Want to know the best Marlene Dietrich movies? How about the worst Marlene Dietrich movies? Curious about Marlene Dietrich’s box office grosses or which Marlene Dietrich movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Marlene Dietrich movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which ones got the worst reviews? Well you have come to the right place…. because we have all of that information and much more.
Marlene Dietrich (1901-1992) was an Oscar® nominated German-American actress and singer. On American Film Institute’s Top 50 Screen Legends list, Dietrich was ranked as the 9th best actress. Right behind #8 Judy Garland and right before #10 Joan Crawford. Her film career lasted almost 60 years. One of the main reasons for such a long successful career was her ability to re-invent herself, professionally and characteristically. So we figured it was about time to give one the silver screen’s first sex symbols her very own Ultimate Movie Rankings movie page.
Her IMDb page shows 56 acting credits from 1919-1978. This page will rank 30 Marlene Dietrich movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Her German silent films, cameos, television appearances and movies not released in North America were not included in the rankings.
Marlene Dietrich Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews, and awards.
Marlene Dietrich 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 Marlene Dietrich movies by co-stars of her movies
- Sort Marlene Dietrich movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Marlene Dietrich movies by yearly box office rank
- Sort Marlene Dietrich 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 Marlene Dietrich movie received.
- Sort Marlene Dietrich 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 Marlene Dietrich Table
- Fifteen Marlene Dietrich movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark. That is a percentage of 46.88% of her movies listed. Shanghai Express (1932) was her biggest box office hit…not counting her cameo role in Around The World In 80 Days.
- An average Marlene Dietrich movie grosses $121.10 million in adjusted box office gross.
- Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter. 24 of Marlene Dietrich’s movies are rated as good movies…or 75.00% of her movies. Witness for the Prosecution (1957) is her highest rated movie while Just A Gigolo (1978) was her lowest rated movie.
- Ten Marlene Dietrich movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 31.25% of her movies.
- Three Marlene Dietrich movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 9.37% of her movies.
- A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00. 26 Marlene Dietrich movies scored higher that average….or 81.25% of her movies. *Morocco (1931) got the the highest UMR Score while Just A Gigolo (1978) got the lowest UMR Score. *Around The World In 80 Days excluded.
Possibly Interesting Facts About Marlene Dietrich
1. Marlene Dietrich was born Maria Magdalene Dietrich in Berlin, Germany.
2. Marlene Dietrich’s road to stardom Cliff Notes style….she started out as a cabaret singer, then she started appearing in German silent films, next she caught the eye of director, Josef Von Sternberg. Von Sternberg cast her in the German and English versions of Blue Angel. Blue Angel was a hit and Dietrich became one of the first sex symbols in film.
3. Marlene Dietrich was nominated for one Oscar® (Morocco) and one Golden Globe® (Witness For The Prosecution).
4. According to the American Film Institute, Marlene Dietrich is the 9th greatest female star of all-time.
5. Marlene Dietrich starred in Alfred Hitchcock’s Stage Fright (1950)….they experienced some friction while making the movie. Hitchcock provided one of my favorite quotes while researching this page. On Dietrich…Hitchcock said….”Marlene Dietrich is a professional – a professional actress, a professional dress designer, a professional cameraman.”
6. Marlene Dietrich was married one time in her life. Her marriage to Rudolf Sieber was from 1924 to his death in 1976. They actually only lived together for five years…but they never got divorced. I wonder if they celebrated their 50th anniversary? They did have one daughter together….and four grandsons. Hey BERN1960…I have a piece of Dietrich trivia you might be interested in….I just did not want to put it in this page.
7. Roles Marlene Dietrich turned down or was seriously considered for: Pal Joey (Rita Hayworth role), All About Eve (Bette Davis role), Whatever Happened To Baby Jane (Joan Crawford role), and Stagecoach (Claire Trevor role). One role she really wanted but did not get was Irene Dunne’s role in I Remember Mama.
8. Marlene Dietrich was voted the 43rd Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly. Dietrich was also the first German actress to be Oscar® nominated.
9. Marlene Dietrich received the U.S. War Department’s ‘Medal of Freedom‘, in 1947, for entertaining American troops in WWII and her strong stand against Naziism.
10. Check out Marlene Dietrich‘s career compared to current and classic actors. Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time. To check out some awesome movie posters of Marlene Dietrich’s movies check out Steve Lensman’s Marlene Dietrich Movie Posters page.
Academy Award® and Oscar® are the registered trademarks of the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences.
I read on your newest page that you had updated this page.
Great.
I have seen 5 more of her films since my last comment for a new total of 17 movies. This finally puts me up over the 50% mark. Yes!
Hi, Bruce.
Thanks for sending the link to this now that it is completed. I am not as familiar with M.D.
s career as other of her contemporaries.
I have seen several of Marlene’s films more than once, while others I have not seen even once. I have only seen 12 of her films. That is well below 50 percent.
The highest ranking I’ve seen is no. 1, Shanghai Express.. The lowest ranking is 25, The Lady Is Willing.
Of the top 5 on your score, I have seen the top 4. I have seen 8 of the top 10. Besides 5, I am missing number 7.
I’ve seen Witness for the Prosecution and Touch of Evil the most often. However, the most enjoyable for me is Destry Rides Again.
Of the ones that I have not seen, Blonde Venus interests me the most because of the costar.
Of the ones I’ve seen, the one I considered the most important to see but have been only able to watch once is Judgement at Nuremburg.
Fascinating woman.
Flora Breen Robison
So my top five would be Destry Rides Again, Witness for the Prosecution, Touch of Evil, Stage Fright and Morocco.
I have seen
Hey Flora. I have been rotating between classic performers and current performers…so about once a week there should be a new classic page here. As for Dietrich…you and Steve are tied at 12 Dietrich movies watched….with me sitting at 10. I actually find that pretty interesting that none of us has even seen half of her movies.
I have seen Blonde Venus but it is not one of Cary Grant’s better movies….he was still years away from becoming the Cary Grant we know and love. I like your Top 5….as I have seen all of those movies and enjoyed all of them. The movie I want to see the most that I have not so far is Desire….the Dietrich/Cooper Morocco reunion movie. Judgement at Nuremberg stars some guy named Widmerk or something like that I thought he was one of your favorites…..lol.
Thanks for your input on my latest classic page….glad to hear from you again.
I look forward to future classic star pages. Yes, Widmark was the main JAN star reason I saw it. Thanks for your thoughts on Blonde Venus.
Cheers,
Flora
Hey Flora….I have gotten many many requests for classic stars….currently my list has over 30 classic performers….and I thought I was running out of ideas for pages….lol. Those requests should keep me very busy. I still have not flipped one of your favorite stars to my new website..but I will be doing Gregory Peck soon. If you remember you helped write that page many moons ago.
1 Marlene observed Hollywood with a wry sense of humour and a degree of cynicism.
2 For example I remember reading that when she was placed on Hollywood’s Box Office Poison List she met on a train one of the others on it – Katie Hepburn possibly – and they had a good laugh about it.
Excellent work on one of the greats Bruce. I watched Destry Rides Again a few weeks ago, one of my favorites. Shanghai Express number one on the moviescore, okay that was one of her most famous films. Surprised to see Touch of Evil so far down the chart, but it did make no.2 on the critics list. Witness for the Prosecution is another favorite of mine but more because of Charles Laughton than Dietrich. I’ve seen 12 of the 30 films you’ve listed. I liked the Hitchcock quote you posted, I remember a quote he said about directing Laughton in Jamaica Inn, “You can’t direct a Charles Laughton film the best you can do is act as referee.”
Hey Steve…..only 12 Dietrich movies watched…..I might be able to beat that number….counting….counting….I am at 10…..so close….but once again I bow to your classic movie watching history. Touch of Evil did not generate much box office heat….pretty sure it took sometime to develop a following. I imagine that had to bother Welles…as it seems the better the movie he made…the more the public ignored the movie when it was in theaters. Destry Rides Again and Witness are my favorites too. Hitch had some very memorable on liners. As always thanks for the visit and the comment.
Marlene Dietrich singing “Falling In Love Again” in Blue Angel is one of the greatest moments in movie history. I see you only listed the English version of Blue Angel. Having seen both versions many times I can tell you that the German version is the better of the two.
Hey Dietrich super fan. I have not seen either versions of Blue Angel…..but your very strong opinion of the movie makes me want to see the movie. I did not include the German version in the rankings because it does not look like it was released in North America. Thanks for checking out my Dietrich movie page.
You will not be disappointed.
Hi – I have seen some of her movies – I am surprised at how many I had seen. GOLDEN EARRINGS was a favorite of mine along with WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION was a good one. Thanks for this one…Another interesting job well done.
Hey BERN1960…..glad you liked checking out her movie page….and glad that you were aware of many of her movies. Thanks for stopping by and checking out my latest movie page.