Movies: Popular Movies of 1938

Movies in chronological context: 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1938th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 938th year of the 2nd millennium, the 38th year of the 20th century, and the 9th year of the 1930s decade. ()

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1,705 movies found (page 1/57):

Bringing Up Baby(1938)

1h 42min | Comedy, Romance / Love

3.8/5 (with 442 votes)

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.

Directed by Howard Hawks - With Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Charles Ruggles, Walter Catlett, May Robson, Fritz Feld, ...

The Lady Vanishes(1938)

| 1h 36min | Mystery, Thriller, Comedy

3.8/5 (with 373 votes)

On a train headed for England a group of travelers is delayed by an avalanche. Holed up in a hotel in a fictional European country, young Iris befriends elderly Miss Froy. When the train resumes, Iris suffers a bout of unconsciousness and wakes to find the old woman has disappeared. The other passengers ominously deny Miss Froy ever existed, so Iris begins to investigate with another traveler and, as the pair sleuth, romantic sparks fly.

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock - With Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lukas, May Whitty, Cecil Parker, Linden Travers, ...

The Adventures of Robin Hood(1938)

1h 42min | Adventure, Romance / Love, History

3.8/5 (with 306 votes)

Robin Hood fights nobly for justice against the evil Sir Guy of Gisbourne while striving to win the hand of the beautiful Maid Marian.

Directed by Michael Curtiz, William Keighley - With Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Claude Rains, Basil Rathbone, Patric Knowles, Eugene Pallette, ...

You Can't Take It with You(1938)

2h 6min | Comedy, Romance / Love

3.8/5 (with 163 votes)

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

Directed by Frank Capra - With Jean Arthur, Lionel Barrymore, James Stewart, Edward Arnold, Mischa Auer, Ann Miller, ...

Rent Apple / iTunes Store | Buy Apple / iTunes Store

Angels with Dirty Faces(1938)

1h 37min | Crime, Drama, Thriller

3.9/5 (with 125 votes)

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.

Directed by Michael Curtiz - With James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, Humphrey Bogart, Ann Sheridan, George Bancroft, Dead End Kids, ...

Port of Shadows(1938)

1h 33min | Crime, Drama, Romance / Love

3.8/5 (with 105 votes)

Down a foggy, desolate road to the port city of Le Havre travels Jean, an army deserter looking for another chance to make good on life. Fate, however, has a different plan for him, as acts of both revenge and kindness render him front-page news.

Directed by Marcel Carné - With Jean Gabin, Michel Simon, Michèle Morgan, Pierre Brasseur, Édouard Delmont, Gaby Wagner, ...

Holiday(1938)

1h 37min | Comedy, Romance / Love

3.7/5 (with 97 votes)

Johnny Case, a freethinking financier, has finally found the girl of his dreams — Julia Seton, the spoiled daughter of a socially prominent millionaire — and she's agreed to marry him. But when Johnny plans a holiday for the two to enjoy life while they are still young, his fiancée has other plans & that is for Johnny to work in her father's bank!

Directed by George Cukor - With Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Lew Ayres, Edward Everett Horton, Binnie Barnes, Henry Daniell, ...

Rent Apple / iTunes Store | Buy Apple / iTunes Store

Alexander Nevsky(1938)

| 1h 49min | Drama, History, War

3.6/5 (with 82 votes)

When German knights invade Russia, Prince Alexander Nevsky must rally his people to resist the formidable force. After the Teutonic soldiers take over an eastern Russian city, Alexander stages his stand at Novgorod, where a major battle is fought on the ice of frozen Lake Chudskoe. While Alexander leads his outnumbered troops, two of their number, Vasili and Gavrilo, begin a contest of bravery to win the hand of a local maiden.

Directed by Sergei Eisenstein, Dmitri Vasilyev - With Andrei Abrikosov, Nikolay Cherkasov, Nikolay Okhlopkov, Dmitry Orlov, Vasily Novikov, Sergei Blinnikov, ...

La Bête Humaine(1938)

1h 40min | Drama, Crime

3.6/5 (with 80 votes)

On board a train bound for the port city of Le Havre, France, railroad stationmaster Roubard murders Grandmorin, who seduced his beautiful young wife, Severine. Engineer Jacques Lantier, stuck in Le Havre while the train is being repaired, also begins a passionate affair with Severine, who tries to entice the handsome stranger to murder her controlling husband. However, Lantier has a secret urge of his own that changes everything.

Directed by Jean Renoir - With Jean Gabin, Simone Simon, Jean Renoir, Fernand Ledoux, Julien Carette, Blanchette Brunoy, ...

Jezebel(1938)

1h 43min | Drama, Romance / Love

3.6/5 (with 75 votes)

In 1850s Louisiana, the willfulness of a tempestuous Southern belle threatens to destroy all who care for her.

Directed by William Wyler - With Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, George Brent, Margaret Lindsay, Donald Crisp, Fay Bainter, ...

Buy Apple / iTunes Store

Ferdinand the Bull(1938)

8min | Animation, Comedy, Kids & Family

3.3/5 (with 69 votes)

This Oscar-winning short tells of a bull who preferred to sit under trees and smell flowers to clashing horns with his fellow animals. As luck would have it, an untimely bee reveals Ferdinand's ferocious side via pained howls and wild stomping. This lands him in the bull-fighting arena amidst characters based on Walt's animators with a matador reportedly modeled after Walt himself.

Directed by Dick Rickard

Mickey's Trailer(1938)

7min | Animation, Comedy

3.7/5 (with 66 votes)

Goofy's in the driver's seat, Mickey's in the kitchen, and Donald's in bed in Mickey's high-tech house trailer. When Goofy comes back to eat breakfast, leaving the car on autopilot, it takes them onto a dangerous closed mountain road. When Goofy realizes this, he accidentally unhooks the trailer, sending it on a perilous route. They come very close to disaster several times, while the oblivious Goofy drives on and hooks back up to them.

Directed by Ben Sharpsteen

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Hôtel du Nord(1938)

1h 37min | Romance / Love, Drama

3.7/5 (with 61 votes)

A young couple, Renée and Pierre, take a room at the Hôtel du Nord, in Paris, near the canal Saint-Martin. They want to die together, but after shooting Renée, Pierre lacks the courage to finish the job and flees. Another guest, Monsieur Edmond, rescues her. When Renée gets out of the hospital she is hired as a waitress at the same hotel. Monsieur Edmond falls in love with her, but Renée is still thinking of Pierre.

Directed by Marcel Carné - With Annabella, Arletty, Louis Jouvet, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Paulette Dubost, Bernard Blier, ...

A Christmas Carol(1938)

1h 9min | Drama, Fantasy, Kids & Family

3.6/5 (with 53 votes)

Classic Charles Dickens holiday tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, the miser's miser who has a huge change of heart after spirits whisk him into the past, present, and future.

Directed by Edwin L. Marin - With Reginald Owen, Gene Lockhart, Kathleen Lockhart, Terry Kilburn, Barry MacKay

Block-Heads(1938)

57min | Comedy, War

3.6/5 (with 49 votes)

It's 1938, but Stan doesn't know the war is over; he's still patrolling the trenches in France, and shoots down a French aviator. Oliver sees his old chum's picture in the paper and goes to visit Stan who has now been returned to the States and invites him back to his home.

Directed by John G. Blystone - With Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Billy Gilbert, Jimmy Finlayson, Sam Lufkin, Patricia Ellis, ...

Tell Your Children(1938)

1h 6min | Drama

2.1/5 (with 43 votes)

High-school principal Dr. Alfred Carroll relates to an audience of parents that marijuana can have devastating effects on teens: a drug supplier entices several restless teens, Mary and Jimmy Lane, sister and brother, and Bill, Mary's boyfriend, into frequenting a reefer house. Gradually, Bill and Jimmy are drawn into smoking dope, which affects their family lives.

Directed by Louis J. Gasnier - With Dorothy Short, Lillian Miles, Dave O'Brien, Thelma White, Carleton Young, Bobby Burns, ...

Brave Little Tailor(1938)

9min | Animation, Kids & Family, Fantasy

3.5/5 (with 42 votes)

When a giant threatens the land, the cityfolk mistake Mickey's boast of killing seven flies with one blow to be giants. He is then forced to fight the giant for real.

Directed by Bill Roberts

Olympia Part One: Festival of the Nations(1938)

2h 6min | Documentary

3.5/5 (with 41 votes)

The First part of Olympia, a documentary about the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin by German Director Leni Riefenstahl. The film played in theaters in 1938 and again in 1952 after the fall of the Nazi Regime.

Directed by Leni Riefenstahl - With Adolf Hitler, Jesse Owens, Luz Long, Spyridon Louis, Rie Mastenbroek, Leni Riefenstahl, ...

Bluebeard's Eighth Wife(1938)

1h 25min | Comedy, Romance / Love

3.6/5 (with 36 votes)

American multi-millionaire Michael Brandon marries his eighth wife, Nicole, the daughter of a broken French Marquis. But she doesn't want to be only a number in the row of his ex-wives and starts her own strategy to tame him.

Directed by Ernst Lubitsch - With Claudette Colbert, Gary Cooper, Edward Everett Horton, David Niven, Elizabeth Patterson, Herman Bing, ...

Boys Town(1938)

1h 36min | Drama

3.4/5 (with 34 votes)

Devout but iron-willed Father Flanagan leads a community called Boys Town, a different sort of juvenile detention facility where, instead of being treated as underage criminals, the boys are shepherded into making themselves better people. But hard-nosed petty thief and pool shark Whitey Marsh, the impulsive and violent younger brother of an imprisoned murderer, might be too much for the good father's tough-love system.

Directed by Norman Taurog - With Spencer Tracy, Mickey Rooney, Henry Hull, Leslie Fenton, Gene Reynolds, Edward Norris, ...

Porky in Wackyland(1938)

7min | Fantasy, Animation, Comedy

3.5/5 (with 31 votes)

Porky Pig goes on a hunt to catch the surreal elusive last Do-Do bird.

Directed by Bob Clampett

Test Pilot(1938)

1h 58min | Drama, Romance / Love

3.3/5 (with 30 votes)

Jim is a test pilot. His wife Ann and best friend Gunner try their best to keep him sober. But the life of a test pilot is anything but safe.

Directed by Victor Fleming - With Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Myrna Loy, Lionel Barrymore, Samuel S. Hinds, Marjorie Main, ...

Swiss Miss(1938)

1h 13min | Comedy, Music

3.1/5 (with 30 votes)

Stan and Ollie are mousetrap salesmen hoping for better business in Switzerland, with Stan's theory that because there is more cheese in Switzerland, there should be more mice.

Directed by John G. Blystone, Hal Roach - With Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Eric Blore, Anita Garvin, Baldwin Cooke, Walter Woolf King, ...

The Baker's Wife(1938)

2h 13min | Comedy, Drama

3.7/5 (with 29 votes)

In this little Provencal village, a new baker, Aimable, settles down. His wife Aurelie is beautiful and much younger than he. She departs with a shepherd the night after Aimable produces his first breads. Aimable is so afflicted that he can not work anymore. Therefore, the villagers, who initially laughed at his cuckoldry, take the matter very seriously (they want the bread) and organize a plan to find Aurelie and to bring her back to the bakery.

Directed by Marcel Pagnol - With Raimu, Ginette Leclerc, Fernand Charpin, Charles Moulin, Alida Rouffe, Charles Blavette, ...

Olympia Part Two: Festival of Beauty(1938)

1h 40min | Documentary

3.4/5 (with 28 votes)

The Second part of Olympia, a documentary about the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin by German Director Leni Riefenstahl. The film played in theaters in 1938 and again in 1952 after the fall of the Nazi Regime.

Directed by Leni Riefenstahl - With Adolf Hitler, Jesse Owens, Luz Long, Spyridon Louis, Rie Mastenbroek, Leni Riefenstahl, ...

Boat Builders(1938)

7min | Animation

3.5/5 (with 28 votes)

Mickey buys a boat kit, and enlists Goofy and Donald to help assemble it. The plans say, "so simple a child could do it", so of course, they have their share of troubles. But before long, they're ready to launch the Queen Minnie, with appropriate fanfare, at which time, all the collapsible parts collapse.

Directed by Ben Sharpsteen

Room Service(1938)

1h 18min | Comedy

3.3/5 (with 27 votes)

Broke Gordon Miller tries to land a backer for his new play while he has to deal with with the hotel manager trying to evict him and his cast.

Directed by William A. Seiter - With Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Lucille Ball, Ann Miller, Frank Albertson, ...

Carefree(1938)

1h 23min | Comedy, Music, Romance / Love

3.4/5 (with 25 votes)

Dr. Tony Flagg's friend Steven has problems in the relationship with his fiancée Amanda, so he persuades her to visit Tony. After some minor misunderstandings, she falls in love with him. When he tries to use hypnosis to strengthen her feelings for Steven, things get complicated.

Directed by Mark Sandrich - With Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Ralph Bellamy, Jack Carson, Hattie McDaniel, Vinton Hayworth, ...

Vivacious Lady(1938)

1h 30min | Comedy, Romance / Love

3.4/5 (with 23 votes)

College town life gets turned upside down after a button-down botany professor secretly weds a sizzling night-club singer.

Directed by George Stevens - With Ginger Rogers, James Stewart, Beulah Bondi, Franklin Pangborn, Charles Coburn, Hattie McDaniel, ...

Donald's Nephews(1938)

8min | Animation

3.1/5 (with 23 votes)

Donald's sister Dumbella sends her three sons Huey, Dewey, and Louie to visit their uncle Donald. They prove to be quite a handful for Donald, even with help from his book on child rearing.

Directed by Jack King