Best Movies of 1930-1939

#1 City Lights 1931

Director: Charlie Chaplin. Cast: Charlie Chaplin, Virginia Cherrill, Florence Lee, Harry Myers, Al Ernest Garcia, Hank Mann.

Overview: City Lights is the first silent film that Charlie Chaplin directed after he established himself with sound accompanied films. The film is about a penniless man who falls in love with a flower girl. The film was a great success and today is deemed a cult classic.

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 27m.

#2 M 1931

Director: Fritz Lang. Cast: Peter Lorre, Ellen Widmann, Inge Landgut, Otto Wernicke, Theodor Loos, Gustaf Gründgens, Friedrich Gnaß.

Overview: M is German director Fritz Lang’s masterpiece that illustrates the portrait of a child murderer that has caused an entire city to begin rioting. The film is based on actual events.

Genres: Crime, Foreign, Indie, Thriller. Country: Germany. Runtime: 1h 57m. Rated: NR.

#3 Modern Times 1936

Director: Charlie Chaplin. Cast: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman, Tiny Sandford, Chester Conklin, Hank Mann, Stanley Blystone, Al Ernest Garcia, Richard Alexander, Cecil Reynolds, Mira McKinney, Murdock MacQuarrie, Wilfred Lucas, Edward LeSaint, Fred Malatesta.

Overview: The Tramp struggles to live in modern industrial society with the help of a young homeless woman.

Genres: Comedy, Science Fiction. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 27m.

#4 Mr. Smith Goes to Washington 1939

Director: Frank Capra. Cast: Jean Arthur, James Stewart, Claude Rains, Edward Arnold, Guy Kibbee, Thomas Mitchell, Eugene Pallette, Beulah Bondi, Harry Carey, Ruth Donnelly, Grant Mitchell, Porter Hall, Pierre Watkin, Charles Lane, William Demarest.

Overview: A naive man is appointed to fill a vacancy in the US Senate. His plans promptly collide with political corruption, but he doesn't back down.

Genre: Drama. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 2h 9m.

#5 It Happened One Night 1934

Director: Frank Capra. Cast: Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert, Walter Connolly, Roscoe Karns, Jameson Thomas, Alan Hale, Arthur Hoyt, Blanche Friderici, Charles C. Wilson.

Overview: Comic romance between a down-to-earth newspaper reporter and a spoiled runaway heiress.

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Road Movie, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 45m.

#6 Dodsworth 1936

Director: William Wyler. Cast: Walter Huston, Ruth Chatterton, Paul Lukas, Mary Astor, Kathryn Marlowe, David Niven, Gregory Gaye, Maria Ouspenskaya, Spring Byington.

Overview: An adaptation of Sinclair Lewis' novel about a middle-aged American automobile tycoon who retires and goes to Europe, where he and his appearance-conscious, snobbish wife find differing sets of values... and new relationships.

Genres: Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 41m.

#7 The Wizard of Oz 1939

We're off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz!

Directors: King Vidor, Mervyn LeRoy, George Cukor, Victor Fleming. Cast: Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley Sr., Billie Burke, Margaret Hamilton, Charley Grapewin, Clara Blandick, Charles Becker, Meinhardt Raabe, Frank Morgan, Frank Morgan, Frank Morgan, Frank Morgan.

Overview: One of the most famous musical films and the first film from Hollywood to use color. Young Dorothy finds herself in a magical world where she makes friends with a lion, a scarecrow and a tin man as they make their way along the yellow brick road to talk with the Wizard and ask for the things they miss most in their lives. The Wicked Witch of the West is the only thing that could stop them.

Genres: Adventure, Family, Fantasy, Musical, Science Fiction. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 41m. Rated: G.

#8 Trouble in Paradise 1932

Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Kay Francis, Herbert Marshall, Charles Ruggles, Edward Everett Horton, C. Aubrey Smith.

Overview: Trouble in Paradise is one of the most important films of Actor, Producer, and Director Ernst Lubitisch, and his personal favorite of all the films he’s made. A story of two thieves who fall in love and begin doing jobs together under the employment of a beautiful woman who stirs up the relationship.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 23m.

#9 Grand Illusion 1937
La grande illusion

Director: Jean Renoir. Cast: Jean Gabin, Dita Parlo, Pierre Fresnay, Erich von Stroheim, Georges Péclet, Werner Florian, Jean Dasté, Sylvain Itkine, Marcel Dalio, Julien Carette, Gaston Modot.

Overview: During 1st WW, two French officers are captured. Captain De Boeldieu is an aristocrat while Lieutenant Marechal was a mechanic in civilian life. They meet other prisoners from various backgrounds, as Rosenthal, son of wealthy Jewish bankers. They are separated from Rosenthal before managing to escape. A few months later, they meet again in a fortress commanded by the aristocrat Van Rauffenstein. De Boeldieu strikes up a friendship with him but Marechal and Rosenthal still want to escape.

Genres: Drama, Foreign, History, Indie, War. Country: France. Runtime: 1h 54m.

#10 Gone with the Wind 1939

Director: Victor Fleming. Cast: Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Olivia de Havilland, Thomas Mitchell, Leslie Howard, Barbara O'Neil, Evelyn Keyes, Ann Rutherford, George Reeves, Fred Crane, Hattie McDaniel, Oscar Polk, Butterfly McQueen, Marcella Martin, Harry Davenport.

Overview: An American classic in which a manipulative woman and a roguish man carry on a turbulent love affair in the American south during the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Genres: Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 3h 39m. Rated: G.

#11 All Quiet on the Western Front 1930

Director: Lewis Milestone. Cast: Lew Ayres, Arnold Lucy, John Wray, Louis Wolheim, Ben Alexander, Scott Kolk, Owen Davis Jr., Walter Rogers, William Bakewell, Slim Summerville, Zasu Pitts, Beryl Mercer.

Overview: A young soldier faces profound disillusionment in the soul-destroying horror of World War I. Together with several other young German soldiers, he experiences the horrors of war, such evil of which he had not conceived of when signing up to fight. They eventually become sad, tormented, and confused of their purpose.

Genres: Action, Drama, History, War. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 2h 20m. Rated: PG.

#12 My Man Godfrey 1936

Director: Gregory La Cava. Cast: William Powell, Carole Lombard, Alice Brady, Gail Patrick, Eugene Pallette, Jean Dixon, Alan Mowbray, Mischa Auer, Pat Flaherty, Robert Light.

Overview: A zany heiress tries to help a tramp by making him the family butler.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 34m.

#13 I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang 1932

Director: Mervyn LeRoy. Cast: Paul Muni, Glenda Farrell, Helen Vinson, Noel Francis, Preston Foster, Allen Jenkins, Berton Churchill, Edward Ellis, David Landau, Hale Hamilton, Sally Blane, Louise Carter.

Overview: Warner Bros.' hard-hitting chain-gang movie was a faithful adaptation of the similarly titled autobiography of Robert Elliot Burns. Paul Muni plays World War I veteran James Allen, whose plans of becoming a master architect evaporate in the cold light of economic realities. Times get really tough when he's falsely convicted of a crime and forced to work on a chain gang.

Genres: Crime, Drama. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 33m.

#14 Make Way For Tomorrow 1937

Director: Leo McCarey. Cast: Victor Moore, Beulah Bondi, Fay Bainter, Thomas Mitchell, Porter Hall, Barbara Read, Maurice Moscovitch, Elisabeth Risdon, Minna Gombell.

Overview: At a family reunion, the Cooper clan find that their parents' home is being foreclosed. "Temporarily," Ma moves in with son George's family, Pa with daughter Cora. But the parents are like sand in the gears of their middle-aged children's well regulated households. Can the old folks take matters into their own hands?

Genres: Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 31m.

#15 The Rules of the Game 1939
La Règle du Jeu

Director: Jean Renoir. Cast: Nora Gregor, Paulette Dubost, Mila Parély, Odette Talazac, Claire Gérard, Anne Mayen, Lise Elina, Marcel Dalio, Julien Carette, Roland Toutain, Gaston Modot, Jean Renoir.

Overview: Jean Renoir’s The Rules of the Game is a comedic drama about a Parisian aristocrat. The film was released shortly before the start of World War II.

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Foreign. Country: France. Runtime: 1h 50m.

#16 Bringing Up Baby 1938

Director: Howard Hawks. Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, May Robson, Virginia Walker, Charles Ruggles, Walter Catlett, Barry Fitzgerald, Fritz Feld, Leona Roberts, George Irving, Tala Birell, John Kelly.

Overview: David Huxley is waiting to get a bone he needs for his museum collection. Through a series of strange circumstances, he meets Susan Vance, and the duo have a series of misadventures which include a leopard called Baby.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 42m.

#17 The Lady Vanishes 1938

Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Cast: Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lukas, Dame May Whitty, Cecil Parker, Linden Travers, Naunton Wayne, Basil Radford, Mary Clare, Emile Boreo, Googie Withers, Sally Stewart, Philip Leaver, Selma Vaz Dias.

Overview: Travellers on a trans-European train are delayed for a night due to bad weather in a small fictional country called Mandrika. The passengers cram into the small village hotel where socialite Iris Henderson meets an old governess called Miss Froy. Shortly after the journey restarts, Miss Froy disappears.

Genres: Action, Comedy, Thriller, Crime, Mystery, Foreign. Country: United Kingdom. Runtime: 1h 37m.

#18 Duck Soup 1933

Director: Leo McCarey. Cast: Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, Chico Marx, Zeppo Marx, Margaret Dumont, Raquel Torres, Louis Calhern, Edmund Breese, Leonid Kinskey, Charles Middleton, Edgar Kennedy.

Overview: Rufus T. Firefly is named president/dictator of bankrupt Freedonia and declares war on neighboring Sylvania over the love of wealthy Mrs. Teasdale.

Genre: Comedy. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 8m.

#19 Gold Diggers of 1933 1933

Director: Mervyn LeRoy. Cast: Warren William, Joan Blondell, Aline MacMahon, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell, Guy Kibbee, Ned Sparks, Ginger Rogers.

Overview: Barney Hopkins is producing a new show on Broadway, but the day before it opens, the set and costumes are confiscated due to not paid bills. Everybody is sitting on the street and due to depression there is no possibility for the three chorus girls Carol, Trixie and Polly. But they hear rumors that Hopkins is producing a new show, they invite him and he promises to give them work.

Genre: Musical. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 36m.

#20 The Thin Man 1934

Director: W.S. Van Dyke. Cast: William Powell, Myrna Loy, Nat Pendleton, Minna Gombell, Henry Wadsworth, William Henry, Harold Huber, Cesar Romero, Natalie Moorhead, Edward Brophy, Cyril Thornton, Maureen O'Sullivan, Porter Hall.

Overview: Comedy-mystery featuring Nick and Nora Charles: a former detective and his rich, playful wife. They solve a murder case mostly for the fun of it.

Genres: Comedy, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 33m.

#21 A Night at the Opera 1935

Director: Sam Wood. Cast: Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Kitty Carlisle, Allan Jones, Walter Woolf King, Sig Ruman, Margaret Dumont, Edward Keane, Robert Emmett O'Connor.

Overview: The Marx Brothers take on high society. Two lovers who are both in opera are prevented from being together by the man's lack of acceptance as an operatic tenor. Pulling several typical Marx Brothers' stunts, they arrange for the normal tenor to be absent so that the young lover can get his chance.

Genre: Comedy. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 36m.

#22 The Adventures of Robin Hood 1938

Directors: Michael Curtiz, William Keighley. Cast: Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Basil Rathbone, Claude Rains, Patric Knowles, Eugene Pallette, Alan Hale, Melville Cooper, Ian Hunter, Una O'Connor, Herbert Mundin, Montagu Love, Leonard Willey, Robert Noble.

Overview: Robin Hood (Errol Flynn) fights nobly for justice against the evil Sir Guy of Gisbourne (Basil Rathbone) while striving to win the hand of the beautiful Maid Marian (Olivia de Havilland).

Genres: Action, Adventure, Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 42m. Rated: PG.

#23 King Kong 1933

Directors: Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack. Cast: Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, Bruce Cabot, Noble Johnson, Steve Clemente, James Flavin, Sam Hardy.

Overview: An adventure film about a film crew in search of a monster on a remote island. The crew finds King Kong and decides to take him back to New York as a money making spectacle. The film is a masterpiece of Stop-Motion in filmmaking history and inspired a line of King Kong films.

Genres: Action, Adventure, Drama, Horror, Thriller. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 40m. Rated: NR.

#24 Frankenstein 1931

Director: James Whale. Cast: Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles, Boris Karloff, Edward Van Sloan, Frederick Kerr, Dwight Frye, Lionel Belmore, Michael Mark.

Overview: Dr. Frankenstein, an obsessed scientist, creates a living being from parts of exhumed corpses. The movie revolves around this monster and his struggle to live again.

Genre: Horror. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 11m. Rated: PG.

#25 Bride of Frankenstein 1935

The monster demands a mate.

Director: James Whale. Cast: Boris Karloff, Colin Clive, Valerie Hobson, Ernest Thesiger, Elsa Lanchester, Gavin Gordon, Douglas Walton, Una O'Connor, E.E. Clive, Lucien Prival, O.P. Heggie, Dwight Frye, Reginald Barlow, Mary Gordon, Anne Darling.

Overview: Bride of Frankenstein begins where James Whale's Frankenstein from 1931 ended. Dr. Frankenstein has not been killed as previously portrayed and now he wants to get away from the mad experiments. Yet when his wife is kidnapped by his creation, Frankenstein agrees to help him create a new monster, this time a woman.

Genres: Drama, Fantasy, Horror, Science Fiction. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 15m. Rated: PG.

#26 One Way Passage 1932

Director: Tay Garnett. Cast: William Powell, Kay Francis, Aline MacMahon, Frank McHugh, Warren Hymer, Frederick Burton.

Overview: A terminally ill woman and a debonair murderer facing execution meet and fall in love on a trans-Pacific crossing, each without knowing the other's secret.

Genres: Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 8m.

#27 Mr. Deeds Goes to Town 1936

Director: Frank Capra. Cast: Gary Cooper, Jean Arthur, George Bancroft, Lionel Stander, Douglass Dumbrille, Raymond Walburn, H.B. Warner, Ruth Donnelly, Walter Catlett, John Wray.

Overview: Longfellow Deeds lives in a small town, leading a small town kind of life. When a relative dies and leaves Deeds a fortune, Longfellow moves to the big city where he becomes an instant target for everyone. Deeds outwits them all until Babe Bennett comes along. When small-town boy meets big-city girl anything can, and does, happen.

Genres: Romance, Comedy. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 55m.

#28 The Awful Truth 1937

Director: Leo McCarey. Cast: Irene Dunne, Cary Grant, Ralph Bellamy, Alexander D'Arcy, Cecil Cunningham.

Overview: The Awful Truth is a 1937 screwball comedy film starring Irene Dunne and Cary Grant. The plot concerns the machinations of a soon to be divorced couple, played by Dunne and Grant, who go to great lengths to try to ruin each others romantic escapades.

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 31m.

#29 You Can't Take It with You 1938

Director: Frank Capra. Cast: James Stewart, Jean Arthur, Lionel Barrymore, Edward Arnold.

Overview: Alice, the only relatively normal member of the eccentric Sycamore family, falls in love with Tony Kirby. His wealthy banker father, Anthony P. Kirby, and his snobbish mother, strongly disapprove of the match. When the Kirbys are invited to dinner to become better acquainted with their future in-laws, things do not turn out the way Alice had hoped.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 2h 6m.

#30 Pygmalion 1938

Directors: Anthony Asquith, Leslie Howard. Cast: Leslie Howard, Wendy Hiller.

Overview: Henry Higgins (Howard) is an upper class phonetics professor who encounters low-class guttersnipe Eliza Doolittle (Hiller) and bets his friend Colonel Pickering (Scott Sunderland) that he can pass her off as a duchess within three months.

Genres: Drama, Comedy, Foreign. Country: United Kingdom. Runtime: 1h 36m.

#31 The 39 Steps 1935

Handcuffed to the girl who double-crossed him.

Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Cast: Robert Donat, Madeleine Carroll, Lucie Mannheim, Godfrey Tearle, Helen Haye, Peggy Ashcroft, John Laurie, Frank Cellier, Wylie Watson, Peggy Simpson, Elizabeth Inglis, Frederick Piper, Hilda Trevelyan.

Overview: The 39 Steps is one of Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpieces. A romantic thriller that revolves around a Canadian tourist visiting London who gets caught in the middle of a murder plot that has police and the secret service after him. A classic Hitchcock of romance mixed with adventure and picturesque scenes.

Genres: Action, Thriller, Mystery, Foreign. Country: United Kingdom. Runtime: 1h 27m.

#32 L'atalante 1934

Director: Jean Vigo. Cast: Michel Simon, Dita Parlo, Jean Dasté, Gilles Margaritis, Louis Lefebvre, Maurice Gilles, Raphaël Diligent.

Overview: This film has been hailed by many critics as one of the greatest films of all time. Jean, captain of the canal barge L'Atalante, has a new wife, Juliette. The couple embark together on the barge. Tensions arise on the trip. Arriving in Paris, Jean and Juliette go to a music club where they meet a street peddler who flirts with Juliette leading to a scuffle with Jean. Enamored with the lights of Paris, Juliette runs off. Jean, furious, casts off, leaving her behind. He becomes very depressed so that first mate Jules decides to look for her and bring her back.

Genres: Drama, Foreign, Romance. Country: France. Runtime: 1h 29m.

#33 Stagecoach 1939

Director: John Ford. Cast: Claire Trevor, John Wayne, Andy Devine, John Carradine, Thomas Mitchell, Louise Platt, George Bancroft, Donald Meek, Berton Churchill, Tim Holt, Tom Tyler.

Overview: 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.

Genres: Drama, Western. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 36m. Rated: NR.

#34 Angels With Dirty Faces 1938

Director: Michael Curtiz. Cast: James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, Humphrey Bogart, Ann Sheridan.

Overview: In New York, the boys Rocky Sullivan and Jerry Connelly are best friends and small time thieves. After a robbery, Rocky is arrested and sent to a reformatory school, where he begins his criminal career. Jerry escapes and later becomes a priest. After three years in prison, Rocky is released and demands the return of $100,000 deposited with his Solicitor - prior to his jail term.

Genres: Crime, Drama. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 37m.

#35 Ninotchka 1939

Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Cast: Greta Garbo, Melvyn Douglas, Bela Lugosi, Sig Ruman, Felix Bressart, Alexander Granach, Gregory Gaye, Rolfe Sedan, Edwin Maxwell, Richard Carle.

Overview: A stern Russian woman sent to Paris on official business finds herself attracted to a man who represents everything she is supposed to detest.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 50m.

#36 The Testament of Dr. Mabuse 1933
Das Testament des Dr. Mabuse

Director: Fritz Lang. Cast: Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Oscar Beregi Sr., Paul Bernd, Henry Pleß.

Overview: Fritz Lang directed this sequel to his nearly four-hour Dr. Mabuse silent of 1922. The film opens with Detective Hofmeister (Karl Meixner) spying on the activities of a criminal syndicate. Not realizing he has been seen, Hofmeister is attacked by the thugs and later turns up out of his mind.

Genres: Crime, Drama, Foreign, Horror, Indie, Thriller. Country: Germany. Runtime: 2h 2m.

#37 Scarface 1932

Director: Howard Hawks. Cast: Paul Muni, Ann Dvorak, Karen Morley, Osgood Perkins, C. Henry Gordon, George Raft, Vince Barnett, Boris Karloff, Purnell Pratt, Tully Marshall, Inez Palange, Edwin Maxwell.

Overview: Scarface is a brutal gangster film from 1932 from director Howard Hawks that depicts the fall of a Chicago gangster.

Genres: Action, Adventure, Crime, Drama, Thriller. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 30m.

#38 Mutiny on the Bounty 1935

Director: Frank Lloyd. Cast: Charles Laughton, Clark Gable, Franchot Tone, Herbert Mundin.

Overview: Fletcher Christian successfully leads a revolt against the ruthless Captain Bligh on the HMS Bounty. However, Bligh returns one year later, hell bent on avenging his captors.

Genres: Action, Adventure, Drama, History. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 2h 12m. Rated: NR.

#39 I Was Born, But... 1932
Otona no miru ehon - Umarete wa mita keredo

Director: Yasujirô Ozu. Cast: Tatsuo Saito, Tomio Aoki.

Overview: Two young brothers become the leaders of a gang of kids in their neighborhood. Ozu's charming film is a social satire that draws from the antics of childhood as well as the tragedy of maturity.

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Foreign, Indie. Country: Japan. Runtime: 1h 40m.

#40 Midnight 1939

Director: Mitchell Leisen. Cast: Claudette Colbert, Don Ameche, John Barrymore, Francis Lederer, Mary Astor.

Overview: An unemployed showgirl poses as Hungarian royalty to infiltrate Parisian society.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 34m.

#41 Fury 1936

Director: Fritz Lang. Cast: Sylvia Sidney, Spencer Tracy, Walter Abel, Bruce Cabot, Edward Ellis, Walter Brennan.

Overview: When a prisoner barely survives a lynch mob attack and is presumed dead, he vindictively decides to frame the mob for his murder.

Genre: Drama. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 30m.

#42 The Women 1939

Director: George Cukor. Cast: Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Mary Boland, Paulette Goddard, Phyllis Povah, Joan Fontaine, Virginia Weidler, Lucile Watson, Marjorie Main.

Overview: Wealthy Mary Haines is unaware her husband is having an affair with shopgirl Crystal Allen. Sylvia Fowler and Edith Potter discover this from a manicurist and arrange for Mary to hear the gossip. On the train taking her to a Reno divorce Mary meets the Countess and Miriam (in an affair with Fowler's husband).

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Horror. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 2h 13m.

#43 The Hunchback of Notre Dame 1939

Director: William Dieterle. Cast: Charles Laughton, Cedric Hardwicke, Thomas Mitchell, Maureen O'Hara, Edmond O'Brien, Alan Marshal, Walter Hampden, Harry Davenport, Katharine Alexander, George Zucco, Fritz Leiber, Etienne Girardot, Helene Whitney, Minna Gombell, Arthur Hohl.

Overview: In 15th century France, a gypsy girl is framed for murder by the infatuated Chief Justice, and only the deformed bellringer of Notre Dame Cathedral can save her.

Genre: Drama. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 56m.

#44 Captains Courageous 1937

Director: Victor Fleming. Cast: Freddie Bartholomew, Spencer Tracy, Lionel Barrymore, Melvyn Douglas, Charley Grapewin, Mickey Rooney, John Carradine, Oscar O'Shea.

Overview: Harvey, the arrogant and spoiled son of an indulgent absentee-father, falls overboard from a transatlantic steamship and is rescued by a fishing vessel on the Grand Banks. Harvey fails to persuade them to take him ashore, nor convince the crew of his wealth. The captain offers him a low-paid job, until they return to port, as part of the crew that turns him into a mature, considerate young man.

Genres: Action, Adventure, Drama, Family, Musical. Countries: Canada, United States of America. Runtime: 1h 55m.

#45 Freaks 1932

The love story of a SIREN, a GIANT, and a DWARF!

Director: Tod Browning. Cast: Edgar Allan Woolf, Leila Hyams, Olga Baclanova, Roscoe Ates, Henry Victor, Rose Dione, Daisy Hilton, Violet Hilton, Schlitze, Josephine Joseph, Koo Koo, Johnny Eck, Peter Robinson, Prince Randian, Daisy Earles.

Overview: A beautiful trapeze artist agrees to marry the dwarf leader of a circus side-show, but his deformed friends discover she is only marrying him for his inheritance.

Genres: Drama, Horror, Thriller. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 4m.

#46 Libeled Lady 1936

Director: Jack Conway. Cast: Jean Harlow, William Powell, Myrna Loy, Spencer Tracy, Walter Connolly, Charley Grapewin, Cora Witherspoon, E.E. Clive, Bunny Beatty, Otto Yamaoka, Charles Trowbridge.

Overview: When an heiress sues a newspaper, the editor hires a reporter to compromise her.

Genres: Comedy, Romance. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 38m.

#47 Les Misérables 1934

Director: Raymond Bernard. Cast: Harry Baur, Paul Azaïs, Florelle, Josseline Gaël, Jean Servais, Orane Demazis, Charles Dullin, Marguerite Moreno, Gaby Triquet, Charles Vanel.

Overview: The lives of numerous people over the course of 20 years in 19th century France, weaved together by the story of an ex-convict named Jean Valjean on the run from an obsessive police inspector, who pursues him for only a minor offense.

Genres: Drama, Foreign. Country: France. Runtime: 4h 41m.

#48 Beau Geste 1939

Director: William A. Wellman. Cast: Gary Cooper, Ray Milland, Robert Preston, Brian Donlevy, Susan Hayward.

Overview: Academy Award winners Gary Cooper and Ray Milland star along with Robert Preston in the epic adventure Beau Geste. When three brothers join the Foreign Legion to escape a troubled past, they find themselves trapped under the command of a sadistic sergeant deep in the scorching Sahara. Now the brothers must fight for their lives as they plot mutiny against tyranny and defend a desert fortress against a brutal enemy. Nominated for 2 Academy Awards, Beau Geste has been universally acclaimed by generations of critics and audiences alike as a true motion picture classic.

Genres: Action, Drama, War. Country: United States of America. Runtime: 1h 52m.

#49 The Blue Angel 1930
Der blaue Engel

Director: Josef von Sternberg. Cast: Emil Jannings, Marlene Dietrich, Kurt Gerron, Rosa Valetti, Hans Albers, Reinhold Bernt, Eduard von Winterstein, Hans Roth, Rolf Müller, Roland Varno, Carl Balhaus, Robert Klein Lörk, Charles Puffy, Wilhelm Diegelmann, Gerhard Bienert.

Overview: The Blue Angel / Der Blaue Engel is a 1930 German film from Josef von Starnberg. An adaptation of the 1905 novel “The Blue Angel: Small Town Tyrant.”

Genre: Drama. Country: Germany. Runtime: 1h 48m.