The Films of John Ford: Ranked
by Musashi94 | created - 04 Feb 2017 | updated - 07 Nov 2020 | PublicA ranking of the films directed by John Ford that I have seen, presented in order of best to worst.
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1. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)
Approved | 123 min | Drama, Western
A senator returns to a Western town for the funeral of an old friend and tells the story of his origins.
Director: John Ford | Stars: James Stewart, John Wayne, Vera Miles, Lee Marvin
Votes: 82,258
2. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
Passed | 129 min | Drama
An Oklahoma family, driven off their farm by the poverty and hopelessness of the Dust Bowl, joins the westward migration to California, suffering the misfortunes of the homeless in the Great Depression.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Henry Fonda, Jane Darwell, John Carradine, Charley Grapewin
Votes: 99,917 | Gross: $0.06M
3. 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: 96,235
4. My Darling Clementine (1946)
Passed | 97 min | Drama, Romance, Western
After their cattle are stolen and their brother murdered, the Earp brothers have a score to settle with the Clanton family.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Henry Fonda, Linda Darnell, Victor Mature, Cathy Downs
Votes: 25,747
5. Stagecoach (1939)
Passed | 96 min | Adventure, Drama, Western
A group of people traveling on a stagecoach find their journey complicated by the threat of Geronimo and learn something about each other in the process.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Claire Trevor, Andy Devine, John Carradine
Votes: 53,727
6. The Quiet Man (1952)
Passed | 129 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A retired American boxer returns to the village of his birth in 1920s Ireland, where he falls for a spirited redhead whose brother is contemptuous of their union.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara, Barry Fitzgerald, Ward Bond
Votes: 42,384 | Gross: $10.55M
7. Fort Apache (1948)
Passed | 128 min | Drama, Western
At Fort Apache, an honorable and veteran war captain finds conflict when his regime is placed under the command of a young, glory hungry lieutenant colonel with no respect for the local Indian tribe.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Shirley Temple, Pedro Armendáriz
Votes: 19,681
8. The Informer (1935)
Approved | 91 min | Crime, Drama
In 1922, an Irish rebel informs on his friend, then feels doom closing in.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Victor McLaglen, Heather Angel, Preston Foster, Margot Grahame
Votes: 7,176 | Gross: $2.07M
9. Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)
Passed | 100 min | Biography, Drama, History
A fictionalized account of the early life of the American president as a young lawyer facing his greatest court case.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Henry Fonda, Alice Brady, Marjorie Weaver, Arleen Whelan
Votes: 9,178
10. Wagon Master (1950)
Approved | 86 min | Drama, Western
Two young drifters guide a Mormon wagon train to the San Juan Valley and encounter cutthroats, Indians, geography, and moral challenges on the journey.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Ben Johnson, Joanne Dru, Harry Carey Jr., Ward Bond
Votes: 5,522
11. 3 Bad Men (1926)
Unrated | 122 min | Drama, Romance, Western
Three outlaws come to the aid of a young girl after her father is killed.
Director: John Ford | Stars: George O'Brien, Olive Borden, Lou Tellegen, Tom Santschi
Votes: 1,501
12. Mister Roberts (1955)
Passed | 123 min | Comedy, Drama, War
In the waning days of World War II, the cargo officer of a Navy supply ship chafes at its role far from the action in the Pacific's backwater areas, his frustration rising when its captain denies the crew liberty over petty irritations.
Directors: John Ford, Mervyn LeRoy, Joshua Logan | Stars: Henry Fonda, James Cagney, William Powell, Jack Lemmon
Votes: 18,230 | Gross: $21.20M
13. She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)
Passed | 104 min | Western
Captain Nathan Brittles, on the eve of retirement, takes out a last patrol to stop an impending massive Indian attack. Encumbered by women who must be evacuated, Brittles finds his mission imperiled.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Joanne Dru, John Agar, Ben Johnson
Votes: 19,317
14. Sergeant Rutledge (1960)
Approved | 111 min | Crime, Drama, Western
Respected Black cavalry Sergeant Brax Rutledge stands court-martial for raping and killing a white woman and murdering her father, his superior officer.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Jeffrey Hunter, Woody Strode, Constance Towers, Billie Burke
Votes: 5,363
15. They Were Expendable (1945)
Approved | 135 min | Drama, War
A Navy commander fights to prove the battle-worthiness of the PT boat at the start of World War II.
Directors: John Ford, Robert Montgomery | Stars: Robert Montgomery, John Wayne, Donna Reed, Jack Holt
Votes: 9,261
16. The Wings of Eagles (1957)
Approved | 110 min | Biography, Drama, War
A biography of Navy flier-turned-screenwriter Frank W. "Spig" Wead.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara, Dan Dailey, Ward Bond
Votes: 4,606
17. The Long Voyage Home (1940)
Approved | 105 min | Drama, War
A merchant ship's crew tries to survive the loneliness of the sea and the coming of war.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Thomas Mitchell, Ian Hunter, Ward Bond
Votes: 4,923
18. The Iron Horse (1924)
Passed | 150 min | Drama, History, Romance
After witnessing the murder of his father by a renegade as a boy, the grown-up Brandon helps to realize his father's dream of a transcontinental railway.
Director: John Ford | Stars: George O'Brien, Madge Bellamy, Charles Edward Bull, Cyril Chadwick
Votes: 2,444 | Gross: $2.06M
19. Cheyenne Autumn (1964)
PG | 154 min | Drama, History, Western
The Cheyenne, tired of broken U.S. government promises, head for their ancestral lands but a sympathetic cavalry officer is tasked to bring them back to their reservation.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Richard Widmark, Carroll Baker, Karl Malden, Sal Mineo
Votes: 6,444
20. 3 Godfathers (1948)
Passed | 106 min | Drama, Western
Three outlaws on the run risk their freedom and their lives to return a newborn to civilization.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Pedro Armendáriz, Harry Carey Jr., Ward Bond
Votes: 10,606
21. How Green Was My Valley (1941)
Passed | 118 min | Drama, Family
At the turn of the century in a Welsh mining village, the Morgans, he stern, she gentle, raise coal-mining sons and hope their youngest will find a better life.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Walter Pidgeon, Maureen O'Hara, Anna Lee, Donald Crisp
Votes: 26,478
22. The Hurricane (1937)
Approved | 104 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A Polynesian sailor unjustly imprisoned after defending himself against a colonial bully is relentlessly persecuted by his island's martinet French governor.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Dorothy Lamour, Jon Hall, Mary Astor, C. Aubrey Smith
Votes: 3,043
23. Rio Grande (1950)
Passed | 105 min | Drama, Romance, Western
A cavalry officer posted on the Rio Grande is confronted with murderous raiding Apaches, a son who's a risk-taking recruit and his wife from whom he has been separated for many years.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara, Ben Johnson, Claude Jarman Jr.
Votes: 17,657
24. Drums Along the Mohawk (1939)
Approved | 104 min | Drama, Romance, War
Newlyweds Gil and Lana Martin try to establish a farm in the Mohawk Valley but are menaced by Indians and Tories as the Revolutionary War begins.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Claudette Colbert, Henry Fonda, Edna May Oliver, Eddie Collins
Votes: 6,792 | Gross: $1.00M
25. Two Rode Together (1961)
Passed | 109 min | Drama, Western
A corrupt marshal is pressured by his army friend into negotiating the release of white captives of the Comanches, but finds that their reintegration into society has its consequences.
Director: John Ford | Stars: James Stewart, Richard Widmark, Shirley Jones, Linda Cristal
Votes: 6,949
26. The Horse Soldiers (1959)
Approved | 120 min | Adventure, Drama, Romance
In 1863, a Union outfit is sent behind Confederate lines in Mississippi to destroy enemy railroads but a captive southern belle and the unit's doctor cause frictions within ranks.
Director: John Ford | Stars: John Wayne, William Holden, Constance Towers, Judson Pratt
Votes: 11,649 | Gross: $1.75M
27. The Lost Patrol (1934)
Passed | 73 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A dozen British soldiers, lost in a Mesopotamian desert during World War I, are menaced by unseen Arab enemies.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Victor McLaglen, Boris Karloff, Wallace Ford, Reginald Denny
Votes: 3,601
28. Wee Willie Winkie (1937)
Approved | 100 min | Adventure, Family
Priscilla Williams, a young girl living with her widowed mother and paternal grandfather at the post he commands in northern India, becomes enamored of military life and embroiled in brewing rebellion against the crown in the early 1900's.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Shirley Temple, Victor McLaglen, C. Aubrey Smith, June Lang
Votes: 1,937
29. Mogambo (1953)
Passed | 116 min | Adventure, Drama, Romance
On a Kenyan safari, white hunter Victor Marswell has a love triangle with seductive American socialite Eloise Kelly and anthropologist Donald Nordley's cheating wife Linda.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Clark Gable, Grace Kelly, Ava Gardner, Donald Sinden
Votes: 9,171
30. The Sun Shines Bright (1953)
Approved | 90 min | Comedy, Drama, Western
William Pittman Priest has to use all his wiles to retain his position as judge in his Kentucky hometown, while continuing to be a voice for the town's underclass and for democratic values.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Charles Winninger, Arleen Whelan, John Russell, Stepin Fetchit
Votes: 1,811
31. Tobacco Road (1941)
Approved | 84 min | Comedy, Drama
Hillbilly family farm life in 1941 rural Georgia.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Charley Grapewin, Gene Tierney, Marjorie Rambeau, William Tracy
Votes: 2,571
32. The Prisoner of Shark Island (1936)
Approved | 96 min | Biography, Drama, History
The story of Dr. Samuel Mudd, who was imprisoned after innocently treating President Lincoln's assassin in 1865.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Warner Baxter, Gloria Stuart, Claude Gillingwater, Arthur Byron
Votes: 2,575
33. Up the River (1930)
Passed | 92 min | Comedy, Crime, Drama
When paroled trustee Steve and former inmate Judy who try to put their criminal lives behind them are blackmailed, two career criminals come to their rescue.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Spencer Tracy, Claire Luce, Warren Hymer, Humphrey Bogart
Votes: 1,376
34. Four Men and a Prayer (1938)
Not Rated | 85 min | Adventure, Mystery
The sons of a disgraced British officer try to clear his name.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Loretta Young, Richard Greene, George Sanders, David Niven
Votes: 875
35. Judge Priest (1934)
Passed | 80 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Judge Priest, a proud Confederate veteran, uses common sense and considerable humanity to dispense justice in a small town in the Post-Bellum Kentucky.
Director: John Ford | Stars: Will Rogers, Tom Brown, Anita Louise, Henry B. Walthall
Votes: 2,521
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