Best movies of 1959
by pauleta_mtr | created - 23 Dec 2016 | updated - 11 Apr 2023 | Public- Instant Watch Options
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1. Ben-Hur (1959)
G | 212 min | Adventure, Drama
After a Jewish prince is betrayed and sent into slavery by a Roman friend in 1st-century Jerusalem, he regains his freedom and comes back for revenge.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Charlton Heston, Jack Hawkins, Stephen Boyd, Haya Harareet
Votes: 253,751 | Gross: $74.70M
9/10
2. Some Like It Hot (1959)
Passed | 121 min | Comedy, Music, Romance
After two male musicians witness a mob hit, they flee the state in an all-female band disguised as women, but further complications set in.
Director: Billy Wilder | Stars: Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, George Raft
Votes: 283,650 | Gross: $25.00M
9/10
3. Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
Approved | 114 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
A surgeon is assigned the case of a young woman whose aunt wants her lobotomized to cover up a family secret.
Director: Joseph L. Mankiewicz | Stars: Elizabeth Taylor, Katharine Hepburn, Montgomery Clift, Albert Dekker
Votes: 17,218 | Gross: $13.90M
8/10
4. The 400 Blows (1959)
Not Rated | 99 min | Crime, Drama
A young boy, left without attention, delves into a life of petty crime.
Director: François Truffaut | Stars: Jean-Pierre Léaud, Albert Rémy, Claire Maurier, Guy Decomble
Votes: 128,110
8/10
5. North by Northwest (1959)
Approved | 136 min | Action, Adventure, Mystery
A New York City advertising executive goes on the run after being mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies, and falls for a woman whose loyalties he begins to doubt.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Jessie Royce Landis
Votes: 346,308 | Gross: $13.28M
8/10
6. Rio Bravo (1959)
Passed | 141 min | Western
A small-town sheriff in the American West enlists the help of a disabled man, a drunk, and a young gunfighter in his efforts to hold in jail the brother of the local bad guy.
Director: Howard Hawks | Stars: John Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson, Angie Dickinson
Votes: 68,097 | Gross: $12.54M
8/10
7. The Diary of Anne Frank (1959)
Approved | 180 min | Biography, Drama, Family
During World War II, a teenage Jewish girl named Anne Frank and her family are forced into hiding in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands.
Director: George Stevens | Stars: Millie Perkins, Shelley Winters, Joseph Schildkraut, Richard Beymer
Votes: 13,696 | Gross: $5.01M
8/10
8. Night Train (1959)
99 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Jerzy enters a train set for the Baltic coast. He seems to be on the run from something - as does the strange woman with whom he must share a sleeping compartment.
Director: Jerzy Kawalerowicz | Stars: Lucyna Winnicka, Leon Niemczyk, Teresa Szmigielówna, Zbigniew Cybulski
Votes: 3,627
7.5/10
9. The Destiny of a Man (1959)
103 min | Drama, War
A Soviet soldier, Andrei Sokolov, has been separated from his family by World War II. Suffering in German captivity, he dreams of meeting his darlings after the victory. But cruel fate turned out otherwise.
Director: Sergey Bondarchuk | Stars: Sergey Bondarchuk, Pavel Boriskin, Zinaida Kirienko, Pavel Volkov
Votes: 3,711
7/10
10. Pickpocket (1959)
Not Rated | 76 min | Crime, Drama
Michel passes the time by picking pockets, careful to never be caught despite being watched by the police. His friend Jacques may suspect, while both men may have their eyes on Jeanne, the pretty neighbor of Michel's ailing mother.
Director: Robert Bresson | Stars: Martin LaSalle, Marika Green, Jean Pélégri, Dolly Scal
Votes: 25,369
7/10
11. Sleeping Beauty (1959)
G | 75 min | Animation, Adventure, Family
After being snubbed by the royal family, a malevolent fairy places a curse on a princess which only a prince can break, along with the help of three good fairies.
Directors: Les Clark, Clyde Geronimi, Eric Larson, Wolfgang Reitherman, Hamilton Luske | Stars: Mary Costa, Bill Shirley, Eleanor Audley, Verna Felton
Votes: 160,958 | Gross: $51.60M
7/10
12. Shadows (1958)
PG | 87 min | Drama, Music, Romance
Cassavetes' jazz-scored improvisational film explores interracial friendships and relationships in Beat-Era (1950s) New York City.
Director: John Cassavetes | Stars: Ben Carruthers, Lelia Goldoni, Hugh Hurd, Anthony Ray
Votes: 12,562
7/10
13. Odds Against Tomorrow (1959)
Approved | 96 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
In need of quick money, a fallen former cop recruits a hard-bitten ex-con and a debt-ridden nightclub singer to pull off a bank job. But as the animosity between them boils over, the entire plan threatens to implode.
Director: Robert Wise | Stars: Harry Belafonte, Robert Ryan, Gloria Grahame, Shelley Winters
Votes: 5,565
7/10
14. Imitation of Life (1959)
Not Rated | 125 min | Drama
An aspiring white actress takes in an African American widow whose mixed-race daughter is desperate to be seen as white.
Director: Douglas Sirk | Stars: Lana Turner, John Gavin, Sandra Dee, Susan Kohner
Votes: 18,225 | Gross: $13.99M
7/10
15. Room at the Top (1958)
Not Rated | 115 min | Drama, Romance
An ambitious young accountant plots to wed a wealthy factory owner's daughter despite falling in love with a married older woman.
Director: Jack Clayton | Stars: Laurence Harvey, Simone Signoret, Heather Sears, Donald Wolfit
Votes: 7,331
7/10
16. Pillow Talk (1959)
Passed | 102 min | Comedy, Romance
An interior decorator and a playboy songwriter share a telephone party line and size each other up.
Director: Michael Gordon | Stars: Rock Hudson, Doris Day, Tony Randall, Thelma Ritter
Votes: 19,182 | Gross: $18.75M
7/10
17. The Young Philadelphians (1959)
Approved | 136 min | Drama
A promising lawyer tries to handle his social and professional problems while climbing the ranks in Philadelphia.
Director: Vincent Sherman | Stars: Paul Newman, Barbara Rush, Alexis Smith, Brian Keith
Votes: 4,275
7/10
18. Last Train from Gun Hill (1959)
Passed | 95 min | Western
A marshal tries to bring the son of an old friend, an autocratic cattle baron, to justice for his role in the rape and murder of the marshal's Native American wife.
Director: John Sturges | Stars: Kirk Douglas, Anthony Quinn, Carolyn Jones, Earl Holliman
Votes: 8,809 | Gross: $2.50M
7/10
19. Al Capone (1959)
Approved | 104 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
A chronicle of the rise and fall of Chicago crime boss Al Capone during the Prohibition era.
Director: Richard Wilson | Stars: Rod Steiger, Martin Balsam, Fay Spain, James Gregory
Votes: 1,909
7/10
20. Day of the Outlaw (1959)
Not Rated | 92 min | Drama, Western
Blaise Starrett is a rancher at odds with homesteaders when outlaws hold up the small town. The outlaws are held in check only by their notorious leader, but he is diagnosed with a fatal wound and the town is a powder keg waiting to blow.
Director: André De Toth | Stars: Robert Ryan, Burl Ives, Tina Louise, Alan Marshal
Votes: 4,424
7/10
21. General Della Rovere (1959)
Not Rated | 129 min | Drama, War
Bardone, a petty con man, is arrested by the Gestapo and coerced into impersonating a partisan leader in order to expose another resistance organizer.
Director: Roberto Rossellini | Stars: Vittorio De Sica, Hannes Messemer, Sandra Milo, Giovanna Ralli
Votes: 3,687
7/10
22. Nazarin (1959)
Not Rated | 94 min | Drama
A priest in a poor community lives a charitable life in accordance with his religious principles, but many others do not return the favor.
Director: Luis Buñuel | Stars: Francisco Rabal, Marga López, Rita Macedo, Ignacio López Tarso
Votes: 6,456
7/10
23. The Last Angry Man (1959)
Approved | 100 min | Drama
An aspiring journalist's story of his aged uncle doctor leads to the uncle's life being profiled on TV.
Director: Daniel Mann | Stars: Paul Muni, David Wayne, Betsy Palmer, Luther Adler
Votes: 1,026
7/10
24. House on Haunted Hill (1959)
Approved | 75 min | Crime, Horror, Mystery
A millionaire offers $10,000 to five people who agree to be locked in a large, spooky, rented house overnight with him and his wife.
Director: William Castle | Stars: Vincent Price, Carol Ohmart, Richard Long, Alan Marshal
Votes: 30,849
6.5/10
25. The Fugitive Kind (1960)
Not Rated | 119 min | Drama, Romance
Valentine "Snakeskin" Xavier, a trouble-prone drifter trying to go straight, wanders into a small Mississippi town looking for a simple and honest life but finds himself embroiled with problem-filled women.
Director: Sidney Lumet | Stars: Marlon Brando, Joanne Woodward, Anna Magnani, Maureen Stapleton
Votes: 7,152
6/10
26. Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)
Not Rated | 90 min | Drama, Romance
A French actress filming an anti-war film in Hiroshima has an affair with a married Japanese architect as they share their differing perspectives on war.
Director: Alain Resnais | Stars: Emmanuelle Riva, Eiji Okada, Stella Dassas, Pierre Barbaud
Votes: 35,903 | Gross: $0.09M
6/10
27. On the Beach (1959)
Approved | 134 min | Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi
After a global nuclear war, the residents of Australia must come to terms with the fact that all life will be destroyed in a matter of months.
Director: Stanley Kramer | Stars: Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astaire, Anthony Perkins
Votes: 14,420 | Gross: $11.00M
6/10
28. Café pod Minoga (1959)
88 min | Comedy, War
Comic stories of Varsovians living under German occupation and struggling with the enemy.
Director: Bronislaw Brok | Stars: Adolf Dymsza, Waclaw Jankowski, Wlodzimierz Skoczylas, Feliks Chmurkowski
Votes: 92
6/10
29. The Hanging Tree (1959)
Approved | 107 min | Western
Unusual western about a doctor with a dark past, whose life is complicated and ultimately redeemed by a young thief, and a pretty Swiss immigrant whom he nurses back to health.
Directors: Delmer Daves, Karl Malden, Vincent Sherman | Stars: Gary Cooper, Maria Schell, Karl Malden, George C. Scott
Votes: 4,755
6/10
30. Two Men in Manhattan (1959)
Not Rated | 84 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A French UN delegate has disappeared into thin air, sending reporter Moreau (Jean-Pierre Melville) and hard drinking photographer Delmas (Pierre Grasset) on an assignment to find him. Their only lead is a picture of three women.
Director: Jean-Pierre Melville | Stars: Jean-Pierre Melville, Pierre Grasset, Christiane Eudes, Ginger Hall
Votes: 2,276
6/10
31. Ride Lonesome (1959)
Approved | 73 min | Western
A bounty hunter (Randolph Scott) escorts a killer (James Best) to be tried for murder, but allows the man's outlaw brother (Lee Van Cleef) to catch up with them to have a showdown over a previous shocking murder.
Director: Budd Boetticher | Stars: Randolph Scott, Karen Steele, Pernell Roberts, James Best
Votes: 6,606
6/10
32. The Devil's Disciple (1959)
Approved | 83 min | Comedy, History, Romance
The black sheep of a family and the local minister discover their true vocations during the Revolutionary War.
Directors: Guy Hamilton, Alexander Mackendrick | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, Janette Scott
Votes: 2,876
6/10
33. The Mouse That Roared (1959)
Approved | 83 min | Comedy
An impoverished backward nation declares a war on the United States of America, hoping to lose, but things don't go according to plan.
Director: Jack Arnold | Stars: Peter Sellers, Jean Seberg, William Hartnell, David Kossoff
Votes: 9,464
6/10
34. Operation Petticoat (1959)
Approved | 124 min | Comedy, Romance, War
During World War II, a commander finds himself stuck with a decrepit (and pink) submarine, a con man executive officer, and a group of army nurses.
Director: Blake Edwards | Stars: Cary Grant, Tony Curtis, Joan O'Brien, Dina Merrill
Votes: 15,880 | Gross: $23.30M
6/10
35. Awantura o Basie (1959)
96 min | Comedy, Family
Stanislawa Olszanska is supposed to take care of several-year-old Basia, the daughter of her deceased friend. By accident, the girl goes to the writer Stanislaw Olszowski.
Director: Maria Kaniewska | Stars: Malgorzata Piekarska, Jerzy Duszynski, Ewa Krasnodebska, Bogdan Baer
Votes: 118
6/10
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