Interesting to note that at the Austin Film Festival last year I attended a panel of readers, contest judges, and gatekeepers, and every one of them said they couldn't care less about the title when a script comes across their desk. But as a writer I have a hard time relaxing into the story if the title is off. To me it's like a character name, it has to click and resonate with me. Thoughts? =)
Screenwriting : How Important is Your Title to You? by Terri Viani
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A good title is definitely a "plus," but not a game changer. A good title sets the table with your reader. We get our hopes up more with a good title. But we've all read a bad script with a catchy title, and vice versa, so we know the proof is in the pages.
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Plus, when you are doing an equery for your screenplay to a manager or production company or whatever, the subject line is Title-Genre... so a great title is going to get them to read the query.
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Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind, Reservoir Dogs, The Usual Suspects, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, The Godfather. The title doesn't really matter; which is why you can call it anything you want :-)
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For what it's worth, most of the pro writers I know stress over their titles. First impressions!
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I think a good title is important. I do put some effort into them. Some I am never happy with.
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I'm in Hal Croasman's ScreenwritingU ProSeries right now, and he says his interviews with industry pros have revealed that many of them say that 30 to 40 percent of their "yes" to a read is based on the title. He thinks the best titles tell the movie's whole story, but I personally think a mysterious but evocative title works, too (like ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND mentioned earlier). My thriller is called TENERIFE, which a lot of people have told me is strange and intriguing and makes them want to know more. I guess I could have called it THE SOPHOMORES AND THE SERIAL KILLERS, but I thought a bit of mystery might be good, especially since it's an offbeat script. By the end of the read, people seem to understand the title and like it a lot.
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To me a title is very important. In fact, I've written two scripts were the idea all started from a title that popped into my mind.
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@Richard... how are you liking Hal's ScreenwritingU ProSeries? I've listened to many of his freebie teleseminars and thoroughly enjoyed them.
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The title is very important and should give a clue as to the subject of the movie. I know a director who spent a year trying to get a distributer for his film with no success, he changed the title and sold it 24 hours later.... Comsider it unimportant at your peril!
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@Brian Shell... I took the ProSeries a couple of years back, and I think it was absolutely worth the time and effort. There is almost too much information to be contained in just the six months, but I still use my notes from it if I get stuck with a story. It is one of the few "writing instruction" classes I ever recommend to people.
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I echo what Jim says, Brian. It's a lot of work, but the breakthroughs are amazing. I'm saving my notes also.
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I agree that the title - like anything we write from cover to cover - is very important. To me, it should be a title that instantly makes the reader generally "see" the story in a high-level literal way (like "The Diary of a Teenage Girl") or conveys the theme or cinematic sense of your story in a more esoteric or cerebral way (like "Smilla's Sense of Snow.") I use those two movies as examples because those are the last two movies I've seen. This week I'm going gory when I have the time - "The Devil's Rejects" and "Sinister 2". Both of those titles aren't so literal, since they could mean a lot of different things, and convey the theme in a more cerebral way - but I still "get" the gist of what they are going to be about. Well...what they are probably going to be about, at least.
Absolutely Bill. It should set the tone. Like the "House on the Left" you know it's NOT a comedy...
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H All! I can't say for script submissions but I can say there have been movies I have skipped and books I have avoided because I was turned off by the title even though they had excellent reviews. I feel a title can make a difference in either direction.
Title is very, very important I believe. We're prejudiced to it. It's like when I'm flicking through my movies TV guide to select what to watch and record the title will give me an immediate impression of what genre it is. Based upon that I'll choose if I want to click a button to read a quick synopsis of it or not. Hence the decision to make the decision is made in a heartbeat based upon the title.