8. Star Wars
George Lucas took a lot of inspiration from the Flash Gordon serials of the thirties when writing Star Wars the opening crawl, the beginning being the end of another story and particularly liked the idea of his film being the fourth part of this bigger story. However it didnt work well from a marketing standpoint and the movie kept its short name. When it came time for a sequel and subsequent re-release of the original in 1980, Lucas decided to go back to the idea hed had earlier, calling the second film the fifth part and re-editing the opening crawl of Star Wars to now call it Episode 4: A New Hope. In retrospect, the name change makes sense, but from a film purist point of view, it marks the first moment when Lucas thought it was perfectly OK to mess with his already perfect films; something that would go on to define his career.