MY TOP 35 MOVIES FOR 1956 (in list order)
by DukeEman | created - 20 Jul 2012 | updated - 2 months ago | PublicThe cinematic mind of Bresson; Ford and Wayne do it again, and Dean hangs out with Taylor and Hudson. (In list order.)
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1. A Man Escaped (1956)
Not Rated | 101 min | Drama, Thriller, War
A captured French Resistance fighter during World War II engineers a daunting escape from a German prison in France.
Director: Robert Bresson | Stars: François Leterrier, Charles Le Clainche, Maurice Beerblock, Roland Monod
Votes: 25,019
One of Bresson's finest...
2. The Searchers (1956)
Passed | 119 min | Adventure, Drama, Western
An American Civil War veteran embarks on a years-long journey to rescue his niece from the Comanches after the rest of his brother's family is massacred in a raid on their Texas farm.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Jeffrey Hunter, Vera Miles, Ward Bond
Votes: 96,349
Wayne and Ford deliver their best...
3. Giant (1956)
G | 201 min | Drama, Western
Sprawling epic covering the life of a Texas cattle rancher and his family and associates.
Director: George Stevens | Stars: Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, James Dean, Carroll Baker
Votes: 42,265
Dream cast in epic melodrama...
4. Baby Doll (1956)
Approved | 114 min | Comedy, Drama
An immature, naive teenage bride holds her anxious husband at bay while flirting with an amorous Sicilian farmer.
Director: Elia Kazan | Stars: Karl Malden, Carroll Baker, Eli Wallach, Mildred Dunnock
Votes: 8,296
Kazan pushes it and gets away with it...
5. Early Spring (1956)
145 min | Drama
A young man and his wife struggle within the confines of their passionless relationship while he has an extramarital romance.
Director: Yasujirô Ozu | Stars: Chikage Awashima, Ryô Ikebe, Teiji Takahashi, Keiko Kishi
Votes: 3,729
Ozu delivers again...
6. Moby Dick (1956)
Not Rated | 116 min | Adventure, Drama
The sole survivor of a lost whaling ship relates the tale of his captain's self-destructive obsession to hunt the white whale, Moby Dick.
Director: John Huston | Stars: Gregory Peck, Richard Basehart, Leo Genn, James Robertson Justice
Votes: 21,925 | Gross: $10.40M
Huston captures the soul of the book...
7. Attack (1956)
Approved | 107 min | Action, Drama, War
In 1944, an American Infantry company sets up an artillery observation post, but tensions between Captain Cooney and Lieutenant Costa run high.
Director: Robert Aldrich | Stars: Jack Palance, Lee Marvin, Eddie Albert, Robert Strauss
Votes: 5,838
Perfect vehicle for Aldrich and cast...
8. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
Approved | 80 min | Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi
A small-town doctor learns that the population of his community is being replaced by emotionless alien duplicates.
Director: Don Siegel | Stars: Kevin McCarthy, Dana Wynter, Larry Gates, King Donovan
Votes: 54,791
One of the best 50's sci-fi...
9. Bob the Gambler (1956)
PG | 98 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
After losing big, an aging gambler decides to assemble a team to rob a casino.
Director: Jean-Pierre Melville | Stars: Roger Duchesne, Isabelle Corey, Daniel Cauchy, Guy Decomble
Votes: 13,363 | Gross: $0.02M
Slick Melville and his cool Noir gangsters...
10. The Girl from Flanders (1956)
105 min | Drama, Romance
A love story between a German soldier and a young Flemish woman amidst World War I.
Director: Helmut Käutner | Stars: Nicole Berger, Maximilian Schell, Viktor de Kowa, Friedrich Domin
Votes: 80
An anti-war film that explores the importance of humanity through a romantic love affair.
11. Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956)
Passed | 113 min | Biography, Drama, Sport
Boxer Rocky Graziano's biopic, based on his autobiography, from childhood to his World Middleweight Championship title win at age 28 in 1947.
Director: Robert Wise | Stars: Paul Newman, Pier Angeli, Everett Sloane, Eileen Heckart
Votes: 9,025
Newman begins to stand out...
12. Elena and Her Men (1956)
Not Rated | 98 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Polish countess Elena falls in love with a French radical party's candidate - a general - in pre-World War I Paris, but another officer pines for her. Starring Ingrid Bergman, with Mel ... See full summary »
Director: Jean Renoir | Stars: Ingrid Bergman, Jean Marais, Mel Ferrer, Jean Richard
Votes: 2,161
Renoir's magic works a treat on Ingrid...
13. The Bad Seed (1956)
Approved | 129 min | Drama, Horror, Thriller
Rhoda Penmark seems like your average, sweet eight-year-old girl. After her rival at school dies in mysterious circumstances at the school picnic, her mother starts to suspect that Rhoda was responsible.
Director: Mervyn LeRoy | Stars: Nancy Kelly, Patty McCormack, Gage Clarke, Jesse White
Votes: 15,784
Overlong, too theatrical, melodramatic campy performances, but still riveting stuff...
14. The Killing (1956)
Approved | 84 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Crook Johnny Clay assembles a five-man team to plan and execute a daring racetrack robbery.
Director: Stanley Kubrick | Stars: Sterling Hayden, Coleen Gray, Vince Edwards, Jay C. Flippen
Votes: 97,572
Kubrick prepares for the big one...
15. The Burmese Harp (1956)
Not Rated | 116 min | Drama, Music, War
A conscience-driven Japanese soldier traumatized by the events of WWII adopts the lifestyle of a Buddhist monk.
Director: Kon Ichikawa | Stars: Rentarô Mikuni, Shôji Yasui, Tatsuya Mihashi, Jun Hamamura
Votes: 6,465
Ichikawa finds peace in War...
16. Written on the Wind (1956)
Not Rated | 99 min | Drama
Alcoholic playboy Kyle Hadley marries the woman secretly loved by his poor but hard-working best friend, who in turn is pursued by Kyle's nymphomaniac sister.
Director: Douglas Sirk | Stars: Rock Hudson, Lauren Bacall, Robert Stack, Dorothy Malone
Votes: 13,428
Hudson and Bacall are perfect in this campy Sirk melodrama...
17. The King and I (1956)
G | 133 min | Biography, Drama, Musical
A widow accepts a job as a live-in governess to the King of Siam's children.
Director: Walter Lang | Stars: Yul Brynner, Deborah Kerr, Rita Moreno, Martin Benson
Votes: 27,926 | Gross: $21.30M
Lavish musical...
18. The Girl Can't Help It (1956)
Approved | 98 min | Comedy, Music
A gangster hires a down-and-out press agent to make his airheaded girlfriend a singing star.
Director: Frank Tashlin | Stars: Tom Ewell, Jayne Mansfield, Edmond O'Brien, Julie London
Votes: 3,920
Tashlin has fun with the jugs, and the music is great...
19. The Ten Commandments (1956)
G | 220 min | Adventure, Drama, Family
Moses, raised as a prince of Egypt in the Pharaoh's household, learns of his true heritage as a Hebrew and his divine mission as the deliverer of his people from slavery.
Director: Cecil B. DeMille | Stars: Charlton Heston, Yul Brynner, Anne Baxter, Edward G. Robinson
Votes: 77,915 | Gross: $93.74M
De Mille sure knows how to make them bigger than the bible...
20. What a Woman! (1956)
92 min | Comedy, Drama
A photographer named Corrado snaps a picture of Antonietta. When it shows up on the front page of a magazine, she wants to take him to court over it.
Director: Alessandro Blasetti | Stars: Sophia Loren, Charles Boyer, Marcello Mastroianni, Elisa Cegani
Votes: 481
Sophia and Marcello warming up for better things to come...
21. Forbidden Planet (1956)
G | 98 min | Adventure, Sci-Fi
A starship crew in the 23rd century goes to investigate the silence of a distant planet's colony, only to find just two survivors, a powerful robot, and the deadly secret of a lost civilization.
Director: Fred M. Wilcox | Stars: Walter Pidgeon, Anne Francis, Leslie Nielsen, Warren Stevens
Votes: 53,250 | Gross: $3.00M
It's a crazy kinky planet...
22. The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
PG | 120 min | Drama, Thriller
An American doctor and his wife, a former singing star, witness a murder while vacationing in Morocco, and are drawn into a twisting plot of international intrigue when their young son is kidnapped.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: James Stewart, Doris Day, Brenda de Banzie, Bernard Miles
Votes: 69,612 | Gross: $10.25M
Hitchcock sure knows how to thrill an audience...
23. Godzilla: King of the Monsters! (1956)
Not Rated | 80 min | Action, Horror, Sci-Fi
A 400-foot (122-meter) dinosaur-like beast, awoken from undersea hibernation off the Japanese coast by atomic-bomb testing, attacks Tokyo.
Directors: Ishirô Honda, Terry O. Morse | Stars: Raymond Burr, Takashi Shimura, Momoko Kôchi, Akira Takarada
Votes: 8,833
Loved it as a child...
24. The Wrong Man (1956)
Not Rated | 105 min | Drama, Film-Noir
In 1953, an innocent man named Christopher Emanuel "Manny" Balestrero is arrested after being mistaken for an armed robber.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: Henry Fonda, Vera Miles, Anthony Quayle, Harold J. Stone
Votes: 31,383
One of the lesser interesting and safe Hitchcock projects...
25. Around the World in 80 Days (1956)
G | 175 min | Adventure, Comedy, Family
A Victorian Englishman bets that with the new steamships and railways he can circumnavigate the globe in eighty days.
Directors: Michael Anderson, John Farrow | Stars: David Niven, Cantinflas, Finlay Currie, Robert Morley
Votes: 29,715 | Gross: $42.00M
Pure fun with Niven and Co...
26. The Fastest Gun Alive (1956)
Passed | 89 min | Drama, Western
In the western frontier town of Cross Creek, storekeeper George Temple is a polite and soft spoken man with a secret past. When 3 bank robbers on the lam stop in town to change horses, George's past comes back to haunt him.
Director: Russell Rouse | Stars: Glenn Ford, Jeanne Crain, Broderick Crawford, Russ Tamblyn
Votes: 3,580
Perfect ending but had to sit through clunky wordy junk to get to it...
27. Hollywood or Bust (1956)
Approved | 95 min | Comedy, Musical
A singer who can't pay his bookie joins a nerdy, star-struck movie fan and his Great Dane in a cross-country convertible ride to Hollywood.
Director: Frank Tashlin | Stars: Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Pat Crowley, Maxie Rosenbloom
Votes: 2,358
One of the better Dean and Jerry comedies…
28. Ransom! (1956)
Approved | 109 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
After the child of wealthy parents gets abducted, the police and a member of the press intervene to assist the parents in their search but end up complicating their impending decisions.
Director: Alex Segal | Stars: Glenn Ford, Donna Reed, Leslie Nielsen, Juano Hernandez
Votes: 2,330
It keeps you intrigued even through all the corniness...
29. Lust for Life (1956)
Approved | 122 min | Biography, Drama
The life of brilliant but tortured artist Vincent van Gogh.
Directors: Vincente Minnelli, George Cukor | Stars: Kirk Douglas, Anthony Quinn, James Donald, Pamela Brown
Votes: 12,511 | Gross: $3.48M
Just didn't have that edge like Van Gogh's life...
30. Love Me Tender (1956)
Approved | 89 min | Drama, Musical, Romance
At the end of the Civil War, a Confederate team is ordered to rob a Union payroll train but the war ends leaving these men with their Union loot, until the Feds come looking for it.
Director: Robert D. Webb | Stars: Richard Egan, Debra Paget, Elvis Presley, Robert Middleton
Votes: 4,714 | Gross: $4.50M
Wrong title for this interesting Elvis film...
31. Pardners (1956)
Passed | 90 min | Comedy, Western
A rich momma's boy returns west with the son of his murdered father's partner to foil a gang trying to gain control of his family ranch.
Director: Norman Taurog | Stars: Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Lori Nelson, Jeff Morrow
Votes: 1,744 | Gross: $7.92M
The lads have fun out West...
32. Castle of the Banned Lovers (1956)
93 min | Biography, Drama, History
The beautiful Beatrice Cenci, daughter of the noble Francesco, falls in love with the intendant Olimpio. But she has to face the jealousy of her violent and morbid father, and the hostility of her stepmother Lucrezia.
Director: Riccardo Freda | Stars: Micheline Presle, Gino Cervi, Fausto Tozzi, Frank Villard
Votes: 149
An Italian melodrama that touches on incest and other taboo topics of the time, all in a corny fashion...
33. While the City Sleeps (1956)
Approved | 100 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A serial killer has been killing beautiful women in New York and the new owner of a media company offers a high ranking job to the first of his senior executives who can get the earliest scoops on the case.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Dana Andrews, Rhonda Fleming, George Sanders, Howard Duff
Votes: 7,083
Cheap Fifties thrills…
34. Rice Girl (1956)
90 min | Drama
A young girl hires herself for a low salary in order to snare herself in the rice fields. By the way, the landlord is also her unknown father, of whom she should know nothing. He stands by her paternal as she gets into trouble.
Director: Raffaello Matarazzo | Stars: Elsa Martinelli, Folco Lulli, Michel Auclair, Rik Battaglia
Votes: 133
All the Italian cliche melodramas squeezed into an interesting look at the life of a female rice field worker…
35. Castle of the Banned Lovers (1956)
93 min | Biography, Drama, History
The beautiful Beatrice Cenci, daughter of the noble Francesco, falls in love with the intendant Olimpio. But she has to face the jealousy of her violent and morbid father, and the hostility of her stepmother Lucrezia.
Director: Riccardo Freda | Stars: Micheline Presle, Gino Cervi, Fausto Tozzi, Frank Villard
Votes: 149
A fiery campy melodrama…
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