J. Lee Thompson Movies
by BaxterCallow | created - 19 Oct 2017 | updated - 19 Oct 2017 | Public- Instant Watch Options
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1. Murder Without Crime (1950)
78 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
In London, a man is blackmailed by his landlord-neighbor after he accidentally kills, in his flat, a woman he picked up in a nightclub.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Dennis Price, Derek Farr, Patricia Plunkett, Joan Dowling
Votes: 268
2. The Yellow Balloon (1953)
76 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
In post-war London, a small boy who blames himself for the accidental death of a friend, falls under the bad influence of a street criminal.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Andrew Ray, Kathleen Ryan, Kenneth More, Bernard Lee
Votes: 533
3. Young and Willing (1954)
Approved | 72 min | Crime, Drama
Frank "women in prison" story that sympathetically tracks several inmates through their imprisonment and subsequent return to society. Some are successfully rehabilitated; some are not.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Glynis Johns, Diana Dors, John Gregson, Olive Sloane
Votes: 311
4. Cocktails in the Kitchen (1954)
Not Rated | 85 min | Comedy, Romance
In postwar London, young graduate Tony (Sir Dirk Bogarde) and his girlfriend Anne (Susan Stephen) decide to marry. Her well-to-do parents are not convinced, but they agree once he has got a... See full summary »
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Dirk Bogarde, Susan Stephen, Cecil Parker, Eileen Herlie
Votes: 188
5. As Long as They're Happy (1955)
74 min | Comedy, Drama, Musical
A stockbroker's youngest daughter tricks an American singer into visiting her family at their suburban Wimbledon home. Her two sisters and their oddball husbands also visit, and the ... See full summary »
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Jack Buchanan, Janette Scott, Jeannie Carson, Brenda de Banzie
Votes: 173
6. An Alligator Named Daisy (1955)
Not Rated | 85 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
An Englishman is left with an abandoned, very tame, and domesticated pet alligator, who helps him develop a bond with a young Irishwoman. Plans to get rid of the animal cause mayhem and produce a surprising outcome for all.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Donald Sinden, Diana Dors, Jeannie Carson, James Robertson Justice
Votes: 416
7. Yield to the Night (1956)
Not Rated | 99 min | Crime, Drama
Woman abused by men meets a man she thinks loves her. He cheats, she kills his mistress. Based on Ruth Ellis, last woman executed in Britain. Less than
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Diana Dors, Yvonne Mitchell, Michael Craig, Marie Ney
Votes: 1,484
8. The Good Companions (1957)
104 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
A touring variety troupe, the "Dinky Doos" are in financial trouble. An encounter with three strangers - Inigo Jollifant (a romantic, song-writing ex-schoolmaster), Miss Trant (a ... See full summary »
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Eric Portman, Celia Johnson, Hugh Griffith, Janette Scott
Votes: 147
9. Woman in a Dressing Gown (1957)
Approved | 93 min | Drama, Romance
A middle-aged married woman is shocked to discover that her husband, whom she thought was content in their marriage, has become infatuated with a beautiful younger woman and plans to leave his family for her.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Yvonne Mitchell, Anthony Quayle, Sylvia Syms, Andrew Ray
Votes: 918
The most affecting aspect of the film is its sense of compassion: we're never asked to condemn or condone, merely to understand.
10. Ice Cold in Alex (1958)
Approved | 130 min | Adventure, Drama, War
During World War II in North Africa, a medical field unit must cross the desert in their ambulance in order to reach the British lines in Alexandria.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: John Mills, Anthony Quayle, Sylvia Syms, Harry Andrews
Votes: 6,619
11. Tiger Bay (1959)
Not Rated | 105 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
A twelve-year-old tomboy witnesses the murder of a woman by her Polish merchant marine boyfriend, but bonds with him and thwarts the police in their investigation.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Hayley Mills, Horst Buchholz, John Mills, Yvonne Mitchell
Votes: 3,165
12. No Trees in the Street (1959)
96 min | Crime, Drama
Surrounded by new 1950s East End high-rise flats, a London detective thinks back to how different things were in the late 1930s. Then it was an area of overcrowded tenements teeming with ... See full summary »
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Sylvia Syms, Herbert Lom, Ronald Howard, Stanley Holloway
Votes: 249
13. North West Frontier (1959)
Not Rated | 129 min | Adventure, Drama
Set on the North West Frontier of colonial India in 1905. A British Army Officer, Captain Scott is sent to rescue a five year old Indian Prince and his American governess, Catherine Wyatt from certain death at the hands of rebel tribesman.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Kenneth More, Lauren Bacall, Herbert Lom, Wilfrid Hyde-White
Votes: 3,053
14. I Aim at the Stars (1960)
Approved | 107 min | Biography, Drama
The story of rocket scientist Dr. Werner von Braun's career, from the 1920s until the late 1950s.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Curd Jürgens, Victoria Shaw, Herbert Lom, Gia Scala
Votes: 251
15. The Guns of Navarone (1961)
Not Rated | 158 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A team of Allied saboteurs is assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held Greek island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: David Niven, Gregory Peck, Anthony Quinn, Anthony Quayle
Votes: 55,430 | Gross: $28.90M
The movie holds up pretty well as a rousing action picture, and also throws in a couple of comments about the contradictions of war.
16. Cape Fear (1962)
Passed | 106 min | Drama, Thriller
A lawyer's family is stalked by a man he once helped put in jail.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum, Polly Bergen, Lori Martin
Votes: 31,897
Unpleasant but suspenseful film noir.
17. Taras Bulba (1962)
Approved | 122 min | Adventure, Drama, History
In the 16th-century Ukraine, the Polish overlords and Ukrainian cossacks fight for control of the land but frequent Turkish invasions force them to unite against the common Turkish foe.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Tony Curtis, Yul Brynner, Christine Kaufmann, Sam Wanamaker
Votes: 4,478 | Gross: $7.41M
18. Kings of the Sun (1963)
Approved | 108 min | Adventure, Drama, History
On the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, the Native American tribe of chief Black Eagle clashes with the Mayan tribe of king Balam.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Yul Brynner, George Chakiris, Shirley Anne Field, Richard Basehart
Votes: 2,186
19. What a Way to Go! (1964)
Approved | 111 min | Comedy, Romance
A four-time widow discusses her four marriages, in which all of her husbands became incredibly rich and died prematurely because of their drive to be rich.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, Dean Martin
Votes: 5,721 | Gross: $13.30M
A big, gaudy, gimmicky comedy which continually promises more than it delivers by way of wit and/or bellylaffs.
20. John Goldfarb, Please Come Home! (1965)
96 min | Comedy
A former Notre Dame football star crash lands over a mythical Arabian country while on spy mission to the USSR. He is then forced by the football-obsessed king of that country to coach their football team .
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Peter Ustinov, Richard Crenna, Jim Backus
Votes: 760
21. Return from the Ashes (1965)
Not Rated | 105 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
In Paris, a Polish gigolo marries a rich Jewish doctor and stands to inherit her estate when she is deported to Dachau by the Nazis.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Maximilian Schell, Samantha Eggar, Ingrid Thulin, Herbert Lom
Votes: 1,185
22. Eye of the Devil (1966)
Not Rated | 96 min | Horror, Mystery
Workers employed at a French vineyard quietly follow old pagan rituals that call for the life of the marquis owner to save his crops during dry seasons.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: David Niven, Sharon Tate, Deborah Kerr, Donald Pleasence
Votes: 3,222
23. Mackenna's Gold (1969)
M | 128 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A bandit kidnaps a Marshal who has seen a map showing a gold vein on Indian lands, but other groups are looking for it too, while the Apache try to keep the secret location undisturbed.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Gregory Peck, Omar Sharif, Telly Savalas, Camilla Sparv
Votes: 9,877
24. Before Winter Comes (1968)
M | 103 min | Comedy, Drama, War
After World War II, in an Austrian camp for displaced people, an interpreter mediates between the British and the Soviets regarding the fate of various refugees.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: David Niven, Topol, Anna Karina, John Hurt
Votes: 417
25. The Chairman (1969)
M/PG | 93 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the US government sends a scientist to China to steal the formula for a new agricultural enzyme developed by the Chinese.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Gregory Peck, Anne Heywood, Arthur Hill, Alan Dobie
Votes: 1,414
26. Brotherly Love (1970)
R | 112 min | Drama
Controversial tragicomedy about a brother's obsessive love for his sister. Having left her husband, Hilary moves in with her unbalanced brother, Pink, who uses wit and humor to hide his amorous yearnings.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Peter O'Toole, Susannah York, Michael Craig, Harry Andrews
Votes: 383
27. Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
PG | 88 min | Action, Sci-Fi
In a futuristic world that has embraced ape slavery, Caesar, the son of the late simians Cornelius and Zira, surfaces after almost twenty years of hiding out from the authorities, and prepares for a slave revolt against humanity.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Roddy McDowall, Don Murray, Ricardo Montalban, Natalie Trundy
Votes: 36,000 | Gross: $9.81M
Dismally lurid stuff, ham-fistedly directed and low on credibility.
28. Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)
G | 93 min | Action, Sci-Fi
Ten years after a worldwide series of ape revolutions and a brutal nuclear war among humans, Caesar must protect survivors of both species from an insidious human cult and a militant ape faction alike.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Roddy McDowall, Claude Akins, Natalie Trundy, Severn Darden
Votes: 33,834 | Gross: $8.84M
Battle looks like the last gap of a dying series, a movie made simply to wring the dollars out of any remaining ape fans.
29. Huckleberry Finn (1974)
G | 118 min | Adventure, Family, Musical
In 1840s Missouri, young Huckleberry Finn, wanting to escape his violent drunkard father, joins Black runaway slave Jim on a quest for freedom down the Mississippi River on a raft.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Jeff East, Paul Winfield, Harvey Korman, David Wayne
Votes: 705 | Gross: $0.42M
30. The Reincarnation of Peter Proud (1975)
R | 105 min | Mystery, Thriller
When college professor, Peter Proud begins experiencing flashbacks of an earlier life, he's mysteriously drawn to a place he's never been to, but which seems familiar and where he soon finds his previous incarnation's wife.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Michael Sarrazin, Jennifer O'Neill, Margot Kidder, Cornelia Sharpe
Votes: 2,268 | Gross: $3.08M
31. St. Ives (1976)
PG | 94 min | Action, Crime, Drama
A crime novelist is hired by a shady character to negotiate the return of stolen confidential documents.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Jacqueline Bisset, John Houseman, Maximilian Schell
Votes: 2,812
It's got atmosphere, an interesting cast, it's ambitious and has some nice action scenes. But it bogs down in those speculations that are the bane of all crime mysteries.
32. The White Buffalo (1977)
PG | 97 min | Action, Adventure, Western
At the closing of 1874 a haunted, dying Wild Bill Hickok teams up with a grieving Crazy Horse to hunt a murderous albino buffalo.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Jack Warden, Will Sampson, Kim Novak
Votes: 5,225
More a white elephant than a white buffalo picture.
33. The Greek Tycoon (1978)
R | 107 min | Drama
A fictionalized account of the Greek shipping magnate, Onassis, and his meeting and subsequent marriage to the widow of assassinated U.S. president, Jacqueline Kennedy.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Anthony Quinn, Jacqueline Bisset, Raf Vallone, Edward Albert
Votes: 2,194
34. The Passage (1979)
R | 98 min | Action, Drama, War
During World War II, a Basque shepherd is approached by the underground, who wants him to lead a scientist and his family across the Pyrenees while being pursued by a sadistic German.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Anthony Quinn, James Mason, Malcolm McDowell, Patricia Neal
Votes: 2,275
35. Cabo Blanco (1980)
R | 87 min | Action, Adventure, Crime
In 1948, an assortment of shady characters are searching for Nazi loot, sunken off the coast of Peru.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Jason Robards, Dominique Sanda, Fernando Rey
Votes: 1,356
36. Happy Birthday to Me (1981)
R | 110 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
At the snobby Crawford Academy, Virginia's group of friends start to go missing years after horrible events that happened to her as a child around her birthday.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Melissa Sue Anderson, Glenn Ford, Lawrence Dane, Sharon Acker
Votes: 11,241
A great deal more complex than it has any right or reason to be.
37. 10 to Midnight (1983)
R | 101 min | Crime, Drama, Thriller
An LAPD detective and his rookie partner are on the trail of a psychopathic young man who is murdering young women.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Lisa Eilbacher, Andrew Stevens, Gene Davis
Votes: 9,361 | Gross: $7.10M
A real button-pusher with a dynamite ending. Gene Davis is memorable as the sicko villain.
38. The Evil That Men Do (1984)
R | 90 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
A professional killer comes out of retirement to investigate and avenge the brutal murder of an old friend.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Theresa Saldana, Joseph Maher, José Ferrer
Votes: 4,746 | Gross: $13.10M
39. The Ambassador (1984)
R | 97 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
An American ambassador to Israel tries to bring peace to the Middle East conflict through unconventional methods, but his efforts are hampered at every turn and his personal life threatened.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Robert Mitchum, Ellen Burstyn, Rock Hudson, Fabio Testi
Votes: 942
40. King Solomon's Mines (1985)
PG-13 | 100 min | Action, Adventure, Comedy
Fortune hunter Allan Quatermain teams up with a resourceful woman to help her find her missing father lost in the wilds of 1900s Africa while being pursued by hostile tribes and a rival German explorer.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Richard Chamberlain, Sharon Stone, Herbert Lom, John Rhys-Davies
Votes: 14,923 | Gross: $15.06M
King Solomon's Mines is frequently laughable. Nothing about the film is convincingly done.
41. Murphy's Law (1986)
R | 100 min | Action, Crime, Drama
Framed for his ex-wife's murder by a parolee he once put behind bars, Los Angeles cop Jack Murphy escapes from custody to capture the killer, but he is now handcuffed to a foul-mouthed thief he had only just arrested.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Kathleen Wilhoite, Carrie Snodgress, Robert F. Lyons
Votes: 6,456 | Gross: $9.95M
42. Firewalker (1986)
PG | 105 min | Action, Adventure, Comedy
A pair of adventurers try to track down an ancient Aztec/Mayan/Egyptian/Apache hoard of gold.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Chuck Norris, Louis Gossett Jr., Melody Anderson, Will Sampson
Votes: 7,673 | Gross: $11.83M
Where to start with this movie? Where to end? Even more to the point, in which order to show the reels?
43. Death Wish 4: The Crackdown (1987)
R | 99 min | Action, Crime, Drama
Architect/vigilante Paul Kersey takes on the members of a vicious Los Angeles drug cartel to stop the flow of drugs after his girlfriend's daughter dies from an overdose.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Kay Lenz, John P. Ryan, Perry Lopez
Votes: 11,132 | Gross: $6.88M
Give up the revenge, too much already
44. Messenger of Death (1988)
R | 91 min | Action, Crime, Mystery
A Denver reporter investigates the mass murder of a family of Mormons in rural Colorado.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Trish Van Devere, Laurence Luckinbill, Daniel Benzali
Votes: 3,367 | Gross: $3.07M
45. Kinjite: Forbidden Subjects (1989)
R | 97 min | Action, Crime, Drama
A brutal Los Angeles police Lt. is determined to bust up an organization that forces underage girls into prostitution.
Director: J. Lee Thompson | Stars: Charles Bronson, Juan Fernández, Perry Lopez, James Pax
Votes: 3,856 | Gross: $3.42M
Odd, well-made and thoroughly unpleasant.
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