Sterling Hayden Movies

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

Sterling Hayden (1916-1986) was an American actor, author, and sailor.   Hayden’s early career featured him in leading roles in westerns and film noir throughout the 1950s.  He became noted for supporting roles like his role as General Jack D. Ripper in Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) and Capt. McCluskey in The Godfather. His IMDb page shows 73 acting credits from 1941 to 1982.   This page will rank Sterling Hayden movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television shows, shorts, cameos, uncredited roles and movies that were not released in North American and a many of his low budget movies that we could not find box office on, were not included in the rankings.

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

1980’s 9 to 5

Sterling Hayden 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 Sterling Hayden movies by his co-stars
  • Sort Sterling Hayden movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
  • Sort Sterling Hayden movies by yearly domestic box office rank
  • Sort Sterling Hayden 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 Sterling Hayden movie received.
  • Sort Ben Sterling Hayden movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score.  UMR puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
1964’s Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

Best IMDb trivia on Sterling Hayden

  1. Sterling Relyea Walter was born in Upper Montclair, New Jersey in 1916.

2.  Sterling Hayden nicknames:  The Most Beautiful Man in the Movies
and The Beautiful Blond Viking God.

3.  After two film roles, Sterling Hayden left Hollywood to fight in World War II. He enlisted in the army, trained in Scotland, but broke his ankle and was let out.  He returned to the US and tried to buy a half-interest in a schooner but could not raise the money. He joined the United States Marine Corps as a private, under the name John Hamilton. While at Parris Island, he was recommended for Officer Candidate School.  After graduation, he was commissioned a second lieutenant and was transferred to service as an undercover agent with William J. “Wild Bill” Donovan’s Office of the Coordinator of Information.

4. Sterling Hayden was the original choice to play the knife thrower Britt in The Magnificent Seven (1960). The part went to James Coburn when Hayden proved unavailable.

5. Sterling Hayden was the first choice of producers Richard D. Zanuck and David Brown to play the role of Quint in Jaws (1975), but Hayden’s tax problems with the US government–he lived outside the country and if he entered the US he would have been arrested–precluded his taking the role.

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

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Check out Steve’s Sterling Hayden You Tube Video

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28 thoughts on “Sterling Hayden Movies”

  1. I believe I requested a Sterling Hayden page a long while back.

    I have seen 13 Sterling Hayden movies, including 8 of the top 10 and 10 of the top 15.

    The HIGHEST rated movie I have seen is Dr. Strangelove.

    The highest rated movie I have NOT seen is The Godfather.

    The LOWEST rated movie I have seen is Zero Hour.

    Favourite Sterling Hayden Movies:

    Dr. Strangelove
    Suddenly
    The Asphalt Jungle
    The Killing
    Johnny Guitar
    Crime of Passion

    Other Sterling Hayden Movies I Have Seen:

    9 to 5
    So Big
    Prince Valiant
    The Long Goodbye
    Crime Wave
    The Star
    Zero Hour

    Reply

    1. Hey Flora….thanks for the visit, the comment and the tally count on Sterling Hayden. Sorry it took so long to do a page on him…I kept hoping some of his lower budget movies would eventually shed some light on their box office numbers….but it is not meant to be.

      Tally count….I have seen 9 to your 13….Steve is 8….and bob picks up the top spot with 15. I have seen all of your favorites with the exception of Suddenly. Love Dr. Strangelove, The Killing and Johnny Guitar as well. I have seen 3 of your non-favorites…with 9 to 5 being my favorite of those movies. Good stuff as always.

      Reply

  2. Thank you for having this page on the legendary Sterling Hayden.
    He was bigger-than-life and a man who did it all: romantic leading man, authentic WW II hero, political activist (once a friendly witness, who later repudiated his role), an extraordinary seaman, gifted writer, and much more. He burned out too fast, lived too fast, and devour all the experiences of life. He was memorable in scores of films, where he often overshadowed his co-stars: The Asphalt Jungle, The Killing, Dr. Strangelove, The Godfather, and many others.
    Thank you for the memory.

    Reply

    1. Hey Frank. Glad you enjoyed our statistical look at the movie career of Sterling Hayden. His “real life” is could easily be something that a movie could center around. “He was bigger-than-life and a man who did it all: romantic leading man, authentic WW II hero, political activist (once a friendly witness, who later repudiated his role), an extraordinary seaman, gifted writer, and much more. He burned out too fast, lived too fast, and devour all the experiences of life.”…..I agree with this comment 100%. The four movies you mention….along with Johnny Guitar make him a movie legend. Thanks for the kind words and for stopping by.

      Reply

  3. In the 1991 film Guilty by Suspicion about the McCarthy witch-hunts Robert DeNiro’s character is being questioned by the un-American Activities Committee about his knowledge of movie people who might be Communists or have sympathy with the latter and one of the names put to DeNiro is Sterling Hayden, who had briefly been a member of the Communist Party around 1946. Like Elia Kazan Sterling drew controversy by “naming names” and later confessed on television that he was ashamed of what he had done. At one point he announced that to get away from it all he was planning an around-the-world trip in his boat.

    A friend of mine who despised collaborators sarcastically remarked at the time “He’ll be back when the money runs out.” In any event, Hayden subsequently further repudiated his cooperation with the Committee, stating in his autobiography, “I don’t think you have the foggiest notion of the contempt I have had for myself since the day I did that thing.”

    As the above tables faithfully show after Dr Strangelove Sterling went through a lean period but with Godpop in 1972 he experienced a brief Indian Summer. One film historian remarked about the cast of the Godfather films “Brando, Richard Conte and Sterling Hayden represent Old Hollywood with Pacino, Duvall, Cann, Keaton and [in Godfather 2] DeNiro bringing in Hollywood’s new wave.”

    Sterling’s net worth at the time of his 1996 death is estimated at $8 million in today’s money. It will be understood from my Part One comments that this new page has been a nostalgic treat for me and is therefore highly “Voted Up!”

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob….good information share on Hayden and his history with “witch hunt” of the 1950s. I think your comment demonstrates the turmoil in his life. Seems there might be a movie of his life some day….lots and lots of drama. Your friend was 100% correct…Hayden only returned to acting when the money ran out. Today it is his supporting roles in monster hits like 9 to 5, The Godfather and Stranglelove that he is remembered for….his leading B days seem to be forgotten. Thanks for the vote up and for stopping by.

      Reply

  4. WORK HORSE: Gail Russell was Sterling’s female co-star in El Paso. Dorothy Lamour was his leading lady the same year in Manhandled as you have correctly listed.

    Sterling was the leading man in many 1950s B movies/programmers, but when there was another important star in the movie Hayden was usually 2nd fiddle, for example to: Davis in The Star; Crawford in Johnny Guitar; Ann Sheridan in Take Me to Town; and even John Payne in El Paso and Edmond O’Brien in Denver & Rio Grande.

    Therefore whilst I would agree broadly with Joel’s take on Sterling’s career, I don’t think that The Master is completely accurate in suggesting that Hayden never found his “niche”. When I was growing up in the 1950s, I saw him as a great iconic figure who provided me with hours of entertainment in action films and B or B+ westerns such as Flaming Feather, Arrow in the Dust, Top Gun, Timberjack, Shotgun, The Last Command, Gun Battle at Monterey and Terror in a Texas Town, at the end of which Sterling ‘outdrew’ a top gunman by harpooning him.

    The Hollywood production system was a lot different in those days and the many 2nd run cinemas that peppered our cities and towns depended on a constant supply of programmers and B movies for their survival. Hayden was one of the action-hero B list stalwarts who was essential to those supply chains because he was very suitable to the types of cheap movies that those cinemas demanded.

    He seemed to be on all the time in double bills and I saw him in Naked Alibi which supported McCrea’s Black Horse Canyon; Crime Wave on the same bill as Lancaster’s South Sea Women; Crime of Passion, supporting Dana Andrews/Betty Hutton’s Spring Reunion; The Killing which shared the bill with Mitchum’s Foreign Intrigue. THAT was I feel Sterling’s niche in the history of Hollywood movies. In such low grade fare he was a godsend to impressionable teenage moviegoers like me in the 1950s. Those years were his personal heyday

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob….many of his 1950s B movies did not make the table…I have been searching for those movies for awhile…but never got any information. The last straw was when I bought the book Sterling Hayden’s Wars…when that book offered up no box office information…I officially gave up and went ahead and published the numbers I did have on Hayden. The book is interesting if somewhat sad…as his life was in a constant state of chaos…or at least the parts I read. Finally…I agree with final 4 sentences 100%. Good stuff as always.

      Reply

      1. H I BRUCE Thanks for your feedback. You got all Sterling’s A list movies and his most important B ones in your table from my recollection, so the page was well worthwhile as many of the films you have listed never had grosses published before. No other site would provide stats for the likes of Top Gun and The Eternal Sea, so well done.

        My aunts used to drool over Sterling. When he announced he was going to sail away round the world for a while, one of the aunts said to me “I wish he’d take me with him!” I would have settled for him taking Joel with him had I known about Hirsch back then!

        Sterling’s niche may not have been the one that interested Joel or those snobs and prima donnas who frequented the Academy; and indeed it may not have been the niche that even Hayden himself preferred. Nonetheless though, the progression of movie history dictated a niche for him that, in the 1950s, was important to itself in those days.

        However I agree with you that it is the likes of Godpop that if they think of him at all today’s audiences will most think of him in connection with – and why not?: he was brilliant in it and today his 50s flicks would have nostalgic memories for only the likes of me. Like Arnie, Sly, Harrison et all I’m getting old! Last night I was moving too slowly in my car for one of today’s “Young Turks” and he shouted out the window at me “Are you pretending to be a ******* tortoise Grandpa?” Sadly I had to grin and bear it: a 78 year old John McClane would have dragged him out of his car and plastered him all over the place!” However for we ordinary guys, as Bette Davis said “Old age isn’t for sissies.”

        I see you’re still listing Dorothy Lamour for El Paso instead of Gail Russell. Is Dottie joining Myrna and Angela as another Cogerson Queen!?

        Reply

  5. “Hulking and handsome, Sterling Hayden never found his niche in films. In the beginning, he was just too big and brutish to be a romantic leading man. And later on, he was just too handsome and fair-featured to make a memorable villain. However, he did develop into a capable and compelling character actor.”

    Rating the Movie Stars Book 4 Star Sterling Hayden Performances
    1950’s The Asphalt Jungle
    1953’s The Star
    1954’s Johnny Guitar
    1954’s Suddenly
    1956’s The Killing
    1964’s Dr. Strangelove or How I Learned Stop Worrying and Love The Bomb
    1972’s The Godfather
    1975’s The Long Goodbye

    Reply

    1. Another Joel subject has an UMR page. I have actually been sitting on this page for awhile…I kept hoping some box office source would appear and allow his to include more of his movies…..but it looks like 36 is going to be the final Hayden tally…at least for awhile.

      Reply

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