Dustin Hoffman Movies

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Want to know the best Dustin Hoffman movies?  How about the worst Dustin Hoffman movies?  Curious about Dustin Hoffman’s box office grosses or which Dustin Hoffman movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Dustin Hoffman movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences? Well you have come to the right place …. because we have all of that information right here.

Dustin Hoffman (1937-) has been a movie star longer than I have been alive. That is a pretty impressive accomplishment especially when you consider that I was born in the 1960s. Over his close to fifty year movie career he has had great success both at the box office and critical acclaim.

His IMDb page shows 76 acting credits since 1961.  This page will rank 52 of his movies from Best to Worst in four different sortable columns of information. Cameos, television appearances, straight to DVD movies and shorts were not included in the rankings.

Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft in 1967's The Graduate
Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft in 1967’s The Graduate

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

Dustin Hoffman 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 Dustin Hoffman movies by co-stars of his movies
  • Sort Dustin Hoffman movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort Dustin Hoffman movies by domestic yearly box office rank
  • Sort Dustin Hoffman 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 Dustin Hoffman movie received.
  • Sort Dustin Hoffman 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 Dustin Hoffman Table

  1. Twenty of Dustin Hoffman’s movies crossed the magical $100 million mark.  That is a percentage of 38.46% of his movies listed.
  2. An average Dustin Hoffman movie grosses $126.90 million in adjusted box office gross….his voice roles were excluded from the averages.
  3. Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter.  35 of Dustin Hoffman’s movies are rated as good movies…or 67.30% of his movies.
  4. 21 of Dustin Hoffman’s movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 40.38% of his movies.
  5. 9 of Dustin Hoffman’s movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 17.30% of his movies.
  6. A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00.  26 of Dustin Hoffman’s movies scored higher that average….or 50.00% of his movies.
  7. Dustin Hoffman has starred in 8 movies that have been nominated for a Best Picture Oscar®…including 3 that wo n the Best Picture Oscar®: 1967’s The Graduate, 1969’s Midnight Cowboy it won, 1974’s Lenny, 1976’s All the President’s Men, 1979’s Kramer vs Kramer it won, 1982’s Tootsie, and 1988’s Rain Man it won.
Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise in 1988's Rain Man
Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise in 1988’s Rain Man

Possibly Interesting Facts About Dustin Hoffman

1. I am sure you know that Dustin Hoffman’s star making role was 1967’s The Graduate. But did you know he was already 30 years old when he played that part, and Anne Bancroft who played Mrs. Robinson was only 36?

2. Over his 45 year carerr, Dustin Hoffman has received 7 Academy Award® nominations (2 wins)….Kramer vs Kramer (1979) and Rain Man (1988). He has 9 Golden Globe® nominations (4 wins) for acting in movies.

3. In the 1980s, Dustin Hoffman only appeared in 4 movies. In 1982 he appeared in one of the biggest comedies ever…Tootsie. Then appeared in one of the biggest box office bombs ever….1987’s Ishtar. He rebounded in 1988 with his second Academy Award® for Best Actor in Rain Man. And finally he appeared in 1989’s Family Business.

4. Dustin Hoffman has been married twice. His first marriage was to Anne Byrne, it lasted from 1969 to 1980 and produced daughters Karina and Jenna. His second marriage is to Lisa Gottsegen, they were married in 1980 – they have four children, sons Jacob and Maxwell and daughters, Rebecca and Alexandra.

5. Dustin Hoffman is the only actor to have leading roles in three Academy Award® Best Picture winning movies Those movies are 1969’s Midnight Cowboy, 1979’s Kramer vs Kramer and 1988’s Rain Man.

6. When Dustin Hoffman was a struggling actor, his roommate was none other than two time Oscar® winner Gene Hackman. It took them almost 40 years but they finally appeared together in one of Hackman’s last movies….2003’s Runaway Jury.

7. Roles Dustin Hoffman either turned down or was seriously considered for…..Blade Runner, Batman Returns(Penguin part), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Gandhi, Get Shorty, The Godfather, Dog Day Afternoon, Jaws, Blade Runner, Misery, Superman (Lex Luther role) and Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

8. In the 1960s Dustin Hoffman used to “chase women” with Ben Affleck’s father, Tim Affleck.

9. Dustin Hoffman directed his first movie in 2013…..Quartet.

10. Check out Dustin Hoffman’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 Globes® are the registered trademark and service mark of the Hollywood Foreign Press.

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83 thoughts on “Dustin Hoffman Movies”

  1. HI STEVE

    1 Dustin is one of those performers who for me contradict the premise that stars are not character actors and vice versa. He has turned in a string of magnificent character portrayals in films such as Midnight Cowboy, Papillon, Dick Tracy, Little Big Man, Rain Man and Joan of Arc The Messenger while at the same time appearing in numerous box office hits in which he was the star or joint star. In the stats table above Dustin’s Top 15 movies alone have grossed a colossal $4.9 billion approximately in adjusted domestic dollars, an average of $325 million per flick.

    2 There is a glut of great posters in your Hoffman video and my personal picks were Billy Bathgate, Sphere, Accidental hero, Perfume, Straight Time, Papillon, Straw Dogs and – most exceptionally – the complete sets of posters from both the Kung Fu Panda franchise and The Graduate.

    3 The very classy stills in the video helped it earn a 97.5% rating in my opinion the very best for me being Dustin with Robin Williams in Hook, with DeNiro in Wag the Dog, with Voight in Midnight Cowboy and the Hoffman solo with gun in Marathon Man. Bruce and you agree on 3 of Dustin’s Top 5 movies – The Graduate, All the President’s Men and Little Big Man.

    Reply

    1. Hi Bob, thanks for reviewing and rating my Dustin Hoffman video, much appreciated.

      Glad you enjoyed the pictorial presentation.

      Interesting box office info, $325m average for each of his top 15 is impressive.

      I’ve always liked Hoffman, more than I liked Newman and Redford. But I wasn’t a fan of Rain Man and I’ve never seen Kramer vs Kramer, the plotline didn’t appeal to me. Loved The Graduate and I’ve watched Marathon Man many times over the years. I recently watched Outbreak again, an enjoyable thriller about a deadly virus. Also watched Sphere again, not a great film but it has an interesting concept. I probably would have enjoyed it more as a novel.

      Bruce has Little Big Man at no.1 and The Graduate at no.3 on his chart, Chef is in the top 10 tieing with All the Presidents Men. This time our charts are completely dissimilar.

      An amazing 8 Hoffman movies have scored 10 out of 10 from my sources – The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy, All the Presidents Men, Little Big Man, Rain Man, Kramer vs Kramer, Lenny and Tootsie. 2 have scored 9 – Straw Dogs and Finding Neverland. And another 8 films scored 8. Which means 18 out of 35 films have scored 8 or more, not bad at all.

      Hoffman’s former roommate is coming up next.

      Reply

      1. Btw when I say 18 out of 35 have scored 8 or more, I meant of course from various movie sources. After I’ve added in other scores and calculated the average that total will usually drop, looking at my files only 6 have managed to stay above 8 from the 35.

        Reply

      2. HI STEVE

        I’ve never seen Rain man as the theme didn’t interest me. I have seen Kramer v Kramer but didn’t like it much. I agree with you about Outbreak being and enjoyable thriller.

        Reply

  2. Bob, Bruce,
    Interesting exchange on Nixon, Hoffman and All the President’s Men, one of the greatest political movies of all time. While I find Redford’s comment on Hoffman rather arrogant and patronizing (unless it was made in jest), I actually think he had a point. In the late 60s and early 70s, Hoffman’s little man persona made him a big star – mainly with The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy and Little Big Man. But in the 6 years between Little Big Man and All the President’s Men, Hoffman only made 5 films (Marathon Man came out after All the President’s Men). Harry Kellerman earned very average box office returns; Straw Dogs did well but was not a big hit; Alfredo Alfredo bombed badly; Papillon was more Steve McQueen’s film, with McQueen in the title role and Hoffman getting significantly less screen time (albeit turning out a great performance, however). So really, only Lenny was a big hit for him as top-billed star. It was an exaggeration to say his career was “flagging”, but AS COMPARED to its highly successful first few years, it appeared to slow down a bit during these years.
    On a completely unrelated note, I’m glad Bob mentioned that little known 1958 “C-Western”, Showdown at Boothill with Charles Bronson. It was fun watching Bronson playing a vulnerable character with a complex. He was allowed to play more interesting parts before he became a big star.

    Reply

    1. HI PHIL

      1 I’m glad that someone else has seen or at least has mentioned seeing Showdown at Boot Hill which is the stand-alone movie Bronson movie I enjoyed most apart from Death Wish and Death Wish 2

      2 Bruce doesn’t seem to have been able to pick it up but it was just as you indicate a minor movie that I saw on the 2nd half of a double bill and would have been a very low grosser. If I recall correctly Steve’s Bronson video didn’t include it either so it most likely was not enthused over by critics and would have had minority appeal for western/Bronson buffs like me. However I’ll stick to my opinions and agree with you that he played a very interesting character in that movie.

      Reply

      1. Hi Bob,
        I thought you may take up me up on the Hoffman-Redford showdown, but you wisely picked up on my comment on Showdown at Boothill instead 😉 Amazing that you actually saw in the cinema. I was able see it on utube and thought it was pretty good. From what I recall, Bronson was signed up to do 4 very minor films in 1958, including that western, and none of them had any impact except Machine Gun Kelly, where he plays a much more unsavory character.

        Reply

        1. HI PHIL

          1 When I went to see Showdown at Boot Hill in 1958 or 59 I saw it in an old variety theatre that had been converted to a cinema and had a second balcony where impoverished teenager Bob used to sit because they were the cheapest seats in the house being so far up in the air and and away from the screen that they were nicknamed The Gods

          2 Hoffman was still an important star when President’s Men was being casted but most things are relative and Redford was fresh from the flushes of Butch, the Sting and other hits and indeed Newman pronounced Robert THE No 1 superstar -I’m sure McQ liked that! – so maybe Redford considered that by the standard of his own achievements Dustin’s career needed a boost. I don’t think Robert was joking but he wasn’t boasting and was speaking-matter of-fact as a person with some kind of executive input to the film. Whether Dustin liked his comment or not he DID give the latter top billing on the screen so certainly there was no malice on his part as there was with Steve towards Paul.

          Reply

          1. PHIL – CORRECTION

            In my previous post to you I employed Belfast slang and used the word “casted” whereas “cast” is I think both the verb and the noun, The Work Horse often picks holes
            in my movie comments so I didn’t want him to have the same opportunity about my grammar – though although clearly a well educated guy himself, judging by some of the books that he boasts of reading he may not be too particular in such matters !!!

          2. Hi Bob, yes I understood, but thanks for teaching me some Belfast slang. Us Canadians are not pointy about these things though .
            I’m not sure when Newman pronounced Robert Redford #1, but at least until the late 70s, McQueen would of course have vehemently and unrespectfully disagreed! McQueen joked that every-time he looked at his rearview mirror he saw Bob Redford. It’s true that several of the scripts McQueen turned down went to Redford, but what seems to have really gotten McQueen’s blood to boil was his own wife, Ali MacGraw, singing the praises of Redford. This apparently led McQueen to start a nasty rumor about Redford, one too shameful to repeat on this site 😉

  3. Hey Bob…here to educate and entertain….lol. Got that Keifer info from a Freddie Prinze Jr. interview. He said he and Keifer had issues because Keifer was so much smaller.

    Reply

    1. HI PHIL 1 I think Paul made his comment about Redford being No 1 round about the mid-seventies and certainly with hindsight nobody but McQueen himself would have regarded Steve as THE superstar between 1974 and his sad death in 1980.

      O wad some Power the giftie gie us
      To see oursels as ithers see us!
      It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
      An’ foolish notion:
      What airs in dress an’ gait wad lea’e us,
      An’ ev’n devotion!

      Certainly one guy who has the gift of seeing it as “ithers” like me see it when it comes to star status is the Work Horse as his Main Table of the Greatest stars of the 1970s in WH’s review of that decade ranks Redford No 1 and Newman No 8 and even Godpop Mumbles who had been around since 1943 on stage and screen and made only 6 movies in the 1970s is ranked at No 18 and therefore listed above Stevie who is in 29th slot on the table.

      2 It is logical that if you overtake someone he/she must have previously been in your rear view mirror.

      3 My son in law who has seen some of my exchanges with the Work Horse commented “He seems a right fellow.” Robert and Paul have always come across to me as “right fellows” and certainly if someone started a “nasty rumour” about somebody else that would be our Stevie.

      4 I suppose though as for some reason McQueen seemed regard Paul as his mortal enemy the latter forming with Redford the most successful buddy buddy act ii movie history would not have endeared Robert to Stevie in the first instance.

      5 Ali MacGraw seems to have been a very perceptive and tasteful young lady when it came to her choice of movie stars to admire though I suppose a cynic might opine that her wisdom appeared to desert her when it came to choosing husbands.

      Anyway this is my last word on the above listed points as I will decline to continue our ‘Trotsky’ double act this time round though I concede it is hard to resist because I find your own responses fun and I always glean some new information from them. Best wishes BOB

      Reply

      1. PHIL

        1 POSTSCRIPT When I implied in my previous post that Ali might have made mistakes when it came to choosing romantic mates it occurred to me to hope that her final film to date wasn’t a harbinger of her future intended pursuits as it was called Get Bruce (1999) and was a documentary in which she played herself Another Dan-like oblique link in the matter is that Ali is an animal rights activist and might be turned on by some guy with an animal-style nickname!!

        2 According to IMDB Steve McQueen was also very chauvinistic and Ali is quoted as saying “He didn’t like the women in his life to have b****”.

        3 I suppose that as Steve took himself very seriously and seemed to live for life-and-death personality conflicts with his fellow human beings lightening up having some fun about these matters would have been as foreign to him as it probably would have been to Spencer Tracy. Thank goodness everybody on this site has a sense of humor with the possible exception of Steve Lensman who gets all fired up about other people enjoying movie stats.

        Reply

        1. Thanks for your further thoughts on this subject Bob. These will be my final thoughts a well as I think it is utterly unfair to Hoffman that McQueen is taking so much space on his page. I mean, putting up with McQueen taking first billing and the title role in Papillon is one thing (he was after all the biggest movie star around….haha), but when the guy starts dominating comments on your UMR page, that’s when you draw the line!

          At least, this time, I benefited from a few wise and solemn words of poetry and additional tit-bits on Ali MacGraw, so I walk away a happy man.

          I was now thinking of commenting on Steve’s Tuesday Weld’s video, but when I saw that two of her most highly rated films starred our favorite topic of conversation, I thought I would refrain from doing so as I would have felt compelled to bring that up (actually, the truth is, I like Tuesday, but I prefer Friday and do not have much to say about her, or for that matter, all the 1950s Janes who have seem to in vogue on this site lately – Russel, Powell and Mansfield).

          Reply

          1. HI PHL 1 Agree that it’s time to put some of our topics to bed. Let’s hope we can stick to that and that we are not like one of those entertainers who announces his/her retirement and then keeps popping up everywhere!

            2 You should always remember though that I too have loved Steve’s films and I highlight his shortcomings because I try to avoid becoming sycophantic about any performer that I admire and I’m not like some people on this site who drool over their idols as if they could walk on water.

            3 I mean I’m totally aware that guys like Cary Grant, Bruce Willis and Maurice Micklewhite and gals like Myrna Loy were/are human and have made mistakes and I have some serious reservations about my top idols as well and don’t approve of everything the Duke or Mr Mumbles say and do though I’ve yet to find anyone who has a bad word to say about my 2nd all-time favourite Greg Peck [except Bette Davis but I think she later retracted]. The downside of that is though that I’ve few anecdotes to tell about the likes of Greg whereas I have many untold stories about Mr M that the Cogerson censorship police would never let me tell on this site.

            4 I mean if Steve hadn’t behaved in such a socially unacceptable way would we have been able to keep a conversation going about him this long? Once you take the McQueen conflicts out of the Newman equation and mention that Paul was on Richard Nixon’s personal enemies list one has little to say about him because he was so uncontroversial and well-behaved. When I criticised some of Stevie’s behaviour in my amateur movie buffs group one guy who is a huge McQueen fan said “Hey Bob that was HIM. If he behaved like your Deanna he’d BE Durbin and not McQueen.”

            5 Also just as Steve LENSMAN points out that sex sells so does bad behaviour. Remember that when Pilate asked the crowd if he should free Jesus who had done no harm the mob replied “No not him. Give us Barabbas.” [the robber]. Anyway I’ll “say Au Revoir but not goodbye” because no doubt we will lock horns over some other bone of contention in future.

  4. HI BRUCE 1 Your dad certainly brushed shoulders with history what with meeting McQueen and being at the Post at the time of Watergate. It’s a wonder that in view of his support for trade union activities he didn’t make Nixon’s Enemies List along with Newman and the others. When I left the Civil Service I worked part-time for a few years in a virtually all-female solicitors’ office and I won a sexual discrimination case against the firm.

    2 Certainly the tapes reveal that Nixon hated just about everything and everybody that moved and the recordings are packed with his tirades against the Jewish community and of course the Democrats and especially the Kennedys.

    3 It is said that when the transcripts were first released to the US public it was not the apparent bending of the law that disgusted them but the foul language that the President and his top aides were heard using non-stop on the tapes.

    4 One thing I will give President Nixon credit for though is his love of foreign affairs and his good sense in appointing Dr Kissinger to negotiate an end to the Vietnam War.

    5 Anyway back to the raison d’etre of this site and in an interview that I saw Redford who had production control of the movie All the President’s Men claimed that he got Hoffman the role in the film to give his “flagging career a boost.” I often wondered if that annoyed Dustin in the way that Grant was reportedly irritated by suggestions that Mae West had “discovered” him and Bette Davis seemingly took offence at Glenn Ford’s suggestion that he had gotten her the Apple Annie part in Pocketful of Miracles.

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob. Well the newspaper business was very good to him. His newspaper ended up being own by the Chicago Tribune….which he really did not like. But his retirement package was pretty amazing under the Tribune’s package.

      Not sure I buy the Redford comment at all. Hoffman was on fire before he made All The President’s Men. He got an Oscar nomination the year before he made the movie….and the three movies made before ATPM averaged an adjusted gross of $181 million. That is not “flagging” at all. So I am sure it annoyed Dustin…since it was so wrong. Granted Redford’s 3 movies before ATPM averaged an adjusted gross of $189 million…..so I guess he was looking down on Hoffman in more than one way…..lol.

      Reply

      1. HI BIG GUY

        1 I totally agree with you and had I not actually seen with my own eyes/heard with my ears Robert make that comment I would have assumed in twas just untrue hype.

        2 Indeed Hoffman still had the clout to force a compromise and command billing over Redford on the screen if not on the posters. Actually such a compromise made artistic and factual sense in my view as W & B were a team and it would have been wrong for stars egos to be exercised through billing that suggested that one of the real life duo was the “lead” character.

        3 I liked your “looking down on” pun and indeed Dustin was criticised by Hirschhorn** types as an unsuitable leading man for Vanessa Redgrave in the 1979 Agatha about the crime writer Agatha Christie as Vanessa at 5 Ft 11 Ins towered above the 5 Ft 5 and three quarters*** Dustin. However if I had been talking to those critics I would have reminded them of what an old school chum of the 5Ft 7 ins Pacino said after Godpop [which I’ve mentioned before on this site]

        “We used to call him Little Al. He’s Big Al now!”

        **Say whatever happened to him ? Nobody’s mentioned Joel most recently!
        ***Ladd fans can breathe a half sight of relief – Laddie was 5Ft 6 and 1/4

        4 It’s always amazes me how some tough-guy stars who are not especially big of physical stature get a bye whilst others like Laddie, Cruise and Dustin are crucified. It’s never dwelt upon that Bogie/Cagney/ Robinson were not tall men. Nor was Charlie Bronson at 5Ft 8 and 1/2in though in the plot of the B western Showdown at Boot Hill [1958 and one you were not able to pick up] the character that the young Bronson played suffered slightly from a height complex

        Reply

        1. Hey Bob….glad you like the pun. You can add Keifer Sutherland list of tough guys that are small. Joel had his “star” moment in the sun….he is back to his normal resting spot….waiting for a classic star so he can share his wisdom.

          As for All The President’s Men…..at this point I find it impossible not to think of both actors when I think about the movie…..both made that movie great.

          Reply

          1. HI BRUCE
            1 Didn’t know about Keifer – as I’ve said before,your site is a daily learning curve for me. I mean where else would I have learnt that Joel existed – WHO ELSE would dream of mentioning him? !!!

            2 Ironically Laddie was probably more physical and athletic than not only all/most of the other “little tough guys” but some big guys as well. Your own excellent Ladd page mentions his being a diving and swimming champion at high school and he also for a time worked as a professional life guard on beaches. I think that if I was drowning I would be wanting Laddie to come for me and not for example the 20St Bud!

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