Want to know the best Irene Dunne movie? How about the worst Irene Dunne movie? Curious about Irene Dunne’s box office grosses or which Irene Dunne movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Irene Dunne movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences? Well you have come to the right place.
Irene Dunne (1898 – 1990) was one of the most popular actresses in Hollywood from the early 1930s through the late 1940s. Dunne earned 5 Best Actress Oscar® nominations. Her IMDb page shows 51 acting credits from 1930-1962. This page will rank Irene Dunne movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. To do well in our overall rankings a movie has to do well at the box office, get good reviews by critics, be liked by audiences, and get some award recognition.
Irene Dunne Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
Irene Dunne Movies Can Be Ranked 5 Ways In This Table
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.
- Sort by Irene Dunne movies by her co-stars
- Sort Irene Dunne movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Irene Dunne movies by yearly domestic box office grosses
- Sort Irene Dunne 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 Irene Dunne movie received.
- Sort Irene Dunne 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 Irene Dunne Table
1. 16 of Irene Dunne’s movies crossed the magical $100 million mark. That is a percentage of 41.02% of her movies listed. Her top box office hit was White Cliffs of Dover (1943) which barely beat out Life With Father (1947) and A Guy Named Joe (1944).
2. An average Irene Dunne movie grossed $111.30 million in adjusted box office gross.
3. Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter. 32 of Irene Dunne’s movies are rated as good movies…or 82.05% of her movies. Her highest rated movie is 1948’s I Remember Mama.
4. 13 of Irene Dunne’s movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 33.33% of her movies.
5. 4 of Irene Dunne’s movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 10.25% of her movies.
6. An average Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00. 29 of Irene Dunne’s movies scored higher that average….or 74.35% of her movies. The Awful Truth (1937) got the highest UMR Score while Thirteen Women (1932) got the lowest UMR Score.
Possibly interesting things about Irene Dunne
1. Irene Dunne was born in Louisville, Kentucky on December 20, 1898.
2. Irene Dunne’s track to Hollywood. After her father died when she was 12, her family moved to Madison, Indiana. In Madison, she started taking music lessons. Her singing ability would take her to New York City. Her ultimate goal was to be part of the Metropolitan Opera Company but that did not work out. She did however start appearing in plays. Her part in the musical Show Boat led to her first movie contract with RKO.
3. Irene Dunne was married one time…to Dr. Francis Griffin from 1928 until his death in 1965…they had one daughter.
4. Irene Dunne was nominated for 5 Best Actress Oscars®. Those 5 movies were 1930’s Cimarron, 1936’s Theodora Goes Wild, 1937’s The Awful Truth, 1939’s Love Affair and 1948’s I Remember Mama.
5. Irene Dunne co-starred with Cary Grant in 3 movies. 1937’s The Awful Truth, 1940’s My Favorite Wife and 1941’s Penny Serenade.
6. The missing Irene Dunne movies that are not included on this page with their critic/audience rating:
- Leathernecking (1930) 70.0%
- Bachelor Apartment (1931) 58.0%
- The Secret of Madama Blanche (1933) 64.0%I
7. Irene Dunne’s Cimarron (1931) won the Best Picture Oscar® but it is ranked as the second-worst of the 92 Best Picture Oscar® winners according to critics and audiences. Only 1929’s The Broadway Melody has a lower critic/audience rating.
8. As I searched and searched for Irene Dunne box office numbers…I found a very impressive Irene Dunne fan site. http://www.irenedunnesite.com/ is loaded with tons more information on Irene Dunne and her movies. This site is highly recommended.
Academy Award® and Oscar® are the registered trademarks of the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences.
This is actually the 3rd home for Cogerson Movie Scores. We started writing these pages over 4 years ago. Our first page was called a hub and it was found on HubPages.com. After some success there we started our own website…CogersonMovieScore.com. So after a combined 3.5 million views we are moving again. For those used to our old movies tables…I agree I liked the older tables better….but these new tables do offer a sort button and a search button….they are starting to grow on me and I hope they grow on you. Please excuse our mess as we build UltimateMovieRankings into a pleasant viewing experience.
For comments….all you need is a name and a comment….please ignore the rest.
1 Actually I used to get Irene herself mixed up with Colbert, Loy and Joan Bennett and all of them with Irene and each other as when I caught up with them in the 1950s they had a couple of screen decades or more under their belts and their heyday had gone and each of them seemed to me like somebody’s aunt or mother rather than a leading lady. I felt too that they were all interchangeable in some of the roles they had settled into when the 50s dawned.
2 For example Irene Dunne was Mother to Bill Powell’s [Life with] Father, Joan Bennett was Mother of the Bride in the two Tracy Liz Taylor ‘Father’ films, Claudette was Troy Donahue’s Mother in her final movie Parrish in 1961 and Myrna was Newman’s mum in From the Terrace in 1960 and had I think played a mother in Mitchum’s The Red Pony 11 years earlier. She wasn’t Big Bob’s ma in that one but looked as if she might have been. Of the 4 Loy may of course have gained the greater internet immortality from the hype about her on the Cogerson site and her inflated box office reputation here !
3 Nevertheless whilst I had no interest in these ladies way back in the 50s today I am from a historical and statistical perspective fascinated by their careers as I am with those of all of the great Classic Era stars and am therefore always pleased to see updates of their Cogerson profiles.
Hey Bob
1. Thanks for the return visit to the very first UMR page.
2. Actually none of the stats changed…just how the page was set up….unlike the Katharine Hepburn page update which resulted in 24 worldwide grosses.
3. I can see you getting those actresses mixed up.
4. Yep Loy was the mother in The Red Pony.
5. Thanks for the kind words.
1 STEVE For me Irene Dunne was the real deal in terms of female stardom. Your posters bear out my recollection that apart from in A Guy Named Joe with Mr Top Billing himself, Tracy , Irene was never denied first billing after she became a major star in the early 1930s [cue for John to get excited!] Indeed as Irene’s heyday was well before I began watching movies I was not over. familiar with the posters for her films and therefore welcomed sight of the fine range you have produced in your video. My favourite posters were Unfinished Business, The Silver Chord, High Wide and Handsome, Back Street and a wonderful one from Magnificent obsession which had I better descriptive powers would have had me reaching for superlatives.
2 Excellent stills of Young Cantankerous and Irene in A Guy Named Joe, Grant Randy & Irene in my Favorite Wife, Love Affair with Boyer/Irene and Cary getting his hair pulled by Irene.
I also liked bothe the stills and poster from Showboat and Theodora Goes Wild. Classy stuff. You and Work Horse are agreed on 3 of the Top 5 and no way was there going to be 100% agreement as you have included in your 5 only one of Irene’s 3 flicks with Grant !
3 Because of the great novelty value that these posters and stills had for me I rate the presentation overall 9.5/10. I liked too Bruce’s cute miniature still above though it occurred to me “Boy does the Work Horse seem to have a soft spot for movies with a man, a woman and a little dog as their stars,” or at least on occasions a man supported by a woman and a little dog!
Hi Bob, thanks for the review, rating and comment, much appreciated.
Glad you liked the posters and stills.
I’ve only seen a few of Irene Dunne’s films and wasn’t really aware at how big a star she was until I started preparing the video and saw her top billed above some big names.
Four of her films recieved 10 out of 10 from my sources – Life With Father, Show Boat, Love Affair and The Awful Truth. But getting a solid 10 from somewhere won’t guarantee a place in the top 5. Life With Father ended up in 7th place with a score average of 7.3.
Bruce’s page came in useful when double checking the top rated movies and there are a couple of mid-range movies missing but honestly who would notice? [wink]
Only a few more ‘golden age’ movie people to go and than I’ll move on to actors born in the 30s and 40s.
HI STEVE
1 I’m pleased that by now quoting Grant’s Awful Truth in a short list of 10/10 movies you may have made up for your negligence in placing only one of Cary’s movies in your video Top 5.
2 I have told you that being no expert in awarding ratings to movies I mark your video’s in relation to how much satisfaction they give me when compared as far as possible to my enjoyment of those John McCormack recordings to which the musical experts have awarded ratings. Most of the admittedly limited but sufficient number of McCormack vocal ratings that I have seen are within the 90 to 95% range where if I recall correctly my markings for the majority of your videos have fallen Only one McCormack disc performance of which I am aware has got more than 95% and I am eagerly on the watch for the Lensman presentation that goes above the 95% rating. – so keep em coming!
Well at least I placed my Cary Grant movie at the top of the heap, which should make up for the scarcity of Cary’s movies in the top 5. 😉
I’m glad you’re enjoying these Bob, I do get the occasional thumbs down on these actors videos but very rarely and usually from India for some weird reason.
My 2010-2015 Sci-Fi top 30 video currently has 214 dislikes, wow! A lot of people are not happy at all with the no.1 movie on there, not my fault I just totted up the scores. But the video also got 1033 likes, which cheered me up a bit. It’s also my most watched video with nearly 212,000 views. I get about 5000 views a day on that channel which is not bad.
Bruce recently celebrated a record breaking 33,000 views in a single day on his site. I think a chunk of that came from the Kurt Russell page which Chris Pratt tweeted. A page with no grosses or ratings, there you go. 🙂
HI STEVE
1 If I understand you correctly you got thumbs down for your actual rankings and ratings of movies. I find it ludicrous that someone would give a negative overall appraisal of an entire profile because of a differing of opinions on the merit of a movie ((s) even if one disagreed with those opinions.. For example my view that Bruce hyped up Myrna Loy’s grosses does not alter my opinion that his page on her was nonetheless comprehensive, interesting and of a high standard.
2 A presentation should be marked down in my view only if the workmanship in it is
faulty and it’s hard to see how anyone could seriously regard the artistic content of your videos negatively – but I suppose as the saying goes it takes all sorts to make a world.
Thank Bob, they see their favorite film isn’t no.1 and they give the video a thumbs down. a bit harsh but that’s how they are. And they can get abusive too, on that sci-fi video I got this comment a few hours ago – “this list is sh**y!” 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QDMvK-iYo0 Your link….since you can not post it. Good stuff Steve….keep up the good work.
Thanks Bruce, and congrats on the 33k views day.
Hey Bob…..I have never seen A Guy Named Joe….but I want to. 60% is not too bad for our comparison pages. Nice review on Steve’s latest video.
MY IMPRESSION OF GREATEST CLASSIC FEMALE BOX OFFICE STARS EVER – A LIST
[In Alphabetical Order]
Julie Andrews
Ingrid Bergman
Claudette Colbert
Joan Crawford
Bette Davis
Doris Day
Irene Dunne
Deanna Durbin
Judy Garland
Betty Grable
Katharine Hepburn
Deborah Kerr
Marilyn Monroe
Mary Pickford
Ginger Rogers
Barbara Stanwyck
Elizabeth Taylor
Shirley Temple
Lana Turner
Esther Williams
B LIST TO FOLLOW TO AVOID CONVOLUTION OF POSTS
Good list….I will have to check it out later as I am headed to sleep……thanks for putting it together. My first things I noticed….Durbin is mentioned and Loy is not…..interesting indeed. 🙂
Hey Bob.
1. I will have to check that out….I read a biography on Dunne….and she had lots of good stuff to say about him. When they first started working together she was the bigger star…..and Penny Serenade he was the bigger star…..yet their relationship always remained good.
2. He and Sophia Loren got “along really well” on their two movies together….as for Kiss Them For Me….I find it hard to blame Mansfield for that mess….her part was the only one that was even remotely interesting….I just recently re-watched that one…..hoping it got better as I got older….that did not prove to be true.
1 In her day Irene was highly regarded and when Life with Father was premiered although William Powell had the title role the theatre owners placed on their marquee revolving flashing lights which continuously rotated top billing between Bill and Irene.
2 Her career came abruptly to a halt in the early 1950s and it has been suggested that she was choosy about scripts and was unable to find further suitable ones for movies. She is though reported as saying that “living rather than acting” was her priority and it is therefore fitting that she lived until she was 91.
3 Anyway I think that the above table includes all her major hits so that this updated page constitutes a fairly comprehensive profile of a great career of the Classic Era.
POSTSCRIPT: I like the new look Latest and Greatest Comments Box and it should be able to save time if retained. For example I’ll be able to say to myself “I will give that a miss – it’s only Steve banging on once more about Tweedie.” or “There he goes again drooling over another of Moore’s cast-offs.”
Have a good weekend BOB
Will reply to this comment in the morning….the end of a very long day.
Hey Bob…..ok….now where was I.
1. Interesting about the rotating billing on the marquee…..if that was available the fight for top billing would not have happened much.
2. Interesting about “living rather than acting”….seems that all actresses/actors should adopt that practice.
3. Glad you like our table…her box office record is pretty impressive…lots of hits and numerous monster hits.
4. She and Cary Grant made a great screen team….The Awful Truth and My Favorite Wife are two of my favorite rom-com classic movies. Penny Seranade is a decent movie to….just to depressing for lots of re-watches.
5. The comment section has changed since your comment….I like the combo….5 current comments….and 50 old comments on their very own page…..WoC is one smart cookie….I am a lucky man.
Thanks for the Dunne feedback.
1 Irene and Cary apparently agreed a GEOGRAPHICAL rotation of billing and if you look at the IMDB site for The Awful Truth and then Penny Serenade you’ll get an illustration.
2 Cary apparently got on with most of his leading ladies and is credited with helping Sophia Loren adapt to American screen comedy. in Houseboat. The only one whom I personally have heard him criticise publicly was Jayne Mansefield whom he blamed for ruining his run of mid to late 50s successes by turning into a flop Kiss Them for Me (1957).
BOB