Jim Treacher over at The Daily Gut posts a movie trailer for Hobo with a Shotgun, a move about a hobo who obtains a shotgun. While this is a trailer for a fictional movie, I like the idea of movies that state their premise clearly in their title, like Snakes on a Plane. Too many Hollywood people want to get all artsy and poetic with titles when we just want to know what the move is actually about without having to read reviews by pompous movies critics. Were Hobo with a Shotgun an actual movie, it would probably end up with some artsy obscure title like Reynold’s Nightmare.
Now, what was the biggest blockbuster of all time? Star Wars. People saw that title and was like, “Hey! I bet that movie has wars in the stars! Let’s see that!” and thus history was made. Were the movie to come out today, for the title they’d probably take some obscure line from the movie and try to conflate it to what the entire film is about, like The Fool Who Follows. No one would go see it.
And what’s my favorite movie? The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly – and that’s exactly what the movie was about. The only way it could be clearer would be to add the subtitle “They’re All After Gold!”
Let’s look at last weekend: What was the number one movie? Ghost Rider. Seems to be a movie about a ghost who rides; might be interesting. Another movie that came out was Bridge to Terabithia. Wha? Why would I want to see that? All I it sounds like I’ll see is some bridge and a place called Terabithia which could be in Europe for all I know. I’ll pass, thank you.
Clear titles clearly make better movies. If I made a movie, I’d title it Pirate Pete’s Adventures in Pirate Land: A Movie About Pirates. No guesswork needed to know what you’d be getting. So let’s try and make some other movies better by giving them clearer titles:
CLEARER MOVIE TITLES
Casablanca -> African Bar with Nazis
Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? -> Fugitive Singing Stars
RashÙmon -> Unreliable Witnesses
Good Will Hunting -> Janitor Math Genius
Reservoir Dogs -> Bank Robber Flashback Fun
Million Dollar Baby -> Girly Boxing Tragedy
The Shawshank Redemption -> The Great Rape Escape
The Silence of the Lambs -> Professor People-Eater
Chinatown -> The Private Eye in the Case of Secret Incestuousness
Sling Blade -> Potato-Eating Killer Man
Jacob’s Ladder -> The Wacky Dreams of a Dying Vietnam Vet
Magnolia -> Crazy Interweaving Story Time
Blade Runner -> Killer Android Attack
Gone with the Wind -> Did That Guy Just Swear?!
Brokeback Mountain -> Gay Cowboys in Search of Oscars
Brazil -> Huh? What Was That Crap?
An Inconvenient Truth -> Someone Pay Attention to Me! Please!
What are your favorite clear movie titles and what movies titles do you think could use improving?
Syriana – Big Oil Snark Fest
Jarhead – Desert Storm Snark Fest
Donnie Darko – Crazy Rabbit Ghost Tells Stupid Kid to Do Bad Things
Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood – Bitter, Selfish Woman Treats Family Badly
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind – Two Selfish People Getting Their Brains Scrambled
Gladiator – Totally Hetero–Probably Wouldn’t Be Interested
“Post About Clear Move Titles”???
Frank, Frank, Frank. How many times have we told you that you shouldn’t rely on Rowdi as an editor? She’s always letting stuff like this slip through.
Blow: not what you think
Goodfellas: killing guys between courses of pasta
Forest Gump: retarded guy saves the world
The English Patient: zzzzzz
The Sixth Sense–Dead Shrink Harasses a Little Kid
An Inconvenient Truth–Run, Algore’s Got a Slide Show!
Cars: Living/Talking Cars
Robots: Living/Talking Robots
GhostBusters: Living Talking GhostBusters
Napolean Dynamite–Contains Neither French Emperors nor Explosives
Blue Hawaii–Elvis in Tiny Little Pants
Clear Title:
The Vikings (1958)
No more explanation needed. This is obviously a movie about manly men doing manly things in manly ways.
Clearer Title:
The Norsemen (1978) -> Lee Majors cashing in on his Bionic Man popularity in this waste of film that is only fit for a drunken MST3K night at a Frat house.
p.s. The best parts were the black viking and the leather miniskirt the Indian princess wore.
Citizen Kane: Publishers are jerks, in Black and White.
Can’t think of a color version.
Star Trek: The Motion Picture – 30 Minutes of the Outside of the Enterprise While an Old Space Probe Kidnaps a Bald Chick.
Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan – No Longer “Mr. Roarke,” Richardo Montalban Kicks some Star Fleet Ass
Star Trek: The Search for Spock – We Didn’t Mean To Kill Off Spock, It’s A Miracle, He’s Back, but Kirstie Alley is gone.
Star Trek: The Voyage Home – Kirk and Spock Save the Whales and Save the Earth
Star Trek: The Final Frontier – Oops, We Let William Shatner Write and Direct This Piece of Crap
Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country – Veiled Reference to the Fall of the Soviet Union with Klingon Good Guys Suing for Peace While the Evil Military is Still Full of Evil Murderousness
“I want that hobo’s head on my wall tonight! And whoever brings him to me gets all my BROADS!”
Seven Samurai -> Samurai (And A Couple Of Fakers) Hired To Defend Poor Village From Bandits, Die
13th Warrior -> Muslim Doesn’t Attempt To Kill Pagan Heathens For Not Converting To Islam But Kills A Lot of Other Things
First Knight -> Sean Connery Plays King Arthur, Julia Ormond Plays Guenevere Whom ISN’T A Complete Slut (Richard Gere isn’t important)
Raiders of the Lost Ark -> Harrison Ford Shoots Bad Guy (That thing about Ford shortening the scene due to dysentery , BTW)
Renaissance Man -> Probably The Most Accurate Depiction Of Boot Camp To Date
Thirteenth Warrior – Vikings and really girly Muslim guy fight crazy drugged up pygmies near a waterfall.
Snatch – Diamond Theft/Boxing Madness with Accents
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels – Gambling Debt Payoff Reefer/Cash Theft Madness with Accents
Damn! Bas got to the 13th Warrior first and had a better title. Jerk.
=+)
The Family Stone = If You Don’t Support Gay Adoption You Suck
Little Miss Sunshine = Surprise, Frank Is Gay
Superman Returns = No Really, Superman Was Actually Gay
The Devil Wears Prada = A Movie Only The Gay Fashion Industry Will Love
Step Up = A Movie Only Gay Dancers Will Love
Running With Scissors = Diary of A Gay Boy
Imagine Me & You = We’re All Secretly Lesbians
Pirates of the Caribbean = The Gayest Pirate Ever
the Dish: Aussies help with Moon Landing coverage. History plus comedy.
Groundhog Day: My husband’s favorite.
A Christmas Story: Bob’s other favorite.
Babe: talking pig thinks its a sheep
Snatch: Pig-Feeding Gangstar vs. Wild F**king Gypsy
The Hunt For Red October: Commies aren’t that bad
Napolean Dynamite: Geeks are cool
The Red Dragon: Killer Hair-Lip
Gone In Sixty Seconds: Car-Theft For Charity
Serenity: Old West-type Space Cowboys Kick Authoritarian Propaganda Butt
And a gimme…
The Princess Bride: Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles
Goonies=Fat Kid Dances, Asian Kid Stereotypes, Retarded Football Player Turns On His Criminal Family
Lord of the Rings Trilogy=The Longest Movie About Hiking Ever
Equilibrium=Ninja Gunfighter Destroys Liberal Ideals (Although I’m Sure That’s Not What The Movie Makers Intended)
Boondock Saints=Pulp Fiction With An Irish Accent
American Beauty=Sweet Statuatory!
The Usual Suspects=Kevin Spacey Is Keyser Soze
Rushmore=The Stalker’s Guide To The Universe
The Crow=When Given The Choice Between Doing This Movie Or Doing Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story, Brandon Lee Should Have Chosen The Latter, You Know, Because He Died While Making The Crow And It Wasn’t A Very Good Movie Anyway
Hook=Robin Williams In Green Tights
Full Metal Jacket = Marines Aren’t “Peter Puffers”
Narnia = The Devil Loses
Brokeback Mountain = Hombres on Hershey Highway
The Last Samurai -> Yay monarchy!
The Day After Tomorrow -> We didn’t listen!
2001 -> Artsy Filmwork: Combined With a Plot You Will Never be Allowed to Admit You Thought Was Boring as Hell
Flashdance: Struggling to Succeed in Sexy Tight Outfits
The Outlaw Josey Wales: Cowboy Spittin’ n Shootin’
Blade: They’re Vampires, It Doesn’t Matter How Many I Kill
Heartbreak Ridge: Clint Kills Cubans — Cool!
Land of the Dead: Liberal Masturbation Fantasy with Zombies
The Village: Really Crazy Rich People Get to do Really Crazy Things
Mean Girls: Hot Chicks Act Mean but it’s OK Because Hey, They’re Hot!
The Professional: Hitman Kills Bad Dudes, Natalie Portman Gets to Watch
Troy: Brad Pitt Slays Men and Women Using Two Different Weapons
Anaconda: Big Snake at All You Can Eat Stupid Human Buffet
King Arthur: Centurion Slaughters Saxons
Daylight: Poseidon Adventure Underground
The Alamo (remake): Mexicans Solders: They’re People!
The Producers: Marines Storm Terrorist Fortress to Rescue Hooter Girls- Not!
Something’s Gotta Give: Someone’s Gotta Give Me a Refund
10 Things I Hate About You: If You Force Me Watch This Shakespeare Re-make it Will make Number 11 on My List.
The Crying Game: You Know, For a Woman, You Have a Really Nice Johnson.
The Last Samurai -> Yay monarchy!
The Day After Tomorrow -> We didn’t listen!
2001 -> Artsy Filmwork: Combined With a Plot You Will Never be Allowed to Admit You Thought Was Boring as Hell
LOL! Though for The Last Samurai, my own title would have been, “See? There’s A Cherry Tree! We Got At Least ONE Thing About Japanese Culture Correct!”
//Lord of the Rings Trilogy=The Longest Movie About Hiking Ever
G-Fresh//
L-O-L! Yer killin’ me!
SE7EN/ Hey Cop, Your Wife Just Gave Me Head; HER Head
The Devil’s Advocate/ Keanu CAN Act & Lawyers Are Pure Evil
Fight Club/ Don’t Beat Yourself Up; Beat Up Someone Else
Brazil/ …?
Me, Myself & Irene/ Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue, I Have MPD, and So Do I
The Day After Tomorrow/ EARTH: The World’s Most Dangerous Planet
The Blood of Heros: Football with a dog skull.
Futuresport: Dean Cain, hot as usual.
Practical Magic: GIRL POWER!!!
Starship Troopers: Casper Van Dien takes public punishment well and still kills bugs.
For what it’s worth, on all of the re-released, updated Star Wars information, they refer to it as “A New Hope.”
Not quite as bad as “The Fool Who Follows”… but I had to make sure it got mentioned.
Yep, and I still call it “Star Wars”, too.
The Patriot – Braveheart fights a condensed American Revolutionary War
Braveheart – Lots of Scottish people kill lots of English people with little historical accuracy.
Girl, Interrupted – Selfish hippy brat goes to a looney bin and realizes the 60’s Hippy movement was ass. Whoppie Golberg goes two whole hours without a Republican/Bush “joke.”
Terminator – Ummm…. actually that one stands by itself.
American Gigilo: Hey guys, he gets paid to do it. Hey gals, you would pay him to do it.
Rocky = Rambo goes boxing
Rambo = Rocky goes military
Fahrenheit 911 – An Anti-American rant of complete fiction (including the “documentary” part) by an obese idiot with a liberal axe to grind.
Dr. Strangelove – A war-mongering Air Force General forces the Soviets to commit nuclear suicide
True Grit – Baby-sitting, one-eyed cowboy kills multiple bad guys and taunts a Texas Ranger
Guys, there’s supposed to be accurate titles, not one sentence descriptions.
Hannah Does her Sisters (X) porn
Shaving Ryan’s Privates (X) gay porn
Yo Quiero Taco Smell (X) bad porn
Brassiere To Eternity (X) old school porn
Men in Back (X) gay porn
Porn on the Fourth Of July (X)porn
Missionary Impossible (X)porn
Black C*ck Down (X)interracial porn
A Streetwalker Named Desiree (X)
Laurence of Her Labia (X)porn
Alexander (R) Still gay porn I think
Batman Begins = Batman Movies End Sucking
The Stepford Wives (new version): Men suck
Dune: Sand and Big Worms
Idiocracy: Modern America Documentary
The Magnificent Seven: Samurai With Guns
Resident Evil: Talk About Bloodsuckers
for bad titles… I still have no idea what Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is about. Its way too vague and symbolic and junk like that.
Brokeback Mountain -> Mount Manbutt
Guys, there’s supposed to be accurate titles, not one sentence descriptions.
Posted by: Frank J. on February 21, 2007 07:29 PM
SHUT UP, FRANK!! WE’RE HAVING FUN!! Gah, you’d think you ran this blog or sumthin…
Winnie the Pooh-Stuffed animals conspire to dominate the world
The Jungle Book-animals in India conspire to dominate the world
Aristocats- cats in france conspire to take old lady’s money and dominate the world
Lion King- uppty african animals conspire to dominate the world
Herbie the Lovebug- Everybody was so high in the Sixties they thought cars were alive…and conspired to dominate the world…
Damn, so late in the game. Oh well, here goes:
Sideways -> Whine Gets Bitter With Age
Always a day late and a dollar short.
Galaxy Quest- The real Star Trek
Weekend at Bernies- Don’t Tell Anyone the Boss is dead.
Sahara- Hot (men, women, action, temperature – take your pick)
Peter Pan- What Women Don’t Want
Hot Shots- The Real Charile Sheen (a docudrama)
Castaway-1hour alone with Tom Hanks
Top Gun- A Visual Representation of Tom Cruise’s Ego
The Devil Wears Prada- The Real Merrill Streep
Independence Day- The Anti- Dr. Strangelove
Back to the Future -> Parental hypocrisy feat. time travel
Back to the Future II -> Just time travel this time
Back to the Future III -> Now it’s a western! Genius!
Bicentennial Man -> Robot has man-envy, doesn’t become killer because the original story is from before the hate-all-humanity era of liberal sci-fi
The Longest Day -> Kicking Nazi ass
Die Hard -> Terrorists in the Skyscraper
Die Hard 2: Die Harder -> Terrorists in the Airport
Die Hard with a Vengeance -> Terrorists about town
Galaxy Quest -> What if Star Trek were real?
Hulk -> Monsters have feeeleeengs too!
Jurassic Park -> Dinosaurs! Versus! People!
Kill Bill vol. 1 -> Girl kicks all sorts of ass, w/stylish visuals
Knight Rider -> Teen hearttrob with a talking car
Tomb Raider -> It was actually a great game, once upon a time, but everyone stopped at looking at Lara’s ass
The Godfather -> Lots of crap happens at random, and a lot of people die
The Godfather Part II -> More crap happens at random, and a lot more people die
The Godfather Part III -> Once you forget the age difference, it’s more random crap with people dying
Misery -> Attack of the Fan
Night Watch -> Russians can botch book to film translations too!
Pearl Harbor -> Annoying Love Triangle crap that may or may not be set around Dec 1941 in Hawaii
Pulp Fiction -> Average, random mob film with screwy editing
Robocop 3 -> Gay Robocop
Rope -> 51 ways to hide an editing cut
Shadow of a Doubt -> That Perverse Little Uncle
Blegh, that’s enough.
Frank, sorry but the clear title concept is a tiny bit confusing. Posters are trying their best.
Brokeback Mountain -> Sheepherders Forsake Livestock, Abuse Each Other
Farenheit 9/11
Drunken Conspiracy Theories
An Inconvenient Truth
My Convenient Propoganda
Brokeback Mountain
Modern Cowboys
Humpback Mountin’
Life After Eastwood & Wayne
Animal Husbandry
Akira
Japamageddon
Malcolm X
Elija’s Disobedient Puppy
Casino Royale: Bond vs. the Frenchie
Talladega Nights: Race Cars on a Track
We Were Soldiers: Soldiers with Machine Guns
Brokeback Mtn.: Men on Each Other
Gone in 60 Seconds: Guys Stealing Cars
Striptease: …that one speaks for itself.
Oh, yeah…
Brokeback Mountain = Hombres on Hershey Highway
Best. Title. Evar.
Brokeback Mountain -> I Poke Ewe, You Poke Me
Fahrenheit 9/11 -> Moore Lefty Drivel
An Inconvenient Truth -> Will Somebody Please Warm Up To Me
Brokeback Mountain / Men In Crack
A Christmas Story = you WILL shoot your eye out!
Das Boot = long, hard, full of seamen.
K-19, The Widowmaker = who left the microwave on?
Eight Heads in a Duffel Bag = exactly.
Hotel Rwanda = Who says there’s no more first-class service these days?
Dante’s Peak = standard disaster film with cheesy romance and stock characters revolving around X (X = a volcano).
Twister = standard disaster film with cheesy romance and stock characters revolving around X (X = a tornado).
Volcano = standard disaster film with cheesy romance and stock characters revolving around X (X = another damned volcano).
Solaris = Even more boring than the Russian original.
Star Wars = whiny drama student gets new life as whiny starship pilot.
Empire Strikes Back = you’d treat your son that way too if he were a whiny drama student.
Return of the Jedi = drama student graduates, makes up with dad, and fights Jimmy Carter.
Big Trouble in Little China -> Big Trouble in Little China