Movie Titles: The Good, The Bad, and The Greatest Story Ever Told

[LastMinit]

Only When I Larf (with what has to be the worst title I’ve ever heard)

Nothing beats 'The Greatest Story Ever Told'.

[Lowry_Sam]

Only When I Larf (with what has to be the worst title I’ve ever heard)

Nothing beats 'The Greatest Story Ever Told'.

Have y'all forgotten The Hottie And The Nottie?

Addendum:
I just went to verify the title on IMDb and the correct spelling is actually

The Hottie & the Nottie

[Grand Wazoo]

Only When I Larf (with what has to be the worst title I’ve ever heard)

Nothing beats 'The Greatest Story Ever Told'.

Have y'all forgotten The Hottie And The Nottie?

Multiple Sarcasms gets my vote

[JSC]

domino harvey wrote: Tue Jul 28, 2026 7:55 pm
Only When I Larf (with what has to be the worst title I’ve ever heard)

Nothing beats 'The Greatest Story Ever Told'.

Have y'all forgotten The Hottie And The Nottie?

Multiple Sarcasms gets my vote

Don't forget Hell Comes to Frogtown and The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies.

[Cash Flagg]

The latter is a fantastic title, and I gave one of my best performances in it.

[MichaelB]

Only When I Larf (with what has to be the worst title I’ve ever heard)

Nothing beats 'The Greatest Story Ever Told'.

Have y'all forgotten The Hottie & the Nottie

I have absolutely no desire to ever sit through a film called Oy Vey! My Son is Gay!!, but I'm delighted that such a thing apparently exists.

[domino harvey]

Was not expecting that to be a movie where I know two of the first three credited actors on the IMDB page! (Or !!! to keep the pattern going)

[Lowry_Sam]

I have absolutely no desire to ever sit through a film called Oy Vey! My Son is Gay!!,

But I think the title tells you everything you need to know about the film & therefore is an objectively good title for it. Torch Song Trilogy on the other hand, tells you nothing about the film (and is not a trilogy), despite being a better film. Perhaps if Torch Song Trilogy had been called Oy Vey! My Son is Gay!! it would at least be remembered today (and the play staged more often) & since it's a better film people wouldn't mind the gimmicky title as much.

When I first heard the title The Hottie & the Nottie mentioned, it conjured up a cheeky soap opera ala The Bold And The Beautiful or The Young And The Restless: The Haughty and the Naughty. But when I saw it written, I realized it was a lame attempt to capitalize on the name of a crass but well-known website (Hot or Not) whose popularity had already waned by the time of the movie's release...and has anyone ever used the word "nottie" outside of this movie? hence the cringeworthiness of the title.

[Do we have a film title thread yet? Teenage Miasma and Sex at Death Camp opens later this month. ]

[PfR73]

I'm not sure if you're intentionally getting the title wrong to make a point, but the title is actually "Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma".

[BoltzmannBrain]

I have absolutely no desire to ever sit through a film called Oy Vey! My Son is Gay!!,

But I think the title tells you everything you need to know about the film & therefore is an objectively good title for it. Torch Song Trilogy on the other hand, tells you nothing about the film (and is not a trilogy), despite being a better film. Perhaps if Torch Song Trilogy had been called Oy Vey! My Son is Gay!! it would at least be remembered today (and the play staged more often) & since it's a better film people wouldn't mind the gimmicky title as much.

When I first heard the title The Hottie & the Nottie mentioned, it conjured up a cheeky soap opera ala The Bold And The Beautiful or The Young And The Restless: The Haughty and the Naughty. But when I saw it written, I realized it was a lame attempt to capitalize on the name of a crass but well-known website (Hot or Not) whose popularity had already waned by the time of the movie's release...and has anyone ever used the word "nottie" outside of this movie? hence the cringeworthiness of the title.

[Do we have a film title thread yet? Teenage Miasma and Sex at Death Camp opens later this month. ]

I dislike short, extremely basic and bland movie titles like Father, or Mother, or Boy, House, Air, Life, Moon, Water, It, Good, Old, Michael, Patrick, The Woman, The Hand, The Accountant, The Room, The Monster, The Car, The Box, The Paper, The Road, etc. They feel like placeholder titles that were meant to exist only until the filmmakers could come up with something better, but because nobody had any good ideas the placeholder title stayed as the final title. They tell of a severe lack of imagination and make me think that the film's screenplay is probably equally empty and uninspired.

[denti alligator]

I dislike short, extremely basic and bland movie titles like Father, or Mother, or Boy, House, Air, Life, Moon, Water, It, Good, Old, Michael, Patrick, The Woman, The Hand, The Accountant, The Room, The Monster, The Car, The Box, The Paper, The Road, etc. They feel like placeholder titles that were meant to exist only until the filmmakers could come up with something better, but because nobody had any good ideas the placeholder title stayed as the final title. They tell of a severe lack of imagination and make me think that the film's screenplay is probably equally empty and uninspired.

Of course you would be missing out on many masterpieces if you really held to this prejudice.

[BoltzmannBrain]

I dislike short, extremely basic and bland movie titles like Father, or Mother, or Boy, House, Air, Life, Moon, Water, It, Good, Old, Michael, Patrick, The Woman, The Hand, The Accountant, The Room, The Monster, The Car, The Box, The Paper, The Road, etc. They feel like placeholder titles that were meant to exist only until the filmmakers could come up with something better, but because nobody had any good ideas the placeholder title stayed as the final title. They tell of a severe lack of imagination and make me think that the film's screenplay is probably equally empty and uninspired.

Of course you would be missing out on many masterpieces if you really held to this prejudice.

There are some classic movies that have very simple titles and I can watch them even if the title is not good. Everyone must agree that The Thing is objectively a terrible name for a movie, but also everyone is so used to that title by now that you couldn't imagine it being called anything else. But whenever they roll out a new movie that is called Family or Eddie or The Square or whatever, I can't help thinking "you really couldn't think of anything better than THAT?"

[Lowry_Sam]

Everyone must agree that The Thing is objectively a terrible name for a movie, but also everyone is so used to that title by now that you couldn't imagine it being called anything else.

It is an abbreviation though from the original, The Thing from Another World which worked for the 50s, but had developed a cheesy 50s aura which had a resurgance in popularity in the 80s and so it would have been misguided to use the full original title as the director was definitely going for straightforward horror/sci-fi and not camp. So it does convey that it's a remake that is serious about its subject, though "Thing" is also a character in a popular horror comedy tv series so probably could have been bettered but is not the worst possible option. For me the worst titles are ones where it's clear that someone is using something gimmicky to attract attention but then does so in a way that makes it obvious the film is just plain bad.

The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!? is often cited as one because of its length, but I would say it does a pretty good job of creating interest where there would have been none and conveys just what kind of movie it is (not serious).

Then there's also titles that just don't convey what the film is about and don't spark interest: The Constant Gardener. How many people are going to go to a movie to watch somebody gardening for 2 hours?

Titanic tells you exactly what you need to know and spurs interest.

[domino harvey]

Now that this is a thread split, I don’t see the problem with the Greatest Story Ever Told - it’s a compelling title, much more so than the film it adorns!

Along this new broad category of titles though, how about those rare beasts: non-literal English titles of foreign films with titles that improve on the original? The ultimate example of this must be Resnais’ rather generic Coeurs (“Hearts”) becoming the infinitely more evocative Private Fears in Public Places

[Never Cursed]

One maladroit title that sometimes comes to mind was for Silver Linings Playbook, which in France became "Happiness Therapy"

Best and Worst Film Titles of 2026:

Best:
Behemoth! (in context)
The Dreamed Adventure
I Deserve a Lover Whose Every Rise Sets Fiery Dooms Raging Across the Skies
The Illusion of an Everlasting Summer
Nirvanna The Band The Show The Movie (if it counts)
Nowhere To Lay My Eyes
Soudain

Worst:
Behemoth! (out of context)
Godzilla Minus Zero
Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!
I Play Rocky
The Odyssey
Teenage Sex And Death At Camp Miasma
Tony

Biggest Downgrade:
The Debut (previously known as "No One Cares")

(suggestions welcome)

[Lowry_Sam]

non-literal English titles of foreign films with titles that improve on the original?

How about Lina Wertmüller's Guinness Book Of World Record Holder for longest title:

Un fatto di sangue nel comune di Siculiana fra due uomini per causa di una vedova. Si sospettano moventi politici. Amore-Morte-Shimmy. Lugano belle. Tarantelle. Tarallucci e vino.

translated to:

Blood Feud

wins on both fronts (bad original & good replacement)

[swo17]

Fontane – Effi Briest oder: Viele, die eine Ahnung habenvon ihren Möglichkeiten und Bedürfnissen und dennochdas herrschende System in ihrem Kopf akzeptieren durchihre Taten und es somit festigen und durchaus bestätigen [Many People Who Are Aware of Their Own Capabilities and Needs, Yet Acquiesce to the Prevailing System in Their Thoughts and Deeds, Thereby Confirming and Reinforcing It] (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1974)

Gertrude Stein hätte Chaplin gerne in einem Film gesehen, in dem dieser nichts anderes zu tun hätte, als eine Straße entlang und dann um eine Ecke zu gehen, darauf die nächste Ecke zu umwandern und so weiter von Ecke zu Ecke [Gertrude Stein Would Have Liked to Have Seen Chaplin in a Film in Which He Had Nothing to Do But to Walk Down a Street, Go Around a Corner, and Then Around the Next Corner, and So On, from Corner to Corner] (Ernst Schmidt Jr., 1979)

On the Marriage Broker Joke as Cited by Owen Land in the Film 'On the Marriage Broker Joke as Cited by Sigmund Freud in Wit and Its Relation to the Unconscious, or Can the Avant-Garde Artist Be Wholed?' (Florina Titz, 2009)

[Lowry_Sam]

Not sure how Wertmüller wins the Guinness record when Fassbinder's (1974) clearly has more characters (212 vs 179) or words (33 vs 32) than Wertmüller's (1978). Gertrude Stein is a short.

[domino harvey]

Perhaps the Fassbinder doesn’t count because it’s two titles and the second is shorter word-wise than Wertmuller’s?

[Lowry_Sam]

The Guinness entry says it's measured by the number of characters including punctuation, but it still doesn't work, at the same time I can't help but think that Wertmüller had Fassbinder's title in mind & was intentionally trying to outdo it.

[domino harvey]

Perhaps they don’t consider secondary titles as counting towards the total? Is that title on the title card in the film?

[McCrutchy]

Anthony Newley's Can Heironymus Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe and Find True Happiness? (1969), could actually be simultaneously good, bad and the "greatest" title ever, depending on how you define the last. As far as I can tell, it has never legally been on video.

[domino harvey]

Which puts me in kind of another intentionally wordy and obtuse question title

[CSM126]

This one’s a contender for both bad title and truly terrible poster art (cuz why not go big):