What makes a good original movie title? It should be evocative, but it shouldn’t promise more than the film can deliver. (For instance, Snakes on a Plane, a title so awesome that the movie couldn’t live up to it.) Kill Bill (pictured) has a good title; it’s blunt, tells you what you need to know, and yet it actually undersells the movie, which turns out to be about so much more than the Bride’s quest for revenge. On the other hand, Reservoir Dogs is not a good title; not only does it tell you nothing, but it has no apparent connection to what’s on screen.
What got me thinking about this topic was Spout’s list of the 10 Best Movie Titles of the Last 10 Years. (Which, in turn, was inspired by EW’s own list of fall 2008 Movies with Misleading Titles.) I’m not sure I agree with much of what’s on their list, but I thought it would be fun for us here at PopWatch to come up with a list of the Best Movie Titles Ever. Some ground rules: Titles that already existed (say, in movies adapted from books, plays, or TV shows) don’t count. It has to be a title that was thought up for the movie. Also disqualified: Any movie that borrows its title from a pop song. Except for Pretty in Pink (which pretty much started the trend), no movie that takes its title from a song has ever been any good.
That said, have at it. If your favorite original movie title is Star Wars or Head or The Killing of a Chinese Bookie or Rebel Without a Cause, let us know. And if you have any suggested rules for what makes a good title (or a bad one), feel free to include them.
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Um, hello, the best movie title is obviously Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead. And the movie ain’t half bad either…
how in the world did chris g already take my choice!
ah! hit send to quickly. anyway, i was going to offer eternal sunshine of the spotless mind up for consideration. i like it because it’s aloof. it keeps you guessing. and it really reflects the movie’s tone.
Once.
The simple, yet intriguing title perfectly reflects the organic quality of the film.
One of my favorite titles is the Manchurian Candidate (it sounds mysterious and creepy, kind of like the movie). I also like Witness (again, kind of mysterious) and Clockwork Orange (very creepy). I tend to dislike titles that are too long or that are too cutesy, but other than that, pretty much anything goes!
I’m not sure this is the exact title, but I stumbled across a movie on imdb onetime called something like “I Killed My Lesbian Wife, Hung Her On a Meathook, and Now I Have a Three-Picture Deal with Disney.” I think it was directed by and/or starred Ben Affleck. Or maybe I dreamed the whole thing, I don’t know.
“Honey I Shrunk The Kids” is truly great.
I remember Premiere Magazine once did a whole series of fake sequels to that one. My favorite was “Honey I Shrunk Three Men and a Baby”.
Mars Needs Women
To Dennis N.: It’s perfect, thanks for reminding me!
And I know it’s cliche, but I like Casablanca. It’s mysterious, exotic and at the same time romantic.
Dumb & Dumber — wearing its lack of pretension on its sleeve.
The first one to leap to mind was cult classic “The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.”
The other was “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” — a title so good, Joss Whedon couldn’t let it go when the original version flopped.
Here are some of my favorite movie TITLES. They are not all necessarily good movies, though, nor have I necessarily even seen them. We’re talking only TITLES here:
- Dude, Where’s My Car?
- Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
- Psycho
- Blade Runner
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind
- My Big Fat Greek Wedding
- Thunderball
- Halloween
- Friday the 13th
- The Exorcist
- All the President’s Men
- The Towering Inferno
Exit Wounds
Dark Water
X2
Gladiator
Sordid Lives
Happy Endings
Nick & Nora’s Infinite Playlist
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Duh.
The first one that came to my mind was Superbad.
Horror movies kind of win at this list. “Nightmare on Elm St,” “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” (Jason is right, that one is full of win), “Night of the Living Dead” . . . and who could forget “Death Bed, The Bed that Eats People”!!!
1)Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
1)Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Horror movies are in a uber-campy league of their own. Attn: Attack of the Killer Tomatoes! (The exclamation point is an essential part of the title)
The debate on titles begins and ends with Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. It is the subtitle that really does it (though Strangelove as the name of a physicist who gets just a bit too excited about the notion of nuclear holocaust is wonderful in its own right), invoking both the spirit of the happy-go-lucky 60s with the sheer terror of mushroom clouds. And to quote Chris G, “the movie ain’t half bad either”.
planes, trains, and automobiles
“Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle”
One of the few times a title has influenced my desire to see the movie. And bonus points for accuracy!
Half the stuff Lifetime comes up with is fantastic. My favorite one was the “Positively True Adventures of the Alleged Texas Cheerleader-Murdering Mom” with “Mother, May I Sleep with Danger?” coming in a close second.
The ones that come to mind for me-
Dude, Where’s My Car? (It is try to its title)
How Stella Got Her Groove Back
I for sure agree with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It definitely wins. I also like The Royal Tenenbaums, Edward Scissorhands, Lost in Translation, Lars and the Real Girl, and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.
Almost Famous
i don’t even feel like i need to explain that
Old School
I’ve got to agree with Eric Friedman about “Blade Runner”
It’s kind of edgy, tells you a little about the movie (it’s the main character’s job), and at the same time begs to be watched.
I was also a fan of Goldeneye. Kind of a cool and creative name for James Bond movie, and it was one of the first not invented by Ian Fleming.
There Will Be Blood
The Killing Fields
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Sunset Boulevard
The Grapes of Wrath
North by Northwest
A Streetcar Named Desire
The Silence of the Lambs
The Departed
(PLEASE CAN SOMEONE TELL ME WHY ‘THE CRYING GAME’ IS CALLED ‘THE CRYING GAME’? i don’t get it)
The Green Mile
Million Dollar Baby
Do the Right Thing
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
To Kill A Mockingbird
The Shawshank Redemption
Road to Perdition
Adam’s Rib
Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
The Pursuit of Happyness
Dr. Strangelove (and its subtitle of course)
Wet Hot American Summer.
“10 Things I Hate About You”…which the title was to be a close approximation of “The Taming of the Shrew”