There’s a lot in a movie title; producers and executives bank a lot of money on the few words that appear on a poster or trailer, and in effect they can contribute to making or breaking a film. If your title sounds cheesy and lame, it can deter audiences away from even an effective trailer that came before it, and similarly if it sounds too obscure, audiences just might not bite.
We’re not exactly short of terrible movie titles in mainstream cinema; I always had a soft spot for the convoluted Love Actually, but my research confirmed my worst fears, that in the grand scheme of things, the title of Richard Curtis’ cloying rom-com really wasn’t that bad at all.
I also considered including the overly wordy, even pompous Quantum of Solace, yet again, it just didn’t measure up on the level of awfulness in the end. Either through laziness or sheer misguided idiocy, these ludicrous and poorly thought-out titles ended up splashing themselves across posters and trailers for us to openly ridicule.
Here are the 10 worst movie titles of all time…
10. The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?
An incredulous and transfixing movie title for several reasons, The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies (with the additional “!!?” included in some versions) wants to ensure we don’t get missold on what the movie is, so it explains the focus in bizarrely intricate detail. It could’ve just been the creatures who stopped living, but no, they’re incredibly strange too, presumably thinking that these words are somehow going to put more butts in seats.
So, they stopped living and didn’t just become zombies but…mixed-up zombies? What exactly is a “mixed-up zombie”? Do they mean messed up? And aren’t all zombies pretty mixed/messed-up? Is this an attempt to distinguish the flick from a typical zombie film? And they actually thought it would succeed? If anyone has a clue, please do let me know.
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12 Comments
Daniel Craig has a film called “Flashbacks of a Fool”, which is about the life of a guy being told by his flashbacks. One of the worst title I’ve ever seen.
I’d go for ‘Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood’!
Fun list but i will have no ill words spoken of The Chipmunks. Be warned young sir, Alvin Simon and Theadore are above reproach and super awesome in every way and i would beseech you to pay homage. :)
Although not as bad as the titles mentioned on this list, the Die Hard sequels always had titles that made me cringe with absolute embarrassment. Live Free or Die Hard, A Good Day to Die Hard, Die Hard 2: Die Harder.
2 Fast 2 Furious
Freddy got Fingered may have a stupid name which holds no relevance to the films actual plot but it is BEYOND HILARIOUS and you have no taste in identifying good comedies X )
For a second, I thought number 10 was a Japanese film, because a lot of their new fiction has those kinds of titles.
But for general bad film titles, anything that replaces letters with numbers is particularly insipid.
Where is OCTOPUSSY???
Absolutely. I love Bond but do not want to see this film because of the title!
Spanking the Monkey (decent movie, mis-leading title)
Attack of the Clones (not a great movie, horrible title)
The Horror Show (good movie, bad title)
Dumb and Dumberer (why was this thing ever made???)
Agree with all of these but having just seen JOHN CARTER I’d have to say that a title about Mars, War, Space, Aliens etc. with no mention of Mars, Space, Aliens or War was a poor marketing choice.
Here’s a pretty decent space blockbuster laboured with what sounds like a true movie of the week title on the billboards. I realise it’s the lead character’s name but come on!
STAR WARS makes you want to see the film!
PREDATOR makes you want to see the film!
JAWS makes you want to see the film!
JOHN CARTER doesn’t make me want to see this film. Why they removed the “of Mars” bit I don’t know.
Movie 43.Enough said.