Best Shirley MacLaine Movie
by brijeshmarand | created - 1 week ago | updated - 1 week ago | PublicShirley MacLaine, a legendary actress, has graced both stage and screen with her talent and charisma. Renowned for iconic roles in films like 'The Apartment' and 'Terms of Endearment', she's captivated audiences for decades. As she celebrates her 90th birthday on April 24, 2024, her enduring contributions to the entertainment industry, including an Academy Award and multiple Golden Globes, continue to inspire generations.
Which of these Shirley MacLaine movies do you consider her best?
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Note: Only movies with a minimum 1,000 votes and an IMDb rating of more than 6.0 are included.
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1. The Apartment (1960)
Approved | 125 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A Manhattan insurance clerk tries to rise in his company by letting its executives use his apartment for trysts, but complications and a romance of his own ensue.
Director: Billy Wilder | Stars: Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, Fred MacMurray, Ray Walston
Votes: 196,949 | Gross: $18.60M
2. Being There (1979)
PG | 130 min | Comedy, Drama
After the death of his employer forces him out of the only home he's ever known, a simpleminded, sheltered gardener becomes an unlikely trusted advisor to a powerful tycoon and an insider in Washington politics.
Director: Hal Ashby | Stars: Peter Sellers, Shirley MacLaine, Melvyn Douglas, Jack Warden
Votes: 77,695 | Gross: $30.18M
3. 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
4. Terms of Endearment (1983)
PG | 132 min | Comedy, Drama
Follows hard-to-please Aurora looking for love and her daughter's family problems.
Director: James L. Brooks | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger, Jack Nicholson, Danny DeVito
Votes: 65,510 | Gross: $108.42M
5. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013)
PG | 114 min | Adventure, Comedy, Drama
When both he and a colleague are about to lose their job, Walter takes action by embarking on an adventure more extraordinary than anything he ever imagined.
Director: Ben Stiller | Stars: Ben Stiller, Kristen Wiig, Jon Daly, Kathryn Hahn
Votes: 341,086 | Gross: $58.24M
6. Steel Magnolias (1989)
PG | 117 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A young beautician, newly arrived in a small Louisiana town, finds work at the local salon, where a small group of women share a close bond of friendship, and welcome her into the fold.
Director: Herbert Ross | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Olympia Dukakis, Sally Field, Julia Roberts
Votes: 63,108 | Gross: $83.76M
7. Irma la Douce (1963)
Approved | 147 min | Comedy, Romance
When a policeman falls in love with a prostitute, he doesn't want her to see other men, so he creates an alter-ego who will be her only customer.
Director: Billy Wilder | Stars: Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, Lou Jacobi, Bruce Yarnell
Votes: 21,417 | Gross: $25.25M
8. Some Came Running (1958)
Approved | 137 min | Drama, Romance
A veteran returns home to deal with family secrets and small-town scandals.
Director: Vincente Minnelli | Stars: Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Shirley MacLaine, Martha Hyer
Votes: 7,380
9. Gambit (1966)
Approved | 109 min | Comedy, Crime, Thriller
An English cat burglar needs a Eurasian dancer's help to pull off the perfect heist, but even the most foolproof schemes have a way of backfiring.
Director: Ronald Neame | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Michael Caine, Herbert Lom, Roger C. Carmel
Votes: 6,591
10. Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970)
GP | 116 min | Adventure, Drama, Romance
When a former Civil War soldier saves a nun from a gang of bandits, they team up to help the Mexicans in their war against the French.
Director: Don Siegel | Stars: Clint Eastwood, Shirley MacLaine, Manolo Fábregas, Alberto Morin
Votes: 30,584 | Gross: $11.50M
11. The Trouble with Harry (1955)
PG | 99 min | Comedy, Mystery
Harry's dead and, while no one really minds, everyone feels responsible. After Harry's body is found in the woods, several locals must determine not only how and why he was killed but what to do with the body.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: John Forsythe, Shirley MacLaine, Edmund Gwenn, Mildred Natwick
Votes: 41,284
12. Wrestling Ernest Hemingway (1993)
PG-13 | 123 min | Drama, Romance
Two lonely, retired septuagenarians, an unkempt, hard-drinking Irish sea captain, and a fussy, well-mannered Cuban barber form an uneasy friendship.
Director: Randa Haines | Stars: Robert Duvall, Richard Harris, Shirley MacLaine, Sandra Bullock
Votes: 3,331 | Gross: $0.23M
13. Sweet Charity (1969)
G | 149 min | Comedy, Drama, Music
Taxi dancer Charity continues to have faith despite endless disappointments at its hands, and hope that she will finally meet the man to romance her away from her sleazy life. Maybe, just maybe, handsome Oscar will be the one to do it.
Director: Bob Fosse | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, John McMartin, Ricardo Montalban, Sammy Davis Jr.
Votes: 6,741 | Gross: $3.43M
14. 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
15. Bernie (2011)
PG-13 | 104 min | Biography, Comedy, Crime
In small-town Texas, an affable mortician strikes up a friendship with a wealthy widow, though when she starts to become controlling, he goes to great lengths to separate himself from her grasp.
Director: Richard Linklater | Stars: Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, Matthew McConaughey, Brady Coleman
Votes: 63,478 | Gross: $9.20M
16. The Turning Point (1977)
PG | 119 min | Drama, Music, Romance
When her daughter joins a ballet company, a former dancer is forced to confront her long-ago decision to give up the stage to have a family.
Director: Herbert Ross | Stars: Anne Bancroft, Shirley MacLaine, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Tom Skerritt
Votes: 5,184 | Gross: $33.60M
17. The Sheepman (1958)
Passed | 85 min | Western
A brash stranger and his sheep arrive in a small town, but not soon after, the townspeople decide they've seen enough of him.
Director: George Marshall | Stars: Glenn Ford, Shirley MacLaine, Leslie Nielsen, Mickey Shaughnessy
Votes: 3,022
18. The Matchmaker (1958)
Approved | 103 min | Romance, Comedy
Thornton Wilder's tale of a matchmaker who desires the man she's supposed to be pairing with another woman.
Director: Joseph Anthony | Stars: Shirley Booth, Anthony Perkins, Shirley MacLaine, Paul Ford
Votes: 1,211
19. Around the World in 80 Days (1956)
G | 175 min | Adventure, Comedy, Family
A Victorian Englishman bets that with the new steamships and railways he can circumnavigate the globe in eighty days.
Directors: Michael Anderson, John Farrow | Stars: David Niven, Cantinflas, Finlay Currie, Robert Morley
Votes: 29,713 | Gross: $42.00M
20. Postcards from the Edge (1990)
R | 101 min | Comedy, Drama
A substance-addicted actress tries to look on the bright side even as she is forced to move back in with her mother to avoid unemployment.
Director: Mike Nichols | Stars: Meryl Streep, Shirley MacLaine, Dennis Quaid, Gene Hackman
Votes: 19,341 | Gross: $37.96M
21. The Last Word (2017)
R | 108 min | Comedy, Drama
Harriet is a retired businesswoman who tries to control everything around her. When she decides to write her own obituary, a young journalist takes up the task of finding out the truth, resulting in a life-altering friendship.
Director: Mark Pellington | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Amanda Seyfried, AnnJewel Lee Dixon, Thomas Sadoski
Votes: 8,854 | Gross: $1.78M
22. Two for the Seesaw (1962)
Approved | 119 min | Drama, Romance
Robert Wise directs Robert Mitchum and Shirley MacLaine in this spicy and poignant love story about a free-spirited Greenwich Village girl who hooks up with a brooding Nebraska lawyer. In HD.
Director: Robert Wise | Stars: Robert Mitchum, Shirley MacLaine, Edmon Ryan, Elisabeth Fraser
Votes: 2,060 | Gross: $3.82M
23. Madame Sousatzka (1988)
PG-13 | 122 min | Drama, Music
Renowned Russian piano teacher Irina Sousatzka gets a new student - Bengali piano prodigy Manek. They are both immigrants in the UK and bond quickly. When Manek's single mother's business fails, he must make a career decision.
Director: John Schlesinger | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Navin Chowdhry, Peggy Ashcroft, Twiggy
Votes: 1,614 | Gross: $3.55M
24. In Her Shoes (2005)
PG-13 | 130 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Strait-laced Rose breaks off relations with her party girl sister, Maggie, over an indiscretion involving Rose's boyfriend. The chilly atmosphere is broken with the arrival of Ella, the grandmother neither sister knew existed.
Director: Curtis Hanson | Stars: Toni Collette, Cameron Diaz, Shirley MacLaine, Anson Mount
Votes: 65,093 | Gross: $32.88M
25. Artists and Models (1955)
Approved | 109 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
Rick Todd uses the dreams of his roommate Eugene as the basis for a successful comic book.
Director: Frank Tashlin | Stars: Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Shirley MacLaine, Dorothy Malone
Votes: 4,384 | Gross: $9.35M
26. Closing the Ring (2007)
R | 118 min | Drama, Romance
A young man searches for the proper owner of a ring that belonged to a U.S. World War II bomber gunner who crashed in Belfast, Northern Ireland on June 1, 1944.
Director: Richard Attenborough | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Christopher Plummer, Dylan Roberts, Gene Dinovi
Votes: 4,871
27. Elsa & Fred (2014)
PG-13 | 93 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A withdrawn senior experiences life in new ways when he begins spending time with the free-spirited woman who lives across the hall.
Director: Michael Radford | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Christopher Plummer, Marcia Gay Harden, Wendell Pierce
Votes: 3,733
28. My Geisha (1962)
Not Rated | 119 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
An actress disguises herself as a geisha in order to land the lead role in her director husband's film version of 'Madam Butterfly'.
Director: Jack Cardiff | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Yves Montand, Edward G. Robinson, Robert Cummings
Votes: 1,598
29. The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1964)
Approved | 122 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Anthology movie about three owners of a yellow Rolls-Royce. A British diplomat buys the car for his French wife. A mobster's girlfriend has an affair in Italy. An American woman drives a Yugoslavian partisan
Director: Anthony Asquith | Stars: Ingrid Bergman, Rex Harrison, Shirley MacLaine, Jeanne Moreau
Votes: 4,015
30. Noelle (2019)
G | 100 min | Comedy, Family, Fantasy
Santa's daughter must take over the family business when her father retires and her brother, who is supposed to inherit the Santa role, gets cold feet.
Director: Marc Lawrence | Stars: Anna Kendrick, Shirley MacLaine, Bill Hader, Kingsley Ben-Adir
Votes: 27,066
31. Can-Can (1960)
Approved | 131 min | Comedy, Musical
In 1896 Paris, a female nightclub proprietor fights against the forces of public morality for the right to feature her performers doing the risqué dance, the Can-Can.
Director: Walter Lang | Stars: Frank Sinatra, Shirley MacLaine, Maurice Chevalier, Louis Jourdan
Votes: 2,491
32. Mrs. Winterbourne (1996)
PG-13 | 105 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Connie, unwed and pregnant, is heading to Boston by train when she meets wealthy newlyweds Hugh and Patricia. The train crashes, and when Connie comes to in the hospital, she is mistaken for Patricia, who died in the crash with Hugh.
Director: Richard Benjamin | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Ricki Lake, Brendan Fraser, Miguel Sandoval
Votes: 8,475 | Gross: $10.07M
33. Guarding Tess (1994)
PG-13 | 96 min | Comedy, Drama
A former U.S. First Lady wants a particular Secret Service agent to head her bodyguard detail, even though he can't stand her.
Director: Hugh Wilson | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Nicolas Cage, Austin Pendleton, Edward Albert
Votes: 19,214 | Gross: $27.05M
34. Used People (1992)
PG-13 | 115 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
At her husband's funeral, Pearl (Shirley MacLaine), Jewish mother of two divorced and antagonistic daughters, meets an old Italian friend (Marcello Mastroianni) of her husband, whose advice... See full summary »
Director: Beeban Kidron | Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Kathy Bates, Jessica Tandy, Marcello Mastroianni
Votes: 1,710 | Gross: $17.96M
35. Carolina (I) (2003)
PG-13 | 96 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
A young woman escapes her wildly eccentric family in search for a life of normalcy.
Director: Marleen Gorris | Stars: Julia Stiles, Shirley MacLaine, Alessandro Nivola, Randy Quaid
Votes: 4,335
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