After starting this thread (about the fact that the first Potter book is called Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone in Britain and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in the United States), it struck me that this surely can’t be the only time this has happened.
Does anybody know if there are any other, popular books or movies that got different names in the US and the UK for marketing reasons?
Well, this doesn’t apply to the UK alone, but I know that that the film released in the US as “the Professional” with Jean Reno and Natalie Portman was released in other countries as “Leon.”
The “Leon” version also included scenes cut from the American release. IMHO, the film was much better intact.
Well, IIRC, one would be Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, if only because “shagged” is almost the equivalent of “fucked” in the UK and it was considered inappropriate to have on advertisements…I don’t recall what they changed the name to.
Lots of Agatha Christie’s books had/have different titles in the US than in the UK. British MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS became (inexplicably, to me) MURDER ON THE CALAIS COACH in the US. And 4:50 FROM PADDINGTON became WHAT MRS McGILLICUDDY SAW! And we won’t mention AND THEN THERE WERE NONE (although the British play version was called TEN LITTLE INDIANS… has the British book title been changed?)
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were called the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles in Europe. Although I can understand the reasoning, I’m not sure this made things any better.
One of my favorite movies A Matter of Life and Death was called “Stairway to Heaven” in the States.
It happened fairly often up through the 60s. Lots of U.S. movie titles were unacceptable for Britain and vice versa. Leslie Halliwell has a long article on the changes in his “Film Encyclopedia.”
Those I can recall:
“Damn Yankees!” (U.S.) became “Whatever Lola Wants.”
“Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hey!” (which doesn’t make much sense even for U.S. viewers) was changed to “Summer Lightning” for Britain.
“Hallalulah, I’m a Bum” in the U.S. was changed to “Hallalulah, I’m a Tramp” in Britain, since “bum” has a different meaning there.
“I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang” was shortened to “I am a Fugitive.”
“The Fortune Cookies” in the U.S. became “Meet Whiplash Willie.”
On the posters I saw in London it said Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me
IIRC, ‘Heathers’ was released as ‘Lethal Attraction’ in some countries outside of the US.
IMDb keeps up with alternate titles on the “Main Details” page for each film, under the heading “Also Known As.”
There is no mention there for the above-mentioned alternates for Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Lethal Attraction is given as a working title for Heathers, not a foreign title. I confess that I didn’t look up every title already mentioned, those just piqued my interest.
KneadToKnow, I don’t recall the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film title being changed, but the “Hero Turtles” variant was used on the TV cartoons (and nauseating quantities of associated merchandise), UK broadcasting standards people having determined that Japanese assassins were unsuitable for presentation to young children.
Although the title of the film was not changed in the UK, some of the promotional material for Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me coyly referred to Austin Powers 2 or “the new Austin Powers movie”.
Some transatlantic title changes are discussed in this article.
I remember seeing it in the theatres as ‘Orient Express’.
This threw me for a loop…
US - Waking Ned Devine
UK - Waking Ned
Is is last name so insignificant? The best I could guess is that there was some movie in England dealing with a Ned Devine and there was concern that this WND might cause confusion so WN was used. 
Well for movies Enceno Man was called California Man in Europe when I was there.
Clive Barker’s Books of blood 1-3 are called the same but 4-6 are called something different in the States.
There are a couple of album names that have been changed too I just can’t think of any off the top of my head.
Thios virtually always happens when movies go to different countries. When I was a kid, the magazine Famous Monsters of Filmland had a reular feature about name changes when films go to different countries.
Often it happens because an American title is untranslateable. The Bond film The Living Daylights had completely different titles elsewhere in the world. Similarly, the French film released in the US as Pardon mon Affaire had an untranslateable French title.
It’s more reasonable, I think, to ask about changes in titles of films that go to different countries that speak the same language. For reasons not clear to me, the “Quatermass” series in Britain was completely retitled in the US:
UK: The Quatermass Xperiment (sic)
US: The Creeping Unknown
UK: Quatermass 2 (this was before they used Roman Numerals)
US: Enemy from Space
UK: Quatermass and the Pit
US: Five Million Years to Earth
(I think the fourth film, The Quatermass Conclusion, had the same title in both places. But it was an awful film.)
I’m sure there are tons of other examples. Title changes seem to be the rule, rather than the exception. I’m still annoyed that they changed the title of both the book and of the film of the first Harry Potter story. It implies that Americans are too unread or too stupid to understand the implications of “Philosopher’s Stone”.
A recent example was the British “The Pope Must Die!” which was changed for American release into “The Pope Must Diet!”, which only made a small amount of sense (Robbie Coltrane is overweight, but that’s about it). Still the original title was considered inappropriate after the assassination attempt on John Paul II.
Here are a few of the better-known films on Halliwell’s list of changes. The U.S. title is listed first.
Jim Thorpe, All American ---- Man of Bronze
Abe Lincoln in Illinois ---- Spirit of the People
Buck Privates (Abbott and Costello) – Rookies
Take Me Out to the Ball Game ---- Everyone’s Cheering
The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer ---- Bachelor Knight
Sons of the Desert (Laurel and Hardy) ---- Fraternally Yours
Angels in the Outfield ---- Angels and the Pirates
Never Give a Sucker an Even Break ---- What a Man
The Bank Dick ---- The Bank Detective
Summer Stock – If You Feel Like Singing
The Magnificent Yankee ---- The Man with Thirty Sons
Royal Wedding ---- Wedding Bells
I Was A Male War Bride ---- You Can’t Sleep Here
Any Wednesday ---- Bachelor Girl Apartment
Public Enemy ---- Enemies of the Public
Public Enemy’s Wife ---- G-Man’s Wife (she must have played around)
Anything Goes (Bing Crosby) – Tops is the Limit
State of the Union — The World and His Wife
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein ---- Abbot and Costello Meet the Ghost
Holiday — Free to Live (also Unconventional Linda)
The Whole Town’s Talking ---- Passport to Fame
Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter ---- Oh! For a Man
Teenage Caveman ---- Out of the Darkness
Miracle on 34th Street ---- The Big Heart
Experiment in Terror ---- The Grip of Fear
The following were British films that chance to the U.S. title. U.S. is still on the right.
Having a Wild Weekend (the Dave Clark Five) — Catch Us If You Can
Damn the Defiant! ---- HMS Defiant
African Fury ---- Cry the Beloved Country
East of Shanghai ---- Rich and Strange (an early Hitchcock)
The Detective ---- Father Brown
Curse of the Demon ---- Night of the Demon
Die, Die, My Darling ---- Fanatic
The Second Best Secret Agent in the Whole Wide World ---- Licensed to Kill
A Yank in London ---- I Live in Grosvenor Square
Tight Little Island ---- Whiskey Galore
House of Fright ---- The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll
At Dawn We Die ---- Tomorrow We Live
The Playgirl and the War Minister (to cash in on the Profumo scandal) ---- The Amorous Prawn
Man with a Million ---- The Million Pound Note
There are many more listed. Generally, the practice was quite common for many years.
Oops. Got confused. The U.S. title is on the left throughout.
As another more recent example, I believe The Ref (in which burglar Denis Leary holds Kevin Spacey’s family at gunpoint) was released in the UK as Hostile Hostages. I got that tidbit from a local video store; any UKers able to confirm?
Appearantly, Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles was the European (at least UK, Germany and Sweden, as far as I know) name for the cartoon, the toy line and the computer games, but not the live action movie. Bizarrely, the follow-ups to the live action movie (II and III) were called Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles, as these posters show:
http://www.seriesam.com/cgi-bin/seek?seek=Teenage+Mutant+Her
Why? Because the word ‘ninja’ was deemed too violent and too offensive for the delicate little flower known as the average European…
Me: << British MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS became (inexplicably, to me) MURDER ON THE CALAIS COACH in the US >>
Screech-owl: << I remember seeing it in the theatres as ‘Orient Express’. >>
Sorry if I was unclear, I was talking about the book titles, not the movie titles.