Worst movie title ever

How about I (symbol for a heart)Huckabees.
Do you say 'I heart huckabees' or I love huckaabees'?

I have never said either as I never went to see it.

By using the title "Booty Call" I think you eliminate a large portion of the movie going population.

One of the worst movie titles has to be Ballistic: Ecks v. Sever. Are we supposed to know who Ecks and Sever are? Are we supposed to care? And what exactly is so "ballistic" about their rivalry? That it was also (according to just about everyone) a terrible movie shouldn't detract from the terribleness of the title.

Along the lines of SSSSSSS and Phfffft! mentioned in the article would be Zotz!, which actually is a fairly enjoyable movie but a pretty bad title.

Along the lines of Phfffft! and Zotz!, I'd include any movie title that has an exclamation point in it, like Them! (oh no! giant ants!). Among the worst would have to be The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?. Not only does it have two exclamation points (are we supposed to be SHOUTING THE TITLE OF THE FILM!!) but it also has an entirely superfluous (and confusing) question mark.

bm ;-)

That title really pissed me off. It made me ask myself all those questions, and then I had inadvertently wasted some of my brain cells on asking myself questions about such a crappy looking movie. I felt duped into thinking about it.

There's so many, Joe, and it makes me think it's about time for a mangled title thread:

"Howard the Duck's End"

I'll have to take some time to think of some of my "favorite" bad movie titles but I think many of them will be those usually silly tacked on titles for sequels following the colon (how appropriate).

"Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan"

A new kind of Monopoly game or Jason has changed drinks?

freebie and the bean

I watched Pirates of the......, enjoyed it

Then I heard about Pirates....Curse of the......

I thought there was a 2nd movie out.

So many movie titles sound the same to me, I can't even keep them apart. Especially all the BlowUp movies my husband like to watch.

it's like there's Rage War, War of Rage, The Plan, Plan for Release, Release from Battle, Battle Scars, Battle of Men, Men Who Blow Stuff Up.
All I know is they are all very loud.

I can't even think of a name of a movie currently out. Like that one about something in the cupboard or closet, I just keep thinking it's called Ninja, but I know that can't be right.

Oh and what, are there like 14 Harry Potter movies out? Don't get me started.

one of the worst movies ever made....

but the worst title

The Quinney's Vacation At Disneyworld....

The Shawshank Redemption

Even after all of the Oscar nominations and wins, I had no desire to watch it just because of the boring sounding title. I think a family member rented the movie, and I had nothing better to do, so I watched it. I was absoutely astounded. I couldn't believe that such a terrific movie was shanked by such an inept title.

It's probably better than the title of the original Stephen King story: "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption." If that had been the movie's title, I'm sure a lot of people would have been asking "does Rita Hayworth star in it?"


Although nominated for seven Academy Awards, Shawshank failed to win a single one.

great flick though.

Good One!

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080391/

Looking at the writeup on IMDB, I realized that I did not recognize ANY of the names of the cast of the original 1978 picture. I think that says something about the movie!

"Attack of the Killer Tomatoes" was, of course, a lampoon of sci-fi monster flicks. It just wasn't as funny as "Piranha" or "Alligator!"

I'm not sure if this fits as a bad movie title, but it's a good story (even if apocryphal) about a movie title. The movie that was released in the UK as The Madness of George III was retitled The Madness of King George in the US because the producers were afraid that American moviegoers would think they were seeing a sequel.

"Bring Me The Head Of Dobie Gillis"

A follow-up to the original article:

Titles so terrible that 'Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes' didn't even make the final cut (registration required)

You never realize just how many movies have awful titles until your mailbox and message boards fill up with hundreds of them.

I asked for The Worst Movie Title Ever, and you answered. And answered. And answered.

Some are poorly named good movies ("The Hudsucker Proxy"). Some are aptly named bad movies ("Gigli").

Some are hits ("Romancing the Stone"). Some are flops ("Freddy Got Fingered").

Some had huge budgets ("Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace"). Some had tiny budgets ("Smiling Fish and Goat on Fire").

Some are serious ("Dying Young"). Some are silly ("Rat Pfink a Boo Boo").

Some are old ("I Dood It," from 1943). Some are new (the as-yet-to-be-released "Failure To Launch").

Some are so awful that they made the cut as nominees for The Worst Movie Title Ever. Keep reading, and you can vote for the stinkiest of the stinky.

But first, let's examine some of the patterns:

Really long titles tend to draw ire. Hence you singled out, among others, "Who Is Harry Kellerman And Why Is He Saying Those Terrible Things About Me?" (1971 Dustin Hoffman movie), "Sheila Levine Is Dead and Living in New York" (1975 neurotic comedy), "The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain" (whimsical 1995 Hugh Grant comedy) and the truly stunning "Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Momma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feeling So Sad" (1967 Broadway comedy adaptation starring Rosalind Russell).

Also inspiring hostility were titles that, through quirks of typography or phonetics, are tough to say or write. This category would include "$" (1971 Warren Beatty caper film), "Pi" (as represented by the mathematical symbol in this 1998 film), "ffolkes" (1980 Roger Moore movie), "SSSSSSS" (1973 snakes horror film), "Gas-s-s" (1971 Roger Corman film) and the numerically challenged "Se7en" (1995) and "Thir13en Ghosts" (2001).

Several readers ripped movies named after songs ("Just Like Heaven," "Pretty Woman," etc.), titles that are redundant (" `Manos' the Hands of Fate' ?- "Manos" meaning "hands"), those that are factually inaccurate ("Krakatoa, East of Java," when Krakatoa is west of Java) and others that feel compelled to announce that they are, in fact, movies ("Star Trek: The Motion Picture," "Santa Claus: The Movie").

There were so many impressive nominees that before we get to the 10 finalists, let's check out an honor roll of runners-up:

"Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo" (1984). Breakdancing sequel as silly as its title.

"Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia" (1974). Appetizingly titled 1974 Sam Peckinpah film.

"Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" (1968). Dick Van Dyke musical that inspired bad memories among readers.

"The Constant Gardener" (2005). John le Carre adaptation that confused moviegoers not familiar with the book.

"Don't Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood" (1996). Wayans brothers spoofy title that, um, wasn't funny.

"Gigli" (2003). Bennifer career-killer with obscurely pronounced title.

"Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life" (2003). Multi-titled sequel flop.

"Leonard Part 6" (1987). Bill Cosby non-sequel dud.

"Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx" (1970). Gene Wilder comedy that sounds like an AFLAC ad.

"Surf Nazis Must Die" (1987). Horror comedy that a bunch of you found appalling.

And now...the finalists for The Worst Movie Title Ever:

"Ballistic: Ecks Vs. Sever" (2002). This Antonio Banderas-Lucy Liu action dud drew many votes for its impenetrable, sounds-like-a-crummy-tennis-match name.

"Can Hieronymus Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe and Find True Happiness?" (1969). Anthony Newley directed, co-wrote and starred in this comedy that's been forgotten except for its mind-boggling title.

"C.H.U.D." (1984). Stands for "Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers," remember? "C.H.U.D. sounds like something you pull out of your drain when it gets clogged up," wrote Jeff Nyman.

"I (Heart) Huckabees" (2004). David O. Russell's existential comedy inspired much invective from readers who don't appreciate the heart symbol in the title. "If you can't speak or write a title with assurance that you have done so correctly, it's a bad one." ?- Jim Peters, Bolingbrook.

"The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?" (1964). It's not like this horror-comedy's makers could have thought this title was snappy, but could it be any more horrific? The punctuation alone makes your head spin.

"Mother, May I Sleep With Danger?" (1996). The multi-nominated title may be even cheesier than the content of this TV movie starring Tori Spelling as a young woman with a bad-news boyfriend.

"The Shawshank Redemption" (1994). Several of you said you might've discovered this acclaimed prison-break drama in the theaters instead of home video if not for the turn-off moniker. "As wonderful a movie as it is, `The Shawshank Redemption' is a horrifically bad title," wrote Jonathan S. Quinn of Chicago.

"Snakes on a Plane" (2006). There was much debate over this upcoming Samuel L. Jackson thriller that's about…guess what? While several readers trashed it, a few defended it on truth-in-advertising grounds. ".`What's the movie about?' `Snakes on a Plane. DUH!'." wrote Dave at Garfield Ridge.

"Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot" (1992). Would people hate the title so much if this Sylvester Stallone comedy weren't such a turkey? We'll never know.

"To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar" (1995). Not only did the stunningly awkward title of this cross-dressing comedy receive the most nominations, but several readers couldn't even get it right as they nominated it ("To Wong Fo"? "Fu Manch"?). "Definitely the most annoying movie title of all time," wrote Nate Soesbe of Naperville.