Puzzle: Mutated Movies

The Game Room
#1

It’s Oscar week, so how about a movie puzzle?

This puzzle consists of a selection of movie titles with something in common. The movie titles were broken into “doublet” pairs, and then the doublets were alphabetized.

Example:

THE KING’S SPEECH
TH EK IN GS SP EE CH
CH EE EK GS IN SP TH

Problems:

  1. Prior to breaking the titles into doublets, the common factor in each title was mutated in a certain way.

  2. In addition to the above problem, each of the 13 sets of doublets has an extra letter pair. This extra doublet is not part of the mutated title at all.

Mitigating Circumstance:

If you put the original titles in alphabetical order by their common factor, you may then read the extra doublets and thus discover what I did to mutate the original titles.
Can you discover the original titles and what I did to them? Hint: Two of the titles are “made for TV” movies.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

  1. AJ AN AN BO DI DO DT ES FT HE HE IN KI KU LL LS MO NG ON TA TH WS

  2. AP CH LI MA NE NO NT RI UB WS

  3. AL DA EN EV IL NO NT TI

  4. BA CK ER GA GO GR HO OA OO RB RE TH VE WS

  5. AL DP DS EN IC KF OR RE TE

  6. AT EH ER KE ME ON OR SE TH

  7. BA EN ER ES EV GE OR RR TH TH YM

  8. AN EE EM ES GR HA NC NE NE OF YL

  9. AI AN AT BF EE FL FR IE KS RB RE SA

  10. AE CH EN ES GA KL LA MI RB UC WH

  11. EN ER HT IG NS ON SS TH TT WA

  12. AS ES IC IN JE KI LO SL SS TE YD

  13. DY ER EY GI LA OV RL SH SL TE VE
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^

#2

Just so I understand how this works, the first two letters of the title would have to exist as a couplet, right? So, if you had put in Star Wars, for example, ST would have to be a couplet? Or am I completely not getting it?

#3

Well, I figured out 1, but haven’t figured out the trick.

1: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the [Crys]tal Skull, with leftovers BO TH WS

#4

Nice, jsgoddess. And I thought #1 would be the hardest!

#5

It seems another hint may be in order if this is to be solved before the Oscar telecast.

Therefore, to help break the quiet:

All the theatrical release movies are well known. Of the two made-for-TV films, one is commonly known, having spawned two short-lived TV series (one good and one bad —IMHO). The other TV movie is fairly obscure even though it stars a very well-known actor. I only chose this flick because it was the absolute first movie using that particular common factor that came to mind. Though there were other better-known choices, this TV movie (based on a book) disturbed me as a child. Alas, current online reviews suggest I was too sensitive, and that the film isn’t very good. Oh well.

#6

In interests of trying something, anything:

Is #7

BARRYMORES THE REVENGE (for JAWS THE REVENGE?)

I have no idea what the pattern would be though.

#7

Interesting puzzles. I think you may have too many layers of obfuscation, though, since you both added extra data and warped existing data in two different ways. I have solved an additional title, though, bringing us to two :

  1. AJ AN AN BO DI DO DT ES FT HE HE IN KI KU LL LS MO NG ON TA TH WS
  • Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
  1. BA CK ER GA GO GR HO OA OO RB RE TH VE WS
  • How Stella Got Her Groove Back
#8

Correction to Candid:

  1. HO WS GA RB OA GO TH ER GR OO VE BA CK [del]RE[/del]
  • How S (GARBO -> tell) a Got Her Groove Back

So 1 could be Crys -> Both or Bows (or Cry -> Bow)

and 4 is Tell -> Garbo

#9

Sorry to correct your correction, but ‘Tella’ is mutated, not ‘Tell’. It could be the whole word ‘Stella’, though, mutated into something else that starts with an ‘S’.

HOWS (tella) GOTHERGROOVEBACK

Not sure where you got your ‘O’ for Garbo, either.

#10

There was an OA that you overlooked.

ETA - if you look at my post above I rearranged the pieces in order.

#11

On further review, you are correct. My bad!

Though I must edit to add, you’re still making an assumption there. We know the ‘S’ in Stella sticks, you’re only assuming that the ‘a’ does.

#12

#8 ->

ANNE OF GREEN [GAB]LES
GAB -> CHANEY
Extra : EM

So the pattern seems to be that the movie title has a ‘talk’ word buried in one of its words; (cry, gab, tell); and that talk word is replaced by the surname of an actor or actress (Bow, Chaney, Garbo) without other rhyme or reason I can discern.

#13

Silent film stars put in place of talky words.

Getting the film names is just so random that I don’t feel like pursuing it further.

#14

OK, that makes “Barrymores: the Revenge” make sense (JAWs: The Revenge, #7)

#2 is Chaplin something

#15

Indeed it does.

#16

So what I’ve got (2 is Chaplin, 3 is Valentino):

  1. Indiana Jones and the crappy crystal skull (Bow - Cry)

  2. CHAPLI NE NO MA NT RI UB WS (not solved yet)

  3. DANTEVALENTINO IL == DANTESPEAK == Dante’s Peak

  4. HOW SGARBOA GOT HER GROOVE BACK == HOW STELLA GOT HER GROOVE BACK

  5. AL DP DS EN IC KF OR RE TE

  6. AT EH ER KE ME ON OR SE TH

  7. BARRYMORES THE REVENGE TH == Jaws The Revenge

  8. ANNE OF GREEN CHANEYLES EM == ANNE OF GREEN GABLES

  9. AI AN AT BF EE FL FR IE KS RB RE SA

  10. AE CH EN ES GA KL LA MI RB UC WH

  11. EN ER HT IG NS ON SS TH TT WA

  12. AS ES IC IN JE KI LO SL SS TE YD

  13. DY ER EY GI LA OV RL SH SL TE VE

#17

Good call on Valentino. #6, I believe, is Keaton; and #12 Lloyd.

#18

#9 is Fairbanks.

#19

Well, my movie buff capabilities are pretty much exhausted. Here’s the letters rearranged with the actor component pulled together in one place (in addition to the solved ones):

  1. Indiana Jones and the crappy crystal skull (Bow - Cry)

  2. CHAPLI NE NO NT MA RI UB WS (not solved yet)

  3. DANTEVALENTINO IL == DANTESPEAK == Dante’s Peak

  4. HOW SGARBOA GOT HER GROOVE BACK == HOW STELLA GOT HER GROOVE BACK

  5. AL DP DS EN IC KF OR RE TE

  6. KEATON EH ER ME OR SE TH (not solved yet)

  7. BARRYMORES THE REVENGE TH == Jaws The Revenge

  8. ANNE OF GREEN CHANEYLES EM == ANNE OF GREEN GABLES

  9. BFAIRBANKS AT EE FL FR IE RE SA (not solved yet)

  10. AE CH EN ES GA KL LA MI RB UC WH

  11. EN ER HT IG NS ON SS TH TT WA

  12. SLLOYD AS ES IC IN JE KI SS TE (not solved yet)

  13. DY ER EY GI LA OV RL SH SL TE VE

#20

#5 is Pickford.