William Wyler: His 25 best films
by cafg-0 | created - 17 Feb 2012 | updated - 21 May 2021 | PublicMy favorite films from this fantastic classic Hollywood director. He was specially good with actors.
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1. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
Approved | 170 min | Drama, Romance, War
Three World War II veterans, two of them traumatized or disabled, return home to the American midwest to discover that they and their families have been irreparably changed.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Myrna Loy, Dana Andrews, Fredric March, Teresa Wright
Votes: 70,585 | Gross: $23.65M
2. The Heiress (1949)
Not Rated | 115 min | Drama, Romance
A naive young woman falls for a handsome young man her emotionally abusive father suspects is only a fortune hunter.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Olivia de Havilland, Montgomery Clift, Ralph Richardson, Miriam Hopkins
Votes: 17,346
3. Wuthering Heights (1939)
Passed | 104 min | Drama, Romance
A servant in the house of Wuthering Heights tells a traveler the unfortunate tale of lovers Cathy and Heathcliff.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Merle Oberon, Laurence Olivier, David Niven, Flora Robson
Votes: 19,775 | Gross: $0.76M
4. 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: 253,768 | Gross: $74.70M
5. The Little Foxes (1941)
Approved | 116 min | Drama, Romance
The ruthless, moneyed Hubbard clan lives in, and poisons, their part of the Deep South at the turn of the twentieth century.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, Teresa Wright, Richard Carlson
Votes: 13,124
6. Detective Story (1951)
Approved | 103 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
On one day in the 21st Precinct squad room, assorted characters form a backdrop for the troubles of hard-nosed Detective Jim McLeod.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker, William Bendix, Cathy O'Donnell
Votes: 9,494
7. Dead End (1937)
Approved | 93 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
The lives of a young man, a young woman, an notorious gangster, and a group of street kids converge one day in a volatile New York City slum.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Sylvia Sidney, Joel McCrea, Humphrey Bogart, Wendy Barrie
Votes: 8,591
8. Jezebel (1938)
Approved | 104 min | Drama, Romance
In 1850s Louisiana, a free-spirited Southern belle loses her fiancé due to her stubborn vanity and pride, and vows to win him back.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, George Brent, Margaret Lindsay
Votes: 15,058
9. The Collector (1965)
Not Rated | 119 min | Drama, Thriller
A man kidnaps a woman and holds her hostage just for the pleasure of having her there.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Terence Stamp, Samantha Eggar, Mona Washbourne, Maurice Dallimore
Votes: 11,965
10. The Letter (1940)
Not Rated | 95 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
The wife of a rubber plantation administrator shoots a man to death and claims it was self-defense, but a letter written in her own hand may prove her undoing.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, James Stephenson, Frieda Inescort
Votes: 14,607
11. Dodsworth (1936)
Passed | 101 min | Drama, Romance
A retired auto manufacturer and his wife take a long-planned European vacation only to find that they want very different things from life.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Walter Huston, Ruth Chatterton, Paul Lukas, Mary Astor
Votes: 10,205
12. Mrs. Miniver (1942)
Approved | 134 min | Drama, Romance, War
A British family struggles to survive the first months of World War II.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright, May Whitty
Votes: 19,472 | Gross: $13.50M
13. These Three (1936)
Passed | 93 min | Drama, Romance
Two schoolteachers and the man they both love face ruin when a malicious student cooks up a lie.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Miriam Hopkins, Merle Oberon, Joel McCrea, Catherine Doucet
Votes: 3,034
14. The Children's Hour (1961)
Not Rated | 108 min | Drama, Romance
A rebellious student at a girls' school accuses two teachers of lesbianism.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Audrey Hepburn, Shirley MacLaine, James Garner, Miriam Hopkins
Votes: 18,413
15. Roman Holiday (1953)
Passed | 118 min | Comedy, Romance
A bored and sheltered princess escapes her guardians and falls in love with an American newsman in Rome.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Gregory Peck, Audrey Hepburn, Eddie Albert, Hartley Power
Votes: 147,707
16. Carrie (1952)
Approved | 118 min | Drama, Romance
A young girl from a provincial town learns the bitter reality of a big city and great love.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Laurence Olivier, Jennifer Jones, Miriam Hopkins, Eddie Albert
Votes: 2,729
17. Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Passed | 137 min | Drama, Family, Romance
The pacifist attitude of a Quaker family is tested as a result of the American Civil War.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Gary Cooper, Dorothy McGuire, Anthony Perkins, Richard Eyer
Votes: 7,745
18. The Westerner (1940)
Passed | 100 min | Drama, Western
Judge Roy Bean, a self-appointed hanging judge in Vinegarroon, Texas, befriends saddle tramp Cole Harden, who opposes Bean's policy against homesteaders.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Gary Cooper, Walter Brennan, Doris Davenport, Fred Stone
Votes: 6,804
19. The Big Country (1958)
Passed | 166 min | Drama, Romance, Western
A New England sea captain in the 1880s arrives at his fiancée's sprawling Texas ranch, where he becomes embroiled in a feud between two families over a valuable patch of land.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Gregory Peck, Jean Simmons, Carroll Baker, Charlton Heston
Votes: 21,137
20. The Desperate Hours (1955)
Approved | 112 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Three escaped convicts move in on and terrorize a suburban household.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Fredric March, Arthur Kennedy, Martha Scott
Votes: 10,885
21. Funny Girl (1968)
G | 151 min | Biography, Comedy, Drama
The life of Fanny Brice, famed comedienne and entertainer of the early 1900s. We see her rise to fame as a Ziegfeld girl, subsequent career, and her personal life, particularly her relationship with Nick Arnstein.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Barbra Streisand, Omar Sharif, Kay Medford, Anne Francis
Votes: 25,176 | Gross: $58.50M
22. The Good Fairy (1935)
Approved | 98 min | Comedy, Romance
A naive girl just out of a cloistered orphanage finds that being a 'good fairy' to strangers makes life awfully complicated.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Margaret Sullavan, Herbert Marshall, Frank Morgan, Reginald Owen
Votes: 1,618
23. Come and Get It (1936)
Passed | 99 min | Drama, Romance
An ambitious lumberjack abandons his saloon girl lover so that he can marry into wealth, but years later becomes infatuated with the woman's daughter.
Directors: Howard Hawks, William Wyler, Richard Rosson | Stars: Edward Arnold, Joel McCrea, Frances Farmer, Walter Brennan
Votes: 2,389
24. The Gay Deception (1935)
Approved | 77 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Mirabel wins a $5, 000 lottery which will enable her to live like a queen in New York. There she meets Sandro, a bellboy who is really a prince, so she does get to be a queen after all.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Francis Lederer, Frances Dee, Benita Hume, Alan Mowbray
Votes: 460
25. How to Steal a Million (1966)
Approved | 123 min | Comedy, Crime, Romance
The daughter of an art forger teams up with a burglar to steal one of her father's forgeries and protect his secret.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Audrey Hepburn, Peter O'Toole, Eli Wallach, Hugh Griffith
Votes: 29,881
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