My Top Ten Robert De Niro Movies

Happy Birthday to Robert De Niro, who turns 74 today.

I was thinking I may not be able to do this list as I may struggle to find ten De Niro movies that I’ve seen. Ha! I’ve seen 29! How did that happen?! Sheesh – he’s been in loads of films. Took me ages just to type out the biggest ones I’ve seen & not seen.

I like De Niro but I’m not gonna pretend he’d make a top ten list of my favorite actors. Of the two, though, I’ve always preferred him to Al Pacino (I’ve only seen 14 of his movies).

As always, I’ll include a list at the end of some of the biggest De Niro movies I’ve not seen. And there are truly some biggies! As for Taxi Driver, it’s a bit like Rocky was for me until I finally watched it all the way through this year for my Blind Spot thingy: I’ve probably seen most of Taxi Driver from seeing bits & pieces over the years but can’t really include it on this list until I fully watch it properly.

I do want to see Once Upon A Time In America & The Untouchables (Maybe I’ll make them Blind Spot 2018 choices!). I have no desire to see Casino as it sounds too violent for my wussy self. And I have a feeling I may get yelled at for Raging Bull not making my Top Ten… 😉

So, of what I’ve managed to see so far, here are My Top Ten Robert De Niro Movies (ranked by movie, not performance):

**List Updated 22/08/17 to add The Untouchables 

The Rest That I’ve Seen:

27. The Fan
26. Cape Fear
25. Great Expectations
24. Red Lights
23. Shark Tale
22. Arthur And The Invisibles
21. Angel Heart
20. Hide And Seek
19. Limitless
18. Cop Land
17. Sleepers
16. American Hustle
15. Backdraft
14. Silver Linings Playbook
13. Meet The Parents & Meet The Fockers
12. Analyze This & Analyze That
11. Raging Bull

Top Ten:

TIE: 10. Ronin & The King Of Comedy

9. Stardust

8. Brazil

7. Awakenings

6. Heat

5. The Deer Hunter

4. Jackie Brown

3. The Untouchables

2. Goodfellas

1. The Godfather: Part II

Need To Re-Watch/Fully Watch:
Taxi Driver, Midnight Run

Not Seen:
Mean Streets, New York, New York, Once Upon A Time In America, Falling In Love, The Mission, We’re No Angels, Stanley & Iris, Mad Dog & Glory, This Boy’s Life, A Bronx Tale, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Casino, Marvin’s Room, Wag The Dog, Flawless, The Adventures Of Rocky & Bullwinkle, Men Of Honor, 15 Minutes, The Score, The Good Shepherd, Machete, Little Fockers, The Family, Last Vegas, The Intern, Joy, Dirty Grandpa

17 thoughts on “My Top Ten Robert De Niro Movies”

  1. I like him, but not his mob movies. I thought he was in devil’s advocate but maybe that was Al Pacino. I do admit that sometimes I get them mixed up. Not when I see them but who was in what film. I also thought he was in another movie but looking it up it was Kevin Spacey in Ordinary Decent Criminal. Some of those are strangely easy to confuse as well. I particularly like how De Niro is so flexible. He can play a much wider variety of parts. I particularly like his sense of comedic timing in the more odball characters he has played over the years. I really like his cross-dressing pirate in Stardust.

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  3. You had me at DeNiro. !!
    As you know, Raging Bull is a classic and should be in the top ten. 😉 Taxi Driver too and you could argue Midnight Run. But the ones you haven’t seen are most surprising; Mean Streets is superb and my personal favourite of DeNiro’s films is Once Upon a time in America. I reckon that’s the best gangster film ever made. It’s better than both The Godfather and Goodfellas.

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    • Ah! Hi! I fell behind on comments. I knew you may appear for De Niro! 😉 I do badly want to see Once Upon A Time In America as I love Leone & that film is probably more “me” than the other gangster stuff. I HAVE seen The Untouchables since making this list, though. Great film too. 🙂

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  4. I haven’t seen many movies on this list, but I remember well ”Once Upon A Time In America” and I am pretty sure you would appreciate it a lot. It’s indeed superior to most criminal movies… And mostly I don’t like criminal movies haha.

    Great Expectations wasn’t very good. 😦 Waste of time.

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  7. Great list. I don’t remember him in Jackie Brown (but I hated that movie with a passion… so I might have been too busy screaming at the screen) It would be too hard for me to pick an order with his films though, I’d have like five movies tied for number one. Godfather II, Brazil, Raging Bull, Silver Linings Playbook and Taxi Driver.

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    • That’s high praise for Silver Linings Playbook! 🙂 Aw, you didn’t like Jackie Brown? I only watched that for the first time this year for that Blind Spot thingy and I really liked it but it was also very flawed. It was like two movies: I adored the bits with Pam Grier & that detective dude who was in love with her and the soundtrack was amazing, especially for their scenes. But then the De Niro, Jackson & Bridget Fonda bits were just kind of… Stupid. So it’s one of those annoying movies that, as a whole, I can’t say was great but I loved certain scenes. But definitely not De Niro’s part. Oh, The Untouchables was pretty great, too. Seen that since doing this list.

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