How to Write a Thriller Movie Title

I've been digging into Netflix's thriller archives lately, and I've almost caught myself renting the same movie twice because the names are all so similar.

Which got me thinking, there's a formula to choosing an appropriate title for a thriller movie. Here's my idea:


Choose any single noun but make sure it's vague. These words seem to fall into a few categories...

Architectural. Choose a location that's in the house, a part of the house, an item in the house, or the house itself. But make sure it's only one word.  (You can use "the" if you absolutely must.) Have fun with it! Here are some off the top of my head:

• The Corner
• Gutter
• The Eaves
• Playroom
• Hamper
• Cupboard
• Icebox

Notice how menacing simple things like a playroom or hamper can be when it's only one chilling word? It makes you think:

• What happened in the playroom that whispers of secrets and creepy toys that aren't even Tickle-Me Elmo? 
• Does the stench of death surrounding the hamper include more than just your husband's balled up socks from his IM baseball team?

Now try it with multiple words in the same genre, and you'll find you give away too much. You want to leave something to the imagination. So you can't do things like:

• Time-Out Chair
• Lumpy Sofa
• Streaky Windows
• Gunky Fridge
• Attic of Too Many House Centipedes.

Actually, I take that back. Attic of Too Many House Centipedes is friggin' scary. Have you seen those things? They're like two-inch long Amtrak trains on a roundtrip schedule to scare the crap out of you. They keep cornering me in my bathroom.

In fact, now I think about it, I can't believe no one's used house centipedes as the main feature in a major horror flick. Freddy and Jason versus Centipedo. I wouldn't sleep for days. 


Neither would Freddie. (He can dish it out, but he can't take it.)

But I digress. Aside from selecting a one-word, centipede-free architectural element, you also can go with a -tion word. Try words like:

• Distraction
• Potion
• Elevation
• Intention
• Dentition

(Come on, dentition can be scary! Would Steve Buscemi be the same after braces? Do you not feel a chill run down your spine when Gary Busey smiles?) 

You can also choose a title that's directional:

• Fallen
• Risen
• The Plummet
• Reverse
• Mirror
• Above
• Follow
• After
• Skid
• Fishtail

And you seem to be allowed to break the one-word rule as long as you include time and/or a number:

• Two Minutes to Die
• Five Days and Three Hours
• 40 Miles Per Hour
• Six Feet
• 27 Toes

(Well, okay, 27 Toes might have to be about a girl in a '30s carnival freak show, but I still think it could work.)

So, tell me, using the system above, what's your new thriller movie title? Just whatever comes to mind, please. :)

I Will Not Write About Charlie Sheen

It's a humor blogger's dream. And it's got everything...

Madness!

Megalomania!

Magic!

And Men (2.5, to be specific).

But today I will not write about the very public mental implosion of Charlie Sheen-- thespian, comedian and, um, vengeance-filled warlock.

See, that would be just so easy. And here at Of Cabbages and Kings, the Cabbage likes to take the road less traveled.

(I mean, it kinda has to take the road less traveled. It's a leaf vegetable. It has no legs. And rolling in the center of a busy highway is just asking for trouble.)

So today I will not talk about Charlie Sheen.

I will not make jokes about how "Two and a Half Men" wasn't meant to refer to the total number of people starring in the sitcom...

It's the number of distinct personalities in Charlie Sheen's head. (I think of it like the Three Faces of Eve" but downsized.)

I will not make cracks about how if Mr. Sheen does, indeed, have "tiger blood" as he states then perhaps he's right-- he doesn't need AA...

Just a good vet.

I will not suggest that because of his "Adonis DNA," this living god simply cannot OD or die of liver cancer or venereal disease, as so many of us have predicted.

Charlie is immortal. So long as he gets a restraining order on all wild boars, and doesn't piss off Artemis, he's golden.

Because I won't write about Charlie Sheen, I will not point out that if Charlie Sheen has "always had a plan and have always executed it perfectly" as he suggests, then how does he account for this choice of haircut?

Or The Three Musketeers?

I will not say any of these things. Because my non-rockstar-warlock mind simply cannot process the wonder properly.

Plus, I can't afford a curse on the blog. I have to think of you, the safety of my nice readers, first.

This is what you get when you feed a stranger in the Alps, Larry!

Jim Croce had it right:

You don't pull on Superman's cape. 

You don't spit into the wind. 

You don't pull off the mask of the 'ol Lone Ranger.

And you never completely recraft well-known, if expletive-filled, lines of the Coen Brothers' dialogue from The Big Lebowski in an effort to make it family friendly.

(I could be paraphrasing Mr. Croce ever-so-slightly.)

I mean, I do understand the desire for networks to clean up movies, so they don't bruise the tender ears of kids who would otherwise have to learn these words through texting. 

But what I witnessed on cable TV over my cup of java this morning was not a simple vanilla substitution of "frig" or "shoot" or "heck." This was dubbing John Goodman's famously repetitious, manic and tire-iron wielding rant against car-stealing juvenile offender Larry Sellers into:

"Do you see what happens when you feed a stranger in the Alps, Larry? This is what you get when you feed a stranger in the Alps, Larry! This is what you get when you feed a stranger in the Alps!"

Feed? A. Stranger? In. The. Alps?

Really, Censor People? REALLY?! 

(Note, the video below titles it "fight" a stranger in the Alps, but listen carefully. Goodman's character Walter goes on to mention something incoherent about feeding scrambled eggs...)

Just where do you even start, as an overdub script writer, to swap in "feed a stranger in the Alps" as a viable threat, and believe no one will notice?

We so rarely hear about guys going to prison and being worried that an angry cellmate named Snake will want to transport them to a European mountain region otherwise known for skiing and chocolate manufacture, to share unspecified sustenance.

So unless I am mistaken due to my own admitted lack o' cool, "feed a stranger in the Alps" has not yet become one of the Hip and Now phrases in today's American lexicon. 

It tends to stand out, is what I'm saying.

Changing major, well-known lines of a script to something involving dining, Switzerland and what later seems to include egg proteins, is a little like selling a powerful SUV in a car commercial... but instead featuring a dairy cow in all the high performance driving shots.

("She's got four-wheel drive, traction control and anti-lock brakes. Plus, the mileage is amazing. Just two bales to the gallon.")

It removes a certain layer of sophistication and authorial intent, is my point.

So what I think happened is they hired the MadLibs School of Family Friendly Film Dubbery to scrub the Lebowski TV version. The goal of this organization would be to plop in the first random word of the same number of syllables from the dictionary, and hope the American Public won't suspect anything.

And I imagine that while it started with Lebowski's "feeding a stranger in the Alps," it then moved on some other film classics.

"Frankly, Scarlett, I don't give a dab!

And:

"We came, we saw, we kicked its ark!"

I notice tomorrow Die Hard is on. Since I don't have it on DVD, it'll be nice to see it on broadcast television again. And to be truly in theme, I shall leave you today with these few noble, parting words:

"Yippie-kai-yay, mocha flavor!"

Ah, yes... Bruce Willis couldn't have said it any better himself!

The Totally Non-Holiday Holiday Movie List

Somehow it became November, and the winter holiday season is creeping upon us. 

Which got me thinking about the rather strange array of movies I trot out during the next eight weeks in an attempt to be festive... while simultaneously not feeling the urge to drive an icepick through my ears because I'm hearing "White Christmas" for the 400th time in a day.

So for all of you folks who reach a point where if you hear about how "every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings" one more time, you're going to go on an eggnog-fueled rampage, this list just might be for you.

Thanksgiving

• Addams Family Values. Ah, nothing like the combination of dry Gothic wit and blue blood summer camp, culminating in a completely off-season Thanksgiving holiday pageant to say, "Pass the turkey... But please use the medieval catapult."
  

Christmas

• Die Hard. Terrorists. Walking through glass in bare feet. Being held hostage. Lengthy delays in airports... Sounds like a family holiday to me! Plus, it's chock full of Christmas music, peace on Earth, and goodwill toward men. Okay, so that's near the closing credits. But, still.

• The Ref. This is the Christmas movie you watch to feel really good about any of the petty conflicts, inconveniences and irritations you might encounter during your own holiday season. Or, perhaps, you'll be wishing Denis Leary will come and hold your own squabbling relatives hostage for holiday dinner-- y'know, just to liven things up a bit in a new, fresh and festive way.

• Ghostbusters II. The ultimate in Christmas feel-goodness as found in mood slime and Jackie Wilson piping "Your Love Keeps Lifting Me Higher" through the movin' groovin' "Harbor Chick," Lady Liberty. If you can make New Yorkers happy during rush hour with monumental traffic jams (literally, in this case), you've truly channeled some holiday spirits. Believe me, I know. I'm originally from New Jersey. I've seen the malls.

• Funny Farm. Watch Chevy Chase try to create the picture-perfect Norman Rockwell Christmas without Randy Quaid in a powder blue leisure suit and dickey. Challenge guests who've had an excess of mulled cider with rum to compete and see who can laugh most like the insane Redbud mailman.

• The Hogfather. Okay, so this really is a Christmas movie... If, y'know, you lived in an alternate universe where Santa was actually an anthropomorphic pig deity. And a wild-boar entourage pulled his sleigh. And where Death was basically a good guy but a little bit misunderstood. And he had a granddaughter who was a part-time nanny, part-time witch. But otherwise, totally Christmassy.

• Death Race. Jason Straitham demonstrates that Christmas is more than a season-- it's inexpensive background set decor while you eradicate the baddies. (Thanks to my friend Dave for this suggestion.)

So, folks-- any other films you'd like to add to this list? At Of Cabbages and Kings we always are glad for suggestions!