Marlon Brando Movies

Want to know the best Marlon Brando movies?  How about the worst Marlon Brando movies?  Curious about Marlon Brando’s box office grosses or which Marlon Brando movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Marlon Brando 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.

Marlon Brando (1924-2004) owned the 1950s as an actor. He received 5 Oscar® nominations for Best Actor between 1952 and 1958. He had it all…. blockbusters, critical acclaim, and an Oscar® win. His movies generated over 200 million ticket sales in the 1950s. Unfortunately the 1960s were not so kind to him. One could argue, that every movie he made in the 1960s was a box office failure. By the early 1970s he was considered box office poison. It was during this time that movie magic would happen again. That of course, was his role in The Godfather.

The Godfather was a blockbuster hit that won Oscars® for Best Picture and Best Actor. The following year he earned another Oscar® nomination for Last Tango in Paris. Then he pretty much stop making movies. Over the last 30 years of his life he only made 10 more movies and they were pretty much supporting parts.

His IMDb page shows 47 acting credits from 1949-2006. This page will rank 37 Marlon Brando movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information.  Television appearances, shorts, cameos, video game roles and direct to DVD movies were not included in the rankings.

Marlon Brando and Vivien Leigh in 1951's A Streetcar Named Desire
Marlon Brando and Vivien Leigh in 1951’s A Streetcar Named Desire

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

Marlon Brando 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 by Marlon Brando’s co-stars of his movies.
  • Sort Marlon Brando movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost.
  • Sort Marlon Brando movies by their yearly box office rank
  • Sort Marlon Brando 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 Marlon Brando movie received.
  • Sort Marlon Brando 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 Marlon Brando Table

  1. Sixteen Marlon Brando movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark.  That is a percentage of 43.24% of his movies listed. The Godfather (1972) was his biggest box office hit.
  2. An average Marlon Brando movie earned $144.60 million in adjusted box office gross.
  3. Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter.  28 of Marlon Brando’s movies are rated as good movies…or 75.67% of his movies.  The Godfather (1972)  was his highest rated movie while Christopher Columbus: The Discovery (1992) was his lowest rated movie.
  4. Eighteen Marlon Brando movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 48.64% of his movies.
  5. Seven Marlon Brando’s movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 18.91% of his movies.
  6. A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) is 60.00 or above.  24 Marlon Brando movies scored higher that average….or 64.86% of his movies.  The Godfather (1972) got the the highest UMR Score while Christopher Columbus: The Discovery (1992) got the lowest UMR Score.
Marlon Brando in 1955's Guys and Dolls
Marlon Brando in 1955’s Guys and Dolls

Adjusted box office grosses are used to make it easier, to figure out how successful a movie was when it was originally released and compare that to our current box office numbers. For example: The classic On the Waterfront grossed $9,240,000 in 1954. In 2014, $9,240,000 million would have ranked 134th for the year….right behind Mom’s Night Out. However its adjusted box office gross of $163,200,000 million would have finished 19th for the year right behind 18th place Gone Girl. 

And finally….just found this page from Luna B. on HubPages….a very interesting read.  Marlon Brando’s Top Ten Movies….highly recommend checking it out.

Steve’s Expanded Marlon Brando You Tube Video

If you do a comment….please ignore the email address and website section.

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193 thoughts on “Marlon Brando Movies”

  1. PART 2 SOME BIG PICTURES BRANDO TURNED DOWN

    THE CONQUEROR 1956. Brando withdrew from the eventual Wayne role and no explanation has been given. However I cannot see Hughes and Marlon falling in love with each other and I doubt if Hughes would have watched it 1 million times if Brando had been in it. Still it pleased me at the time that two of my greatest idols were considered for the same role.

    THE ARRANGEMENT 1969 with Kazan again. Role ultimately went to Kirk Douglas.

    BUTCH CASSIDY/SUNDANCE KID [1969] Paul Newman who claimed he offered Brando a lead role in every movie over which Paul had production control wanted Brando for that blockbuster and he told Brando to take his pick of the two roles.

    RYAN’s DAUGHTER [1970] Another blockbuster hit – Cogerson adjusted domestic gross of almost $260 million.

    Marlon’s reasons for turning down ALL 3 of these movies were the same (1) he was on a “downer” over the assassination of Martin Luther King (2) he preferred to make1969’s political drama Burn instead of any of the 3. He said later that Burn was in fact his favourite film among his own and he’s in good company there because Cogerson gives it an excellent 76% rating. However [in the 1983 shocker film book that would have made even the Spanish Inquisitors quail if they had decided to take up acting as a side-line] Bruce’s “Boss” gives Burn just 2 stars. But hey! – what’s new in the Joel V Marlon saga?

    EARNING CAPACITY “These days, $1 million doesn’t seem like much. But there was a time when $1 million meant something. A time when earning that kind of pay-check, particularly in the world of entertainment, made you almost a god among men. That time was 1962.In this instalment of our 60 at 60 series, we head to the year of Bob Dylan’s debut album, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and director Lewis Milestone’s Mutiny on the Bounty We bring up Mutiny for one very specific reason.

    For his services in the lead role of Fletcher Christian in the film, American actor Marlon Brando commanded the first-ever $1 million salary for a movie role. The stars of modern times can more easily command higher salaries, offer creative instruction, and even secure film credits as executive producers on the very movies in which they’re starring. And it all started with Brando. And it wouldn’t be the last time he made history with his deposit slip. For just 10 minutes of screen time as Jor-El in 1978’s Superman, Brando also became the first actor to cross the $3 million mark for a film salary [about $12 million today] plus an 11.3 % of the gross earning Brando a place in the Guinness Book of Records.” [Mike Janella 19 Aug 2015]

    Reply

  2. May 27, 2019 at 7:41 pm
    Hey Bob…another interesting story about Brando. Sounds like something that might be based on some truth (a meeting, Brando was late) and some fiction (disguised as a wall). Though Brando was starting to slide….at the time of Lawrence…thinking Brando had enough clout to still get most jobs. As difficult as he was to work with sometimes…I think he and Lean might have killed each other in the desert of Lawrence of Arabia. Good stuff as always. COPIED FROM DENNIS HOPPER PAGE

    HI WORK HORSE I agree with everything you say except I don’t think Brando’s 1960s decline enters into the equation. You must remember that filming of Lawrence started on 15 May 1961. [By the way my birthday is 15 May so wouldn’t it have had personal Dan-like significance for me if Marlon HAD started filming Lawrence on my birthday?!]

    Brando’s first three 60s films were Fugitive Kind, One Eyed Jacks and Mutiny on the Bounty. The first of those turned a SMALL profit and indeed has a Cogerson adjusted domestic gross of about $71 million. Jason Statham’s average adjusted domestic gross is approx. $58 million and films are much more expensive to make nowadays. For example a Greta Garbo movie, 1929’’s The Kiss, with an adjusted Cogerson domestic gross of just $42 million and a worldwide one of $74 million was able to turn a “significant” profit back in its day according to Wikipedia. As Cogerson records prior to Fugitive Kind Brando’s eleven 1950s films sold a whopping 200 million tickets.

    The other two Brando early 60s films, Jacks and Bounty, were released in the States on 31 March 1961 and 8 Nov 1962 respectively so that their box office returns and critical reception would not have been known when in late 1960 or early 1961 Lean was offering Marlon the part of Lawrence.

    Indeed (1) at that juncture Marlon was able to “dine out” on his massive commercial & critical success in the 50s which as you put it he “owned” (2) although he did not make a movie in 1961, Quigley nevertheless ranked him as the 21st most popular movie star in America that year (3) for Mutiny on the Bounty released just a bare month before Lawrence Marlon received a unique mega salary – see Part 2 (4)and film historians define his period of decline as 1963 [2 years after the Lawrence contract negotiations] until 1971.

    In short at the turn of the 1960s nobody could have dreamed that Brando would have such a severe decline that decade so I can’t really let you get away with going all the way in “out-Brandoing” me about Brando!! However your implication about him still being able to write his own ticket is astute see Part 2.

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob…pretty sure this is the missing comment…not sure why it went into the spam folder. Goodness gracious the amount of spam in that folder is an insane amount. Felt like I was stuck in the quantum realm….lol. Now I head to work. Sorry for the delay.

      Reply

      1. Then again….this looks like one of the comments that went through. I am so confused. At this point, not thinking I am going to be able to find the missing comment. The spam filter fills up so fast it is almost impossible to find a good comment. Sorry about that…not sure why it went there in the first place.

        Reply

  4. HI BRUCE

    All great minds think alike! as I see that you have now sought Flora’s opinion and I will be interested in that as consulting her was one of my suggestions..

    My own further comments are on the Grant page, which is fitting as I think I’ve contributed enough to that mumbling fellow’s page!

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob….yep….I was thinking…I should get somebody’s opinion that liked the new rating look versus letting the ones that did not like it decide everything….lol.

      Reply

  5. Hey Flora, Steve and Bob. This page has WoC’s Red (bad), Yellow (ok) and Green (good movie) as the rating ticket….the Cary Grant has just one color….which is better?

    Reply

    1. Thanks for asking my opinion of the ticket color rating system. For what it’s worth, I agree with Bob that I don’t wish to take sides between husband and wife. However, I do find that the single colour is more straightforward and easy to understand at a glance.

      One thing about three tickets being yellow as a caution – isn’t 60% as a UMR score supposed to represent a “good” though not “great” movie? I’ve seen three out of five stars as good films that I enjoyed when I rate movies on Letterboxd.

      Reply

      1. Thanks Flora for the feedback on the ticket color. I agree that the one color looks the best…though the red, yellow and green look is interesting as well. Too busy is the best way I can describe it.

        As for the percentages….50% is the average…..so 60% would be better than average….I think once you reach 70% you are looking at a really good movie. But yes…..60% is a good movie. I usually use 3 starts as average when I am doing my Letterboxd.com reviews.

        Happy New Year…..though I think you still have a couple more hours of 2018 left…..I am in 2019 already. Good stuff as always.

        Reply

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