. Let the fun commence on Monday!

    Reply

    1. November 3, 2018 at 6:15 am
      TOP 20 BRITISH STARS AT THE BRITISH BOX OFFICE 1950-1959

      Dirk Bogarde-58 points [Sir Dirk – I agree with this ranking!]]
      Kenneth More -49 points [CBE – ie Commander Order Brit Empire]
      Alec Guinness -46 points [Sir Alec]
      Jack Hawkins-45points [CBE]
      Norman Wisdom-40 points [OBE – Officer of Order of British Empire]
      Alistair Sim-31 points [CBE]
      John Mills-28 points [Sir John]
      Anna Neagle-22 points [Dame Anna Neagle]
      Jean Simmons-17 points [OBE]
      Anthony Steel-17 points [Married Anita Ekberg 1956-1959]
      Richard Todd-16 points [OBE}
      Jack Warner- 16 points[OBE – Famous as TV PC Dixon of Dock Green]
      Virginia McKenna-13 points [OBE}
      John Gregson-12 points
      Stanley Baker[ 12points [Sir Stan –Sir Maurice Micklewhite’s mentor ]
      Michael Wilding-12 points [Liz Taylor’s 2nd hubby 1952-57]
      Glynis Johns -11 points
      Ronald Shiner – 11
      Ian Carmichael -10 points [ OBE]
      Robert Newton-10 points
      SELECTED OTHERS
      Nigel Patrick-8 points
      Michael Redgrave-5 points [Sir Michael Scudamore Redgrave]
      Diana Dors-2 points **
      Belinda lee-1 point

      **Real name Diana Mary Fluck – She had to be careful in pronouncing that

      Reply

      1. November 3, 2018 at 10:36 am FROM STEVE
        Good stuff Bob. The only actors on your list to cross over into big American films are Alec Guinness and Jean Simmons. The rest are ‘peculiarly’ British and might be reasonably well known on the European continent. A few of them are on my upcoming ‘Season of the Brits’. The only ones I’ve never heard of are Belinda Lee and Ronald Shiner (who he?).

        I should add Diana Dors to my files.

        I’m starting things off with a bang, an expanded top 50 for ‘Larry Oliver’, as the Brits used to call him 60 years ago mispronouncing his surname. “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close the wall up with our English dead.”

        Reply

        1. November 3, 2018 at 11:14 am
          HI STEVE Ronald Shiner had a 30 year movie career in comedy films which ran from the early 1930s until the early 1960s though his roots were originally in West End theatre and music hall. He always looked to me a bit like Stanley Holloway in My fair Lady and they seemed to me to carry on in similar fashion in some ways. A lot of Shiner’s stuff was BBC radio type humour carried over from the 1940s. I came across him in the early 1950s when he was in the following run of popular Brit comedies and got top billing in all but a few of them. I loved him then but I doubt if these films would appeal to me now. When he died in 1966 he left £30,000 in his will.

          Top of the Form
          Up to His Neck
          See How they Run
          Dry Rot
          My Wife’s family
          Carry on Admiral
          Girls at Sea
          The Navy Lark
          Operation Bullshine
          Keep it Clean
          Aunt Clara
          Not Wanted on Voyage.

          Belinda Lee was type cast in the “sexy blonde” roles that were all the range in the 1950s. Despite her short life she made 25 movies and these are the ones I personally most remember her for. She had supporting roles in most of her films but did get top billed in a few -eg Nor the Moon by Night in 1958 and Love Now Pay Later in 1959. .

          Runaway Bus – with Frankie Howard
          Man of the Moment – with Norman Wisdom
          Who Done It? – with Benny Hill
          Miracle in Soho – with John Gregson
          The Big Money – with Ian Carmichael
          Eyewitness – with Donald Sinden

          Anyway am looking forward to Larry. Meanwhile take care.

          Reply

          1. November 3, 2018 at 10:50 pm FROM BRUCE
            Wow….Steve…great minds thinking alike….I just commented that Alec Guinness and Jean Simmons were the only ones on Bob’s list to have UMR pages. I also agree on the question who is Ronald Shiner?…..relative of Atlanta Falcons’s QB Dick Shiner? Sounds like Brits will be invading your You Tube channel

          2. Joel Hirschhorn To Bob
            November 4, 2018 at 10:59 am
            Hey Bob…though you generally bash my thoughts on movie stars….I felt it was time to share my thoughts on Dirk Bogarde. Of the 410 stars I rated in my book…Rating The Movie Stars….Dirk is out 42nd highest rated star. Here is my overview on his career.

            “Dirk Bogarde has elegance style, looks, and extraordinary talent. It can truthfully be said of him that he never gave a bad performance. Yet the British press was indifferent to his work until Victim (1961), Perhaps some of his lightweight material he did, delayed proper recognition. But there are few, if any, who would deny his ability today. Dirk Bogarde remains one of the greatest examples of intelligent acting.”

            My Four Star Bogarde Performances:
            Quartet (1948)
            The Blue Lamp (1950)
            So Long At The Fair (1950)
            Desperate Moment (1953)
            Doctor In The House (1954)
            The Sleeping Tiger (1954)
            Simba (1955)
            Doctor At Sea (1955)
            The Spanish Gardener (1956)
            Night Ambush (1957)
            Campbell’s Kingdom (1957)
            The Wind Cannot Read (1958)
            A Tale Of Two Cities (1958)
            The Doctor’s Dilemma (1959)
            Libel (1959)
            Victim (1961)
            The Password is Courage (1962)
            I Could Go On Singing (1963)
            The Servant (1963)
            Darling (1965)
            Accident (1967)
            Our Mother’s House (1967)
            The Fixer (1968)
            The Damned (1969)
            Death In Venice (1971)
            Providence (1977

    1. Hey Taylor…you are right….19 is more than some of the people that have pages here. Maybe one day he will get his very own UMR page.

      Reply

    2. HI MASTER [It’s catching!]

      Good of you to send me your detailed thoughts about, and the list of 4 star performances by, one of my own greatest idols [after yourself] Dirk Bogarde as you know how I value your opinion. I’ve seen most of the films you list.

      I see you include in the list the 1958 The Wind Cannot Read so this piece of ancient trivia will no doubt please you as it involves the actor who is arguably the chief villain in your own book Marlon Brando.

      As you will be aware The Wind cannot is an East meets West love story like Sayonara starring Brando and released round the same time, and Margaret Hinxman, Britain’s lead film critic in the 1950s, opined that Bogarde’s performance was better than Brando’s Oscar nominated one in Sayonara. Win/win for me of course as BOTH of them are my idols!

      Whilst it’s always a delight to hear from you I wonder if you and I should be corresponding directly like this as if too many names are flagged up in association with my posts your No 1 pupil tends to get confused and fails to credit some of my comments to his top UMR Contributors box and that makes it all the more difficult for me to catch up on that Steve fella.

      Take care

      Reply

  3. Thanks for making this page. I realize this was made at Bob and Steve’s request for Steve’s upcoming video series, but I watch a lot of British movies as well and have been hoping to talk about these actors too for a long time. I will of course be responding to Steve’s videos on his YouTube channel. I have talked a lot about how my main source of movies is TCM, but I also watch a Canadian channel called Silver Screen Classics, and some of these films I’ve seen on that channel.

    I have seen 96 of these 197 movies.

    The HIGHEST ranked film I have seen is Lawrence of Arabia.

    The highest ranked film I have NOT seen is Gladiator.

    The LOWEST ranked film I have seen is Saint Joan.

    I will list the films I have seen for the top 30 by tens:

    Top 10 Films I Have Seen:
    Lawrence of Arabia
    Ben Hur
    Bridge on the River Kwai
    My Fair Lady
    Oliver!
    Hamlet
    Around the World in 80 Days

    Top 20 Films Seen:
    Spartacus
    Goodbye, Mr. Chips
    The Guns Of Navarone (my favourite movie of all time)
    Quo Vidas
    Mutiny on the Bounty
    Moulin Rouge
    The African Queen

    Top 30 Films I’ve Seen:
    In Which We Serve
    The Longest Day
    Great Expectations
    Arthur
    Murder on the Orient Express
    Cleopatra
    Swiss Family Robinson
    Anna and the King of Siam
    The Third Man
    Von Ryan’s Express

    Hopefully you will put this page up at the top of UMR so readers and contributers know there is a new British film/actor page.

    I have too many favourite movies to mention even though listing them is what I usually do.

    Favourite actors on this list include Rex Harrison, Trevor Howard, Jack Hawkins, Peter Ustinov, John Guilgud, Michael Wilding, Dirk Bogarde, Robert Donat, and John Mills

    Reply

      1. I always liked him in A Bridge Too Far….which is one of my all-time favorite movies….and Dirk is first billed….so do I count too?

        Reply

    2. Hey Flora
      1. I was going to make this the “post of the day” for tomorrow.
      2. Yes…this was done just to make them happy….doubt it works….lol.
      3. Congrats on that awesome tally of 96….my tally is lower….but a surprising 75….I thought it was going to be much less.
      4. 80% of the Top 30 is pretty impressive.
      5. My first miss was In Which We Serve.
      6. Glad you liked this pretty massive table.
      Good feedback as always.

      Reply

  4. HI BRUCE

    First class summary of Brit actors’ participation in movies. I’ll have to study it further but at first glance I think that many if not most of the actors that I mentioned in my recent posts to Steve are included and it’s great that you were able to contribute so early and quickly in Steve’s Great Brit series. You’ve even got Ronald Shiner in and STEVE didn’t know who he was!

    Is this page intended to be permanent? If so I propose to post on it my comments on Steve’s Brit videos as they come along.

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob….this is a permanent page….I can see adding to it….when somebody suggests a new UMR subject that will have issues like these thespians…I almost included Richard Harris….but he is Irish?….and that would offend Harris fans? I had to search pretty deep to find that Shiner movie…lol.

      Reply

      1. HI BRUCE

        Thanks and excellent. I think a separate page on the Brit subject will make matters simpler. Tomorrow I will transfer the other relevant exchanges to this one.

        You will maybe see that I have been exchanging posts with an old friend of yours and mine. For some reason the exchanges have brought to mind the closing words of Dr Lecter in 20001’s Hannibal [sequel to Silence of the Lambs] “I’m just about to have an old friend for dinner!”

        Reply

  5. All this talk about how the poor little orphan British actors were not getting their proper UMR credit….got us motivated to create this page. This is some British actors that do not have an UMR page. Is it all of their movies? No….it does list the ones in the database. I orginally thought it was going to be 100 movies….but in the end….it is 200 movies.

    Reply

    1. If you sort by the co-star column….it will sort the movies by star…..though a few of the movies have more than one Brit star.

      Reply

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