Spencer Tracy Movies

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

Fox Films signed Spencer Tracy (1900-1967) to his first movie contract. His first movie was Up the River, directed by John Ford and co-starred another newcomer, Humphrey Bogart.  For the next five years, Tracy appeared in nearly five films a year. Most of these films were low budget films that were forgotten as soon as they were produced. Just how bad were this movies? After making Dante’s Inferno in 1935, Tracy’s contract was terminated. Being fired was Spencer Tracy’s big break, as it allowed him to sign a contract with MGM. At MGM, Spencer Tracy became one of the greatest actors of all-time. This page has every movie he made from 1935 to 1967.

His IMDb page shows 78 acting credits from 1930-1967. This page will rank 60 Spencer Tracy movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television shows, shorts, cameos and many of his early Fox Films’ movies that were not released in theaters were not included in the rankings.

Spencer Tracy, Judy Holliday and Katharine Hepburn in 1949's Adam's Rib
Spencer Tracy, Judy Holliday and Katharine Hepburn in 1949’s Adam’s Rib

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

Spencer Tracy 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 Spencer Tracy movies by co-stars of his movies.
  • Sort Spencer Tracy movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort Spencer Tracy movies by adjusted worldwide box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort Spencer Tracy 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 Spencer Tracy movie received.
  • Sort Spencer Tracy 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.
  • Use the sort and search buttons to make this table very interactive.  For example type in “Katharine Hepburn” in the search box…and the Hepburn/Tracy movies pop right up

Stats and Possibly Interesting Things From The Above Spencer Tracy Table

  1. Thirty-one Spencer Tracy movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark.  That is a percentage of 51.66% of his movies listed. How the West Was Won (1963) was his biggest box office ht just barely holding off 1936’s San Francisco.
  2. An average Spencer Tracy movie grosses $149.80 million in adjusted box office gross.
  3. Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter.  43 of Spencer Tracy’s movies are rated as good movies…or 71.66% of his movies. Adam’s Rib (1949) is his highest rated movie while Plymouth Adventure (1952) was his lowest rated movie.
  4. Thirty Spencer Tracy movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 50.00% of his movies.
  5. Twelve Spencer Tracy movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 20.00% of his movies.
  6. An average Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 40.00.  42 Spencer Tracy movies scored higher than that average….or 70.00% of his movies.  Boys Town (1938) got the the highest UMR Score while Up the River (1930) got the lowest UMR Score.
Spencer Tracy in 1963's It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World
Spencer Tracy in 1963’s It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World

Possibly Interesting Facts About Sir Spencer Tracy

1. In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked Tracy ninth among the Greatest Male Actors of All-Time.

2. He received 9 Oscar(®) nominations for Best Actor.…..he won twice…for 1937’s Captain Courageous and 1938’s Boys Town.

3. Spencer Tracy joins Luise Rainer, Jason Robards, Katharine Hepburn and Tom Hanks as the only actors to win back to back acting Oscars®.

4. Spencer Tracy had to drop out of the movies, Cheyenne Autumn and The Cincinnati Kid, due to health issues, both times his part was played by Edward G. Robinson.

5. In the Oscar(®) winning Pixar movie Up, Carl the main character is a combination of Spencer Tracy and Walter Matthau….the next time you see Up try and not think of Spencer Tracy whenever Carl is on screen….it can not be done.

6. Turned down Cary Grant’s role in The Philadelphia Story in order to make Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

7. Along with Katharine Hepburn, visited an ailing Humphrey Bogart almost daily as he was dying of cancer…..while Katharine Hepburn was with Spencer Tracy on the night he died.  Tracy died only 17 days after filming of 1967’s Guess Who`s Coming to Dinner had been completed.

8. Has three films on the American Film Institute`s 100 Most Inspiring Movies of All Time. They are: Captains Courageous (1937) at #94, Boys Town (1938) at #81 and Guess Who`s Coming to Dinner (1967) at #35.

9. The John Tracy Clinic is a private, non-profit education center for infants and preschool children with hearing loss in Los Angeles, California. It was founded by Lousie Treadwell Tracy , wife of actor Spencer Tracy, in 1942. It provides free, parent-centered services worldwide. The Clinic has over 60 years of expertise in the spoken language option.

10.  Recently I discovered one awesome Spencer Tracy tribute site.  Highly recommend checking out The Greatest of All Spencer Tracy.  This site has some awesome Spencer Tracy photos, links to Spencer Tracy information and much much more.

Check out Spencer Tracy’s career compared to current and classic actors.  Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.

Proof of possibly interesting fact # 5 about Spencer Tracy.

 

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

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87 thoughts on “Spencer Tracy Movies”

  1. I adore the photo of Carl! UP was a fantastic movie! It’s for big kids also even though it’s animated. For some reason I wanted to go UP for hours after watching it! 🙂

    Reply

  2. Hi Codgerson anyone of my vintage would have loved Spencer Tracy, Charles Laughton too. Guess who’s coming to dinner is one of my all time favourite movies and its theme helped to make me a more rounded person. I like reading autobiographies and Sidney Poitiers’ is one of the most interesting i have found. I would have seen most of Tracy’s movies, but alas can only remember the big ones such as Boys Town and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Adam’s Rib. He was one of the best in an era where he had plenty of competition. Cheers Buddy.

    Reply

  3. Another excellent page Conanson, congrats on the win for Best Avatar btw. I wasn’t even nominated for prettiest avatar! [sniff]

    I love Spencer Tracy, great actor, one of the best. Boys Town isn’t one of my favourites though. Boom Town with Clark Gable was a lot of fun and I would recommend Dante’s Inferno as a very interesting early film in his career. The depiction of hell in the film is still startling and clips from this sequence have turned up everywhere.

    I agree with Flora on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, one of my favourites of his films and an excellent score by Franz Waxman. There is one famous anecdote from this film I want to repeat here – Somerset Maugham visiting the set while they were filming remarked on seeing Spencer Tracy – “Which one is he playing now, Jekyll or Hyde?” 🙂

    Adams Rib is my favourite of the Tracy/Hepburn team ups, watched it many times.

    Awesomely Interesting.

    Oh and the great Charles Laughton would make an interesting page too… 🙂 “Sanctuary! Sanctuary!”

    Reply

  4. Hi, Cogerson.

    First of all, I have to disagree that his doing the film Jeckyll and Hyde was a mistake. It was a classic. It is fabulous. I know The Philidelphia Story is a big hit, but his version of the horror story is much superior to Fredrich March’s version. I love this movie. the thing with Tracy, he was an idol to so many actors thatregadless of wht his films did at the box office, he didn’t really make any bad movies once he moved to MGM. He was always great.

    Plus, I noticed the resemblence to Tracy in up right away. He looks exactly like him. ther eare a lot of salutes to clasic movies in that film.

    Not sure how to discuss Tracy here. I considred saying what films of his I’ve seen vs. haven’t seen, but since my percentage would be wildly different compared to if you had included his cameo films I don’t think so.

    So, I will talk about my feelings for certain films in the Movie Score list, briefly. The comedy legends in It’s a Mad, Mad, mad,Mad World. Wow!

    First: in the top ten: I love numbers 3, 5, 7, and 9. Yes, I love some war films 🙂 They are beautiful stories, al lthree.

    I know Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner is dated now, but you can’t look at movies as what they mean now. You have to look at the time they were made.

    It is my favourite film of TRacy and Hepburn together. I prefer their dramas in general to their comedies. A personal preference related a lot to the fact that I prefer Hepburn in her dramas. I’m not a big fan of comedies but more of an attitude where it depends on the specific movie.

    From 11-25: My favourite of these is definately Bad Day at Black Rock. There are several eventual or already winners of the Academy Award. Plus Ryan was nominated. It is one of my favourite movies, period.

    He appeared in Broken Lance with Widmark who adored him. They worked wonderfully together. Robert Wagner was the main character of the brothers.

    26-40: My favourite is Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde. As I believe I’ve hinted already. Having Tracy and Ingrid Bergman is a dream.

    tortilla Flat was a mistake. He was the wrong ethnicity-so was everyone else. It is an od film, one that makes me uncomfortable.

    Test Pilot is a lot of fun. Once again, Tracy and Gable working together, along with the fabulous Myrna loy.

    41-52: the only one I’ve seen so far is his debut Up the River. He and Bogart together in theearly part of their careers. It is not a bad film. My guess is that racy didn’t realize that his next films would be so bad while he was making this movie.

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  5. Spencer Tracy was an excellent actor. So many wonderful films. Northwest Passage was such a favorite film of your fathers – it was an excellent film……..such good information on a wonderful actor. I have seen quite a few of his movies. THANKS.

    Reply

    1. Hey BERN1960…yep dad was a huge Tracy fan…especially Northwest Passage…thanks for stopping by

      Reply

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