What’s in a Name? Inside the Art and Science of Crafting the Perfect Movie Title
In 2021, Paramount was testing a new movie called “Something’s Wrong With Rose” — a supernatural horror film about a therapist named Rose who loses touch with reality after witnessing a patient’s bizarre suicide.
Audiences at the research screening were responding enthusiastically to the scary movie, but studio executives noticed that they were stumbling over its name.
“Walking out of the theater, we were like, ‘We need a simpler title,’” remembers Marc Weinstock, Paramount’s president of global marketing and distribution.
One component in the story — the bone-chilling grins that slowly creep over the faces of victims — distinguished this horror film from others, and Paramount knew those scenes would frighten crowds in a big way. So they landed on “Smile,” a common word that took on a new, more sinister meaning after the studio’s inescapable, smirk-centric marketing campaign. The movie became a huge hit, to the tune of more than $200 million worldwide.
The process of naming films is rarely a straightforward assignment. And with the glut of entertainment options vying for viewers’ attention, there’s heightened pressure to come up with something that sticks.
