Terrific titles tarnished by everything afterwards

Our writers look at some of their favourite titles that are unfortunately coupled with not so great films

Elizabeth Meade
25th November 2021
Image Credit: IMDB
First impressions matter, and with films that couldn't be more true. It's important to have a good title to draw people in; something boring or unremarkable is sure to garner no attention. But on occasion, some films are able to come up with excellent titles, and then forget to make the rest of the film actually good...
Shark Tale

I thought the name Shark Tale was a great film title as a kid. It sounded like it was going to be something like one of the many other ocean movies I liked as a four-year-old.

Shark Tale? More like Shark Fail. Credit: IMDb

Unfortunately, I got bored and told my dad I wanted to leave the cinema. While I still don't regret walking out of the film seventeen years later, I imagine I might like it a bit more now that I'm old enough to get the jokes. That said, it never gained the status of classic family films like Shrek or High School Musical, so I don't think I'm missing much. After all, if kids don't actually get your film's jokes, it's hard to connect with your young audience. I found that similar films like The Reef (2006) had more entertainment value, even when they weren't that much better.

Elizabeth Meade

Video Credit: Movieclips Classic Trailers
365 Days

I went into watching 365 Days (2020) completely blind, and I exited wishing I was completely blind.

No words can caption this trauma, Credit: IMDb

Asked by a bunch of friends to watch it with them, I was excited and intrigued by all the "recommendations" but most of all by the title. What could be happening in those 365 days? Could it be a siege, a deadline or a threat of death? My mind was racing as to what this timeline title could mean and when I eventually sat down to watch I didn't know what to expect.

I should have expected the worst. Turns out that those titular 365 days was the amount of time a mafia member holds a woman hostage in an attempt to get her to fall in love with him. This film upsets me down to my very core and being asked to watch it has added permanent strain on some of my friendships.

Also, I believe that given this film's February 2020 release, the national lockdown for the UK starting in March of the same year is no coincidence...

George Bell

Video Credit: Movie Guide
AUTHOR: Elizabeth Meade
(she/her) 4th year Chem student. Former Head of Current Affairs and Former Science Sub-Editor. Avid reader. Chaos theorist. Amateur batrachologist and historian. Rock fan. Likes cybersecurity and cooking. Wrote the first article for Puzzles. Probably the first Courier writer to have work featured in one of Justin Whang's videos.

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