Want to know the best David Lean movies? How about the worst David Lean movies? Curious about David Lean box office grosses or which David Lean movie picked up the most Oscar nominations? Need to know which David Lean 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.
This David Lean (1908-1991) movie page comes from a request by Dan, Peter, and Rebecca. Lean was an English film director, producer, screenwriter, and editor. His career spanned for almost 60 years (1928-1984). During his career, he directed 16 full-length motion pictures. From 1942 to 1955 he directed 11 of those movies. From 1957 to 1984 he only directed 5 movies…but those five movies grossed over $2 billion in adjusted gross, received 43 Oscar® nominations and won 23 Oscars®….including 1957’s The Bridge on the River Kwai and 1963’s Lawrence of Arabia which won the Best Picture Oscar®.
His IMDb page shows 19 directing credits from 1942-1984. This page will rank David Lean movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Shorts, documentaries and almost all of his silent films are not included in the rankings. Lean’s two uncredited movies and his one tv show were not included in the rankings.
David Lean Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
David Lean 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 David Lean movies by co-stars of his movies.
- Sort David Lean movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort David Lean movies by yearly domestic box office rank
- Sort David Lean 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 many Oscar® wins each David Lean movie received and
- Sort David Lean 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.
Stats and Possibly Interesting Things From The Above David Lean Table
- Six David Lean movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark. That is a percentage of 37.50% of his movies listed. Doctor Zhivago (1965) was his biggest box office ht when looking at adjusted domestic box office gross.
- An average David Lean movie grosses $195.50 million in adjusted box office gross.
- Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter. 16 of David Lean’ movies are rated as good movies…or 100.00% of his movies. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) is his highest rated movie while Ryan’s Daughter (1970) was his lowest rated movie.
- Ten David Lean movie received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 62.50% of his movies.
- Seven David Lean movie won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 43.75% of his movies.
- An average Ultimate Movie Ranking (UMR) Score is 39.86. 12 David Lean movies scored higher than that average….or 75.00% of his movies. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) got the the highest UMR Score while The Passionate Friends (1949) got the lowest UMR Score.
Possibly Interesting Facts About David Lean
1. David Lean was born in Croydon, Surrey in 1908. Lean’s family were strict Quakers. As a child he was not allowed to see movies.
2. David Lean was nominated for 11 Oscars® in his career. 7 for Best Director, 2 for Best Editing and 2 for Best Screenplay. He won 2 times…..Best Director for 1957’s The Bridge on the River Kwai and 1963’s Lawrence of Arabia.
3. Only William Wyler (12 nominations), Martin Scorsese (8 nominations) and Billy Wilder (nominations) have more Best Director Oscar® nominations than David Lean. Lean’s 7 Best Director Oscar nominations are matched by Steven Spielberg, Woody Allen and Fred Zinnemann who also have 7 nominations.
4. David Lean received a Best Director Oscar® nomination for 43.75% of the movies he directed. Compare that percentage to other great directors: Spielberg 24.13%, Allen 15.21%, Scorsese 32.00%, Wyler 33.33%, Zinnemann 30.43%, Wilder 32.00% and M. Night Shyamalan 10.00%.
5. David Lean and Alec Guinness made 6 movies together. Lean gave Guinness his first credited role ever….1946’s Great Expectations. After not appearing in Lean’s Ryan’s Daughter (they had a falling out)…Guinness returned in Lean’s final movie…1984’s A Passage To India.
6. David Lean directed 11 different actors in Oscar®-nominated performances: Directed 11 different actors in Oscar® nominated performances: Celia Johnson, Katharine Hepburn, Alec Guinness, Sessue Hayakawa, Peter O’Toole, Omar Sharif, Tom Courtenay, John Mills, Sarah Miles, Peggy Ashcroft and Judy Davis. Guinness (The Bridge on the River Kwai), Mills (Ryan’s Daughter) and Ashcroft (A Passage To India) won for their performances in one of Lean’s movies.
7. Peter O’Toole based his Oscar® nominated performance in The Stunt Man (1980) on Lean. O’Toole played a crazed movie director.
8. David Lean was married six times. He had one son.
9. David Lean was honored with the American Film Institute Life Achievement Award in 1990.
10. David Lean’s Doctor Zhivago (1965) is the 8th biggest box office hit of all-time when looking at adjusted box office grosses.
Check out David Lean’s movie career compared to current and classic stars on our Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time page.
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David Lean was another great film maker. I like all of his films. I love his adaptation of Charles Dickens’ “Great Expectation”, a classic and one of the best British films of the 1940’s. I also loved 1962’s “Lawrence of Arabia” my favorite David Lean film. I think it is one of the finest films ever made. Thank You Bruce for doing a page on one of the greatest directors of all time.
Hey Lyle……I just recently saw Great Expectations….and it is indeed a good movie.Lawrence of Arabia is easily one of the greatest of all-time. In my ranking equation…with just a tick less than 24,000 movies ranked…this one is ranked 6th of all the movies in my database. Lean’s Bridge Over The River Kwai is 10th and Doctor Zhivago is 64th…pretty impressive stats for Lean….who is without a doubt one of the greatest directors of all time. Thanks for stopping by.
Hi
David Lean is definitely one of the all time greats and he’s up there with the best of them. I’ve seen most of his films and I think my favourite 2 would be Brief Encounter and Ryan’s Daughter. Brief Encounter is very quintessential, English, stiff upper lip love story, which probably many young people today would find it hard to relate. But Celia Johnson was so fantastic in the lead that she made it so real and believable. Ryan’s Daughter got an awful panning from the critics, so bad that Lean didn’t work for nearly 14 years. Of course it is set in Ireland, but unlike the romantic Quiet Man, it is more the darker character of Ireland involving the troubles.
It was interesting that Alec Guiness didn’t play the role of a priest.
Another favourite would be Summertime. Lean said his favourite actress was Katharine Hepburn. The scene where she falls into the canal affected her eyes for the rest of her life. Funny that the only Lean movie I wouldn’t be that keen on is Dr.Zhivago but hey you can’t please everyone.
Hey Chris….as always I appreciate you stopping by and talking movies. Of your 2 favorites I would give the edge to Ryan’s Daughter. Ryan’s Daughter looked so awesome…it made my wife and I want to come to Ireland just see the locations that Lean shot the movie at. I have heard that area is now filled with tourist stuff…..that would be a shame…that beach area was so stunning. I do agree with you about Celia Johnson in Brief Encounter…she deserved her Oscar nomination. I tried to find out the reason for the Guinness/Lean falling out..but I found nothing….just a few weak possibilities. I have not seen Summertime. I will have to check that one out and pay attention to when Hepburn hits the water. As for Dr. Zhivago….despite John Cusack’s character in Must Love Dogs thinking Zhivago was the best movie ever..I agree with you….it was a one and done movie for me. Nice music….but way way too slow. As always glad to see your comment.
Very informative. Like the table and the way it is set up.
Thanks S & S…glad you like the table. The tables are the main part of the page…..so really glad to hear such nice words about it.
Love this. Lawrence and Bridges are two of my all time favourites!
Thank you Connely. You and my dad have the same two favorite movies. Of the two I like Lawrence of Arabia the best. Thanks for checking out my Lean page.
Hi Bruce,
Great idea this table. Lawrance of arabia is one of the greatest movie of all-time for me. Moreover I’ve looked for the box office of Brief encouner for years. Thanks. Did you find it in Variety ?
Hey laurent….thanks for the compliment. I did a 1946 page….and Brief Encounter made that page. I had a software change since then so my reference page is gone for that movie. It did not make any of the Variety lists….and I have the rentals just a shade under a million….which back then was pretty impressive. Pretty sure I got it from one of the many David Lean books out there. Thanks for stopping by.