For perfectly descriptive titles you missed:
Snakes on a Plane and Cowboys vs Aliens.
I always liked the full title of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Speaking of sorceror, Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone was an absolutely horrible and meaningless title change for me for the American book and movie. “Sorceror’s Stone” means diddly squat to me. “Philosopher’s Stone” makes more sense.
I was dithering about reading the books or not and the title may have made a difference in the beginning before the movies. After I saw the first movie, it all became clear and so I stayed away from the books and movies from then on because it is obvious from the title that they are dumbed down (even if they’re not: we’re talking titles here.)
Mel Brooks’ Silent Movie.
Doesn’t even need a cutline.
Then again, neither does Sharknado, whose unnecessary cutline is “Enough said.”
Nope. It’s because they can’t copyright (or is it trademark?) the title to a public domain story. It’s about branding.
Pixar’s titles haven’t been particularly interesting. The movies have sold because everyone knows (or at least knew) that Pixar = Family Fun. But: A Bug’s Life, Up!, Cars and Toy Story. Not interesting. Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo, better.
The protagonist in Turbo is bitten by a radioactive car and gets enough super-speed to win races NASCAR-style. You could do a lot worse for a title.
Terrible:*** John Carter***
Great: Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter
Jaws was a good title.
Big was a bad title.
The really terrible thing about Unknown as a title is that another Unknown was released just a few years earlier.
We could start another thread of recycled movie titles, sometimes within the same year. Just a couple of years ago there was 9, Nine, and two other titles with “nine” in the name in the same season.
Just so you folks know, John Carter is definitely NOT the title Andrew Stanton wanted. He wanted to cal it John Carter of Mars, but the Powers-That-Be at Disney didn’t want him to call it that, thinking that it would a.) turn off female elements in the audience, who they thought might not want to see a science fiction epic; b.) It might invoke thoughts of the previous summer’s Mars Needs Moms; c.) They told Stanton that he only “became” John Carter “of Mars” at the end, after he wins.
It was stupid all around 9What did they think, that women and girls might blunder into the movie if they thought it was the story of some earth-bound adventure about Noah Wylie? That failure is contagious by title?
But those are all such logical reasons. :rolleyes:
For me, the huge mistake was not the truncation of the title but the abandonment of the fabulous art title they had developed and used in the long-lead promotion - and used in the final materials even though the centerpiece is a highly stylized “JCM.” Switching to a deadly-dull Futura or FraGo or whatever that was just killed the movie’s image as being ANYTHING anyone would want to see.
I agree entirely.
They sell T-shirts with that stylized “JCM” logo. I almost got one for last year’s Arisia, but instead went with a shirt having a fan-made poster for the unmade Gods of Mars.
Marin County, actually…and based on a non-fictional (think Fast Times at Ridgemont High) book. Very funny.
Plan 9 From Outer Space
My choice, **Sorceror[/B[ has been mentioned already;. I’ve also mentioned Dreamquest in the past on this Board. Both of these sound like they ought to be Carlos Casteneda movies, or something.
The Last King of Scotland – if you only saw the title lsted, you’d never guess this was about Idi Amin
Ballistic : Ecks vs. Sever
**Metalstorm: the Detruction of Jared-Syn
Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone**
I’m not especially fond of subheadings, but it really annoys me when the subheadings, which are supposed to clarify and amplify the title, just make it more obscure. I start out feeling that I’m on the outside of an inside joke, or that there’s something going on I should have known about before this.
Sorceress (1982) is a bad sword-and-sorcery movie. It’s about… no, not a sorceress, sorry. There is a male wizard, but no sorceress anywhere. There are a pair of busty twin female warriors, and the whole movie basically an excuse for them to keep getting undressed. But no sorceress.
This is a favorite Bad Film of mine, that I’ve shown at Bad Film Festivals. It’s produced (of course) by Roger Corman. Its production values and effects are so awful that it looks like a bad foreign film dubbed into English – but it isn’t.
There ARE two other films with the same title, but they’re fairly decent films. And involve actual Sorceresses.
Close enough!
Best Title Ever:
Snakes On A Plane
There it is - the title and the plot all rolled into one! No surprises, no tricks - just snakes on a plane. Bam. You buy your ticket and get your money’s worth.