Joan Crawford Movies

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

Even though Joan Crawford (1904-1977) was voted by the American Film Institute as the 10th greatest film actress, I have to admit that I have not seen many of her movies (fourteen to be exact). So how did I write a movie page that ranked all of her movies from 1st to 78th? Lots and lots of research is the answer.

Well the first place I started was IMDb (Internet Movie Database) and saw she had lots of acting credits.  Then I read two of her biographies….Not The Girl Next Door by Charlotte Chandler and Possessed: The Life of Joan Crawford by Donald Spoto. Next I was lucky enough to find this Best of Everything Joan Crawford tribute page on the internet which was jam packed with tons of hard to find box office information from the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. Using the information that I had collected from these sources I was able to finally write this page.

Her IMDb page shows 103 acting credits from 1925-1972. This page ranks 78 Joan Crawford movies from Best to Worst in seven different sortable columns of information. Television shows, shorts, cameos and movies that were not released in North American theaters were not included in the rankings.

Joan Crawford and Clark Gable in 1934's Chained...her 9th biggest box office hit.
Joan Crawford and Clark Gable in 1934’s Chained…her 9th biggest box office hit.

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

78 Joan Crawford 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.

  • The highlighted movie links take you to that movie’s trailer or a small clip of the Joan movie.
  • Sort Joan Crawford movies by co-stars of her movies
  • Sort Joan Crawford movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort Joan Crawford movies by yearly domestic box office gross
  • Sort Joan Crawford 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 Joan Crawford movie received.
  • Sort Joan Crawford 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 Joan Crawford Table

  1. Twenty-seven Joan Crawford movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark.  That is a percentage of 34.61% of her movies listed. Mildred Pierce (1945) was her biggest box office hit.
  2. An average Joan Crawford movie grosses $80.50 million in adjusted box office gross.
  3. Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter.  36 of Joan Crawford’s movies are rated as good movies…or 46.15% of her movies.  Johnny Guitar (1954) is her highest rated movie while Trog (1970) was her lowest rated movie.
  4. Fifteen Joan Crawford movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 19.23% of her movies.
  5. Three Joan Crawford movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 3.84% of her movies.
  6. A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00.  47 Joan Crawford movies scored higher than that average….or 60.25% of her movies.  Mildred Pierce (1945) got the the highest UMR Score while Trog  (1970) got the lowest UMR Score.
Joan Crawford in 1954's Johnny Guitar
Joan Crawford in 1954’s Johnny Guitar

Possibly Interesting Facts About Joan Crawford

1. Joan Crawford’s birth name was Lucille Fay LeSueur. The only movie that lists her birth name is Pretty Ladies (1925).  How she got the Joan Crawford name comes from Bob Kale.  “Her name was voted on by the public in a movie magazine.  The public’s first choice was Joan Arden.  Since there was already a Joan Arden already making movies….they had to go with the second choice…..Joan Crawford.  She initially hated the name because she thought it was to close to “crawfish”.

2. Joan Crawford was nominated for 3 Oscars® during her career….winning one time for 1945’s Mildred Pierce. Her other two nominated performances were for 1947’s Possessed and 1952’s Sudden Fear. She amazingly was never nominated for a Golden Globe®.

3. Speaking of Possessed….she is one of the few actresses to appear in two movies with the same name that have absolutely nothing to do with each other. Possessed (1931) was about a factory worker and was a romantic movie…while Possessed (1947) was about a woman that is obsessed with a man and how that obsession leads to murder.

4. Joan Crawford was married 4 times in her life. Marriage one was to actor Douglas Fairbanks Jr. (an actor), marriage two was to Franchot Tone (they appeared in 8 movies together), marriage three was to Phillip Terry (an actor) and finally she was married to Alfred Steele (CEO of Pepsi-Cola). Many of her movies at her request/demand had Pepsi placement in them.  Joan Crawford adopted five children. The three girls were Christina, Cathy and Cynthia. The two boys were both called Christopher …although one of the two boys was reclaimed by his birth mother. Christina authored the book…Mommie Dearest….which was turned into a movie starring Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford.

5.  Joan Crawford appeared in two all-star movies….1929’s Hollywood Revue and 1944’s Hollywood Canteen.  Both roles were cameos and were not included in the rankings.  It should be noted that Hollywood Revue was the first time Crawford’s voice was heard in movies….while Hollywood Canteen was one of the biggest box office hits of the 1940s.

6.  One of Joan Crawford’s last project was one of Steven Spielberg’s first projects. She appeared in the TV movie Night Gallery, which had 3 segments (she starred in the 2nd segment, directed by Spielberg) and aired in November of 1969. The actual TV show did not premiere until over a year later, in December of 1970.

7. According to Quigley Publications…..Joan Crawford was a Top Ten Movie Star from 1930 to 1936. She was ranked #1 in 1930, #3 in 1931 and 1932, #10 in 1933, #6 in 1934, #5 in 1935 and #7 in 1936. By the end of 1937 she was considered “box office poison”….without a doubt a case of …”what have you done for me lately”.

8. Joan Crawford and Bette Davis simply hated each other. Their feud lasted for decades and is legendary in the history of Hollywood. Somehow they managed to actually act in a movie together….1962’s Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?. Then again I guess the fact that their two characters in the movie hated each other as well…made the acting pretty easy for them.

9. Joan Crawford was Fred Astaire‘s first on screen dance partner. The two appeared in 1933’s Dancing Lady. Others in the cast….Clark Gable, Franchot Tone (her 2nd husband) and the Three Stooges.

10. One of the best collection of Joan Crawford fans can be found on Facebook at Joan Crawford Chat Room.  If you are a Joan Crawford you have to join this group….it is easily the best movie group on Facebook that I have come across….and I am in many Facebook movie groups.

Check out Joan Crawford‘s career compared to current and classic actors.  Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.

This is the 3rd home for my Joan Crawford movie page….but this is a brand new You Tube video…made especially for my new and hopefully final home for my Joan Crawford page.

But Wait…We Have More Joan Crawford Movie Stats…How About Adjusted Worldwide Grosses on 59 Joan Crawford Movies

Academy Award® and Oscar® are the registered trademarks of the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences.

For comments….all you need is a name and a comment….please ignore the rest.

(Visited 1 times)

225 thoughts on “Joan Crawford Movies”

  1. This is awesome! thanks so much for sharing this, I love all these facts and figures! Who’d have thunk the Gorgeous Hussy did so well?

    Reply

      1. Ricoh Vigen I think Mannequin and Gorgeous Hussey are in the same boat….great box office numbers….but not liked by many people.

        Reply

    2. It was huge at the box office….but not many people like it…if you sort the movies by critic/audience rating The Gorgeous Hussy falls all the way to 57th place. Sounds like a Michael Bay Transformers movie of the 1930s….people strongly dislike the movie…but it earns a boatload of money!

      Reply

  3. I love Joan, but so much of her appeal is that face!!!!

    And up until the hokey unconvincing ending, she is truly great in A Woman’s Face. Up there with Bette. She just couldn’t pull of the’reformed’ part convincingl.

    But God! That face!!! We get to live her characters THROUGH her face. Her face is like the 20th century. Glamorous, poor, hard, mannequin like, warm, sculptural, insect like.

    Lol, yeah, much of her appeal is that face. Definitely, a better actress than given credit for, but really needed a good director to get it out of her.

    But that face!!

    Reply

    1. Hey Chris….thanks for checking out my Joan movie page. I have not seen A Woman’s Face….but I will be sure to add that to my list of movies to watch. Good point about her best feature…and good point about needing a director to get that performance out of her. She was one of the greatest ever….thanks for stopping by and talking Joan.

      Reply

  4. Hey would you mind letting me know which webhost you’re utilizing? I’ve loaded your blog in 3 different browsers and I must say this blog loads a lot quicker then most. Can you recommend a good web hosting provider at a fair price? Thank you, I appreciate it!

    Reply

  5. Hi

    I’m surprised that Joan is number 10 in the legends list. I would’ve put her around 5 or 6 after Davis, Monroe, the 2 Hepburns and Garbo. If I was a script writer for soaps, I would watch Mildred Pierce for pointers, it must be one of the best soap opera movies ever. With the ungrateful daughter, the sleazy boyfriend, the good daughter tragically dying young, the wise cracking friend and of course Crawford and her fur coat. It was without doubt her best movie.
    Although A Woman’s Face is also excellent and worth seeing.
    Many of her movies were pretty mediocre and she was the biggest and best thing in them but really that’s what made her unique. She survived for so long at the top of the heap. She must have had incredible self belief and drive to last so long. Although she probably paid a heavy price in her personal life.
    A lot of the stuff in her daughter’s book Mommie Dearest, drink was involved and I think she wouldn’t have been the first person who was a horrible drunk. But that aside, she was a legend and probably the likes of will never be seen again.

    Reply

    1. Hey Chris….I think Joan suffers from not having many must rewatch classic movies….yes she has Mildred Pierce…but other than Grand Hotel….her movies lack name recognition by the casual movie fan…I think that knocked her down a few pegs in AFI’s eyes. I agree with you about Mildred Pierce….I think if you compare her Mildred to the Kate Winslet Mildred….her version is so much better…even if the new version allowed them to include all the steamy details.

      I agree with you that she was a legend….and I do not think we will see anybody like her again. I feel the truth of her personal life will never really be known….in some ways it is a shame that Mommie Dearest seems to be taken at 100% fact……which I imagine the truth lies halfway between what Joan was seeing and what her daughter was seeing. As always….thanks for stopping by and talking movies.

      Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.