The 2nd Mad Max movie starring Mel Gibson was titled “Mad Max II” but was released in the US as “The Road Warrior”. NFI why.
Not sure why this was done but in some territories Zootopia was renamed:
Not to be forgotten is Agatha Christie’s “Ten Little N******s”, which was retitled “Ten Little Indians”, and retitled again to “And Then There Were None”. (Abe Books has a number of the originals on sale, but you will pay $150 and up).
Les Triplettes de Belleville was released under the literal translation The Triplets of Belleville in English-speaking countries - except the UK and Ireland, where it was titled Belleville Rendez-vous.
Movie titles in Spanish seem to assume the audience is composed of idiots, no nuance or thought can be required to understand the title.
In Latin-America they (used to, is no longer so common) add the words “en apuros” (“in trouble”) and/or “mad” to every title.
In Spain they are even worse, famously renaming “Die Hard” (Latin-American name: “Duro de Matar” (Hard to kill)) to “Jungla de Cristal” (Crystal Jungle).
I’m going to watch some football now, but later I will chime in to talk about High Noon → Solo ante el peligro, North by Northwest → Con la muerte en los talones (ES) / Intriga internacional (Latin America), Once upon a time in the West → Spiel mir das Lied vom Tod, and similar things. They are many, some quite intriguing.
Of course titles get changed, because producers are weird and distributers are crazy. And sometimes because they simply don’t understand the original title.
“Solo ante el peligro” would be “Alone before danger” or “facing danger alone”. Not great, but not bad.
“Con la muerte en los talones” . . . . “With death in its claws”, maybe?
What does “Spiel mir das Lied vom Tod” mean?
Which are very likely all different in every country, so I can see why they did this.
See this post:
I remember during a trip to England years ago that the movie Gross Anatomy, a middling medical school comedy starring Matthew Modine, had been retitled A Cut Above. I found it strange. Do medical schools in England call that class by another name? Did someone just decide they didn’t want the word “gross” in the title?
The Russian title of American Beauty was Beauty, American Style, completely overlooking the ambiguity associated with the roses.
The French WW2 movie Indigenes was renamed Days of Glory here.
Damn Yankees would have been renamed because they didn’t want the word Damn in a film title in England.
“We Sail in Harm’s Way” is the motto of the US Navy.
The Russian translation for the John Wayne/Kirk Douglas war flick In Harm’s Way was In the Manner of Mr Harm, further proof that Russian translators are some of the world’s worst.
I had a good laugh over that one, just like I did when encountering “The Tretyakov Gallery is full of worthless paintings” and “Streetwalkers would gather under Skriyabin’s window to listen whenever he was playing his violin.”
On the contrary, I think that the word “damn” is considered less offensive in the U.K. than in the U.S. One online paper I found says that it’s considered a very mild swearword. Why do you consider it to be more offensive in the U.K. than in the U.S.?
Wikipedia notes “Originally titled Licence Revoked, the name was changed during post-production due to American test audiences associating the term with driver’s licence” [sic]. See also here.
cite?
There were at least three British film with “damn” in the title made in between the two versions of Damn Yankees! No problem for them.
Village of the Damned
Children of the Damned
The Damned
The recent French shark movie on Netflix was retitled from Sous la Seine to Under Paris, presumably due to the understandable concern that Americans don’t know what or where the Seine is. Of course, if you watch 3 seconds of preview it’s obvious the movie is based in Paris anyway.
Do they even have American Beauty roses in Russia? Or did they rename them “Glorious Blossoms of Holy Mother Russia and her Natural Beauty?”
It’s even better. (copied from Wiki)
The title of the film for the Swedish release uses the translation of the name of the play within the story, Springtime for Hitler. As a result of its success, most of Mel Brooks’ subsequent films in Swedish were given similar titles, despite being otherwise unrelated: Springtime for Mother-In-Law, Springtime for the Sheriff, Springtime for Frankenstein, Springtime for the Silent Movies, Springtime for the Lunatics, Springtime for World History, Springtime for Space, and Springtime for the Slum. The practice ended by the time Robin Hood: Men in Tights was released, at Brooks’ request.
I’m sure there are some Russians who know about American Beauty roses. Those who do probably wouldn’t try to translate the name.