Best Movies of 1955 by Rank
37
1
Satyajit Ray
Kanu Bannerjee, Karuna Bannerjee, Subir Bannerjee, Uma Das Gupta, Chunibala Devi
Drama
India
Bengali
94
2
Charles Laughton
Robert Mitchum, Shelley Winters, Lillian Gish, James Gleason, Evelyn Varden
Drama / Film-Noir / Thriller / Crime / Cult
USA
English
156
3
Nicholas Ray
James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo, Jim Backus, Ann Doran, Corey Allen
Drama / Cult
USA
English
168
4
Ingmar Bergman
Ulla Jacobsson, Eva Dahlbeck, Harriet Andersson, Margit Carlqvist
Comedy / Romance
Sweden
Swedish
198
5
Henri-Georges Clouzot
Simone Signoret, Véra Clouzot, Paul Meurisse, Charles Vanel, Jean Brochard
Mystery / Thriller / Horror / Film-Noir
France
French
300
7
John Sturges
Spencer Tracy, Robert Ryan, Anne Francis
Drama / Thriller / Mystery / Western
USA
English
317
8
Jules Dassin
Jean Servais, Carl Mohner
Crime / Thriller / Caper / Gangster / Film-Noir
France
French
319
9
Carl Theodor Dreyer
Preben Lerdorff Rye, Birgitte Federspiel, Emil Hass Christensen
Drama / Religion
Denmark
Danish
336
10
Robert Aldrich
Ralph Meeker, Cloris Leachman, Gaby Rodgers, Maxine Copper, Albert Dekker
Thriller / Film-Noir / Crime / Detective / Cult
USA
English
341
11
Max Ophüls
Martine Carol, Peter Ustinov, Anton Walbrook, Henri Guisol
Drama / Period Film / Biography
France / West Germany
French
763
14
Douglas Sirk
Jane Wyman, Rock Hudson, Agnes Moorehead, Conrad Nagel
Drama / Romance
USA
English
790
15
David Lean
Katharine Hepburn, Rossano Brazzi, Isa Miranda, Darren McGavin
Romance / Drama
UK / USA
English
814
16
Alexander Mackendrick
Alec Guinness, Cecil Parker, Herbert Lom, Peter Sellers, Danny Green, Jack Warner
Comedy / Crime / Caper / Family
UK
English
836
17
Alain Resnais
Michel Bouquet, Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, Julius Streicher
Documentary / Short / History / War
France
French
845
18
Laurence Olivier
Cedric Hardwicke, Nicholas Hannen, Laurence Olivier, Ralph Richardson
Drama / War / History / Biography / Epic
UK
English
902
19
Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons, Frank Sinatra, Vivian Blaine
Musical / Comedy / Romance / Crime / Gangster
USA
English
973
20
Daniel Mann
Anna Magnani, Burt Lancaster, Marisa Pavan
Drama / Romance
USA
English
1025
21
Jean Renoir
Jean Gabin, Françoise Arnoul, María Félix
Comedy / Musical / Drama / Romance
France / Italy
French
1057
22
Otto Preminger
Frank Sinatra, Kim Novak, Eleanor Parker, Arnold Stang
Drama
USA
English
1156
23
Richard Brooks
Sidney Poitier, Glenn Ford, Anne Francis, Louis Calhern
Drama
USA
English
1210
24
John Ford, Mervyn LeRoy, Joshua Logan
Henry Fonda, James Cagney, Jack Lemmon
Comedy / Drama / War
USA
English
1480
25
Alfred Hitchcock
Edmund Gwenn, John Forsythe, Mildred Natwick, Mildred Dunnock
Mystery / Comedy / Thriller
USA
English
1553
26
Anthony Mann
James Stewart, Arthur Kennedy, Donald Crisp, Cathy O'Donnell, Alex Nicol
Mystery / Western
USA
English
1563
27
Kenji Mizoguchi
Machiko Kyô, Masayuki Mori, Sô Yamamura
Drama / History / Epic
Japan / Hong Kong
Japanese
1595
28
Alfred Hitchcock
Cary Grant, Grace Kelly, Jessie Royce Landis, John Williams
Mystery / Romance / Thriller / Crime / Caper
USA
English
1597
29
Charles Vidor
Doris Day, James Cagney, Cameron Mitchell, Robert Keith, Tom Tully
Biography / Drama / Musical / Romance / Gangster
USA
English
1705
30
Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske
Peggy Lee, Barbara Luddy, Larry Roberts, Bill Thompson
Drama / Family / Animation / Comedy / Musical / Romance
USA
English
1737
31
Mark Robson
William Holden, Grace Kelly, Fredric March, Mickey Rooney, Robert Strauss
Drama / War
USA
English
1777
32
Fred Zinnemann
Gordon MacRae, Gloria Grahame, Gene Nelson, Charlotte Greenwood
Musical / Romance / Western
USA
English
1798
33
Phil Karlson
John McIntire, Richard Kiley, Kathryn Grant, Edward Andrews
Drama / Film-Noir / Crime
USA
English
1897
34
William Wyler
Humphrey Bogart, Fredric March, Arthur Kennedy, Martha Scott, Dewey Martin
Film-Noir / Drama / Thriller / Crime
USA
English
1897
34
Daniel Mann
Susan Hayward, Patty Duke, Richard Conte, Eddie Albert, Jo Van Fleet, Don Taylor
Biography / Drama / Music
USA
English
1930
35
Frank Tashlin
Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Shirley MacLaine, Dorothy Malone
Comedy / Musical / Romance
USA
English
1956
36
Peter Glenville
Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Wilfrid Lawson
Drama / Religion
UK
English
1982
37
Michelangelo Antonioni
Valentina Cortese, Gabriele Ferzetti, Franco Fabrizi
Drama
Italy
Italian
1988
38
Orson Welles
Orson Welles, Michael Redgrave, Jack Watling, Patricia Medina, Akim Tamiroff
Thriller / Crime / Mystery / Drama
France / Spain / Switzerland
English
2133
40
Stanley Donen, Gene Kelly
Gene Kelly, Dan Dailey, Cyd Charisse, Dolores Gray, Michael Kidd, David Burns
Drama / Comedy / Musical / Romance
USA
English
2162
41
Henry King
William Holden, Jennifer Jones, Torin Thatcher, Isobel Elsom
Drama / Romance
USA
English
2168
42
Joseph H. Lewis
Richard Conte, Jean Wallace, Cornel Wilde, Brian Donlevy, Robert Middleton
Film-Noir / Crime / Drama / Thriller / Detective / Gangster
USA
English
2169
43
Samuel Fuller
Robert Ryan, Robert Stack, Shirley Yamaguchi, Cameron Mitchell, Brad Dexter
Drama / Film-Noir / Crime / Detective
USA
English
2238
44
Leslie Norman
Michael Redgrave, Sheila Sim, Alexander Knox, Denholm Elliott, Ursula Jeans
Thriller / Drama
UK
English
2239
45
Billy Wilder
Marilyn Monroe, Tom Ewell, Evelyn Keyes, Sonny Tufts
Comedy / Romance
USA
English
2285
46
Robert Aldrich
Jack Palance, Ida Lupino, Wendell Corey, Jean Hagen, Rod Steiger
Drama / Film-Noir
USA
English
2297
47
Michael Cacoyannis
Melina Mercouri, George Foundas, Alekos Alexandrakis
Drama / Romance
Greece
Greek
2299
48
Thorold Dickinson
Edward Mulhare, Michael Wager, Margalit Oved, Arik Lavie, Michael Shillo
Adventure / Drama / War
Israel
English
2306
50
Guy Hamilton
John Mills, Eric Portman, Christopher Rhodes, Lionel Jeffries, Bryan Forbes
Drama / War
UK
English
2306
50
Brian Desmond Hurst
Dirk Bogarde, Virginia McKenna, Basil Sydney, Marie Ney, Joseph Tomelty
Drama / Action
UK
English
2330
51
Chuck Jones
Bill Roberts
Family / Animation / Short / Comedy / Musical
USA
English
2353
52
Hiroshi Inagaki
Toshirô Mifune, Koji Tsuruta, Mariko Okada, Kaoru Yachigusa, Michiyo Kogure
Action / Adventure / Biography / Drama / History
Japan
Japanese
2378
53
Henry Koster
Richard Todd, Jean Peters, Marjorie Rambeau, Jill Esmond
Drama / Family / Biography / Religion
USA
English
2393
54
Stanley Kramer, Frank Kramer
Olivia de Havilland, Robert Mitchum, Frank Sinatra, Gloria Grahame
Drama
USA
English
2450
55
Mikio Naruse
Hideko Takamine, Masayuki Mori, Mariko Okada, Isao Yamagata
Drama / Romance
Japan
Japanese
2474
56
Federico Fellini
Broderick Crawford, Richard Basehart, Giulietta Masina
Drama / Comedy / Crime
Italy / France
Italian
2511
57
Robert L. Bendick, Philippe De Lacy
Betty Marsh, John Marsh, Beatrice Troller, Fred Troller
Documentary
USA
English
2511
57
Stanley Kubrick
Frank Silvera, Jamie Smith, Irene Kane, Jerry Jarret, Mike Dana, Felice Orlandi
Crime / Drama / Film-Noir / Thriller / Gangster
USA
English
2555
58
Franco Rossi
Geronimo Meynier, Luigi Tosi, Vera Carmi, Carlo Tamberlani
Comedy / Drama
France / Italy / Spain
Italian
2555
58
Samson Samsonov
Lyudmila Tselikovskaya, Sergei Bondarchuk, Vladimir Druzhnikov
Drama / Comedy
Soviet Union
Russian
2578
59
Charles Walters
Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds, David Wayne, Celeste Holm
Comedy / Romance
USA
English
2605
60
Helmut Käutner
Curd Jürgens, Marianne Koch, Viktor de Kowa, Karl John, Eva Ingeborg Scholz
Drama / War
West Germany
German
2605
60
Henry Cornelius
Julie Harris, Laurence Harvey, Shelley Winters, Ron Randell, Lea Seidl
Drama / Comedy / Romance / Period Film
UK
English
2605
60
Richard Quine
Janet Leigh, Jack Lemmon, Betty Garrett, Bob Fosse, Kurt Kasznar, Dick York
Musical / Comedy / Romance / Drama
USA
English
2605
60
Phil Karlson
Ginger Rogers, Edward G. Robinson, Brian Keith, Lucy Marlow, Lorne Greene
Drama / Film-Noir / Crime / Gangster
USA
English
2605
60
Frank Launder
Alastair Sim, Bill Travers, Norah Gorsen, Molly Urquhart, Francis De Wolff
Comedy / Drama / Romance / Sports
UK
English
2609
61
Jacques Tourneur
Joel McCrea, Vera Miles, Lloyd Bridges, Wallace Ford
Western / Action
USA
English
2654
62
John Ford
Tyrone Power, Maureen O'Hara, Robert Francis, Donald Crisp
Drama / Biography
USA
English
2689
63
Raoul Walsh
Van Heflin, Aldo Ray, Mona Freeman, Nancy Olson, James Whitmore, Raymond Massey
Drama / War / Romance
USA
English
2689
63
Luis Buñuel
Miroslava Stern, Ernesto Alonso, Rita Macedo, Ariadna Welter, Eva Calvo
Comedy / Crime / Drama
Mexico
Spanish
2689
63
Andrzej Wajda
Tadeusz Lomnicki, Urszula Modrzynska, Tadeusz Janczar, Janusz Paluszkiewicz
Drama / War / Romance
Poland
Polish
2689
63
Mark Donskoy
Vera Maretskaya, Aleksey Batalov, Tatyana Piletskaya, Andrei Petrov, Sergei Kurilov
Drama / Period Film
Soviet Union
Russian
2689
63
Juan Antonio Bardem
Lucia Bosé, Alberto Closas, Otello Toso, Carlos Casaravilla
Drama / Crime
Spain / Italy
Spanish
2689
63
Christian-Jaque
Charles Boyer, Martine Carol, Walter Chiari, Paul Frankeur, Elisa Cegani
Drama / Romance / Period Film
France / Italy
French
2689
63
Sergei Yutkevich
Sergei Bondarchuk, Irina Skobtseva, Andrei Popov, Vladimir Soshalsky
Drama / Period Film
Soviet Union
Russian
2689
63
Jesse Hibbs
Audie Murphy, Marshall Thompson, Charles Drake, Jack Kelly, Gregg Palmer
Action / Biography / Drama / War
USA
English
2689
63
Mario Camerini, Mario Bava
Silvana Mangano, Kirk Douglas, Anthony Quinn, Rossana Podestà
Adventure / History / Fantasy / Romance
Italy
Italian
2691
64
Carol Reed
Celia Johnson, Diana Dors, David Kossoff, Joe Robinson, Jonathan Ashmore
Comedy / Drama / Family / Fantasy
UK
English
2740
65
Edward Dmytryk
Deborah Kerr, Van Johnson, John Mills, Peter Cushing
Drama / Romance / War
UK
English
2741
66
Anthony Asquith
David Niven, Margaret Leighton, Noelle Middleton, Allan Cuthbertson
Drama / Comedy
UK
English
2773
67
László Benedek
Alice Treff, Marianne Sinclair, Beate Koepnick
Drama / War
West Germany
German
2778
68
Fritz Lang
Stewart Granger, George Sanders, Joan Greenwood, Viveca Lindfors
Adventure
USA
English
2788
69
Andrzej Munk, Jan Riesser
Gustaw Holoubek, Wojciech Siemion, Stanislaw Wawrytko
War / Drama / Action / Adventure
Poland
Polish
2788
69
Wolfgang Staudte
Dick Van Der Velde, Berta Drews, Kees Brusse
Drama
Netherlands / West Germany
Dutch
2788
69
Anatole Litvak
Vivien Leigh, Kenneth More, Eric Portman, Emlyn Williams
Drama / Romance
UK
English
2788
69
Burt Lancaster
Burt Lancaster, Diana Lynn, Dianne Foster, John McIntire
Drama / Western
USA
English
2788
69
Yves Ciampi
Yves Montand, María Félix, Jean Servais
Adventure / Drama / Crime / Romance
France / West Germany
French
2792
70
Vincente Minnelli
Richard Widmark, Lauren Bacall, Charles Boyer, Gloria Grahame
Drama
USA
English
2792
70
Howard Hawks
Jack Hawkins, Joan Collins, Dewey Martin, Alex Minotis
Drama / History / Epic
USA
English
2792
70
Kenji Mizoguchi
Raizô Ichikawa, Michiyo Kogure, Mitsusaburô Ramon
Drama / History / Epic
Japan
Japanese
2807
71
William Beaudine
Tim Considine, David Stollery, Roy Barcroft, Harry Carey Jr., Leonard P. Geer
Adventure / Western / Family / Serial
USA
English
2807
71
Alfred Hitchcock
Claude Rains, Hume Cronyn, Jessica Tandy, Edmund Gwenn, Herbert Marshall
Mystery / Thriller
USA
English
2807
71
Alan Crosland Jr., Herschel Daugherty
James Arness, Milburn Stone, Amanda Blake, Tom Brown, Dabbs Greer, Hank Patterson
Drama / Western
USA
English
2807
71
various
James Arness, Milburn Stone, Amanda Blake, Ken Curtis, Glenn Strange, Dennis Weaver
Drama / Western / Serial
USA
English
2807
71
unknown
Johnny Carson, Virginia Gibson, Barbara Ruick, Jill Corey, Jack Prince
Comedy / Music
USA
English
2807
71
Ward Kimball
Dick Tufeld, Walt Disney, Wernher von Braun, Heinz Haber, Willy Ley
Documentary / Animation / Short / Family
USA
English
2807
71
Charles F. Haas
Tim Considine, Tommy Kirk, Carole Ann Campbell, Russ Conway, Mort Mills
Family / Comedy / Drama / Music / Serial
USA
English
2807
71
Al De Caprio, Charles Friedman, Nat Hiken
Phil Silvers, Harvey Lembeck, Herbie Faye, Paul Ford, Maurice Gosfield
Comedy / Family
USA
English
2807
71
William Beaudine
Dick Tufield, Dr. Heinz Haber, Wernher Von Braun, Willy Ley, Ward Kimball
Documentary / Animation / Family
USA
English
2807
71
Jacques Tourneur
Joel McCrea, Miroslava Stern, Kevin McCarthy, John McIntire, John Carradine
Western
USA
English
2807
71
Norman Taurog
Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Diana Lynn, Nina Foch, Raymond Burr, Mitzi McCall
Comedy / Crime
USA
English
2809
72
Mark Robson
Glenn Ford, Dorothy McGuire, Arthur Kennedy, John Hodiak, Katy Jurado
Drama
USA
English
2832
73
Kinuyo Tanaka
Yumeji Tsukioka, Ryôji Hayama, Junkichi Orimoto, Hiroko Kawasaki
Biography / Drama / Romance
Japan
Japanese
2860
75
Edgar G. Ulmer
Arthur Kennedy, Betta St. John, Eugene Iglesias, Charlita
Crime / Drama / Western / Action / Romance
USA
English
