The title came from the amount of money Edward Lewis (Richard Gere) offered prostitute Vivian Ward to spend a week with him.
When Michael Eisner originally heard the film pitch from Jeffrey Katzenberg, he was convinced it would be bomb at theaters.
Budget: $14 million
Box Office: $463.4 million
Writer Dan O’Bannon explained how he came up with the name for the hit sci-fi movie in a 2003 documentary on the film, “The Beast Within: Making Alien.”
“‘Star Beast’ is one of those titles that you think of and then … you throw them away,” said O’Bannon. “I was running through titles and they all stank. I didn’t like any of them. One morning, at three o’clock, at Ronnie’s apartment, I’m typing away writing dialogue and the characters are saying ‘the alien this’ and ‘the alien that.’ Suddenly, that word alien just came up out of the typewriter at me. I said 'Alien. It’s a noun and it’s an adjective ... Yes! That’s it, I have the title!’”
Budget: $11 million
Box Office: $104.9 million
According to “Star Wars” documentary “Empire of Dreams,” producer Howard Kazanjian recalled how George Lucas originally wanted to call the "Star Wars" sequel "Return of the Jedi"; however, he convinced him to change his mind.
“George came to me and said the title of Episode VI is ‘Return of the Jedi,’ and I said I think it’s a weak title,” said producer Howard Kazanjian. “And, he came back one or two days later and he says, ‘We’re calling it ‘Revenge of the Jedi.’”
After posters were released for the film and a theatrical teaser trailer was shown in theaters, Lucas decided to change the name weeks before the film’s release.
“Just before it got to the theaters, George came back and he said, ‘I want to go back to ‘Return of the Jedi,’" said Kazanjian. “The logic behind that was a Jedi does not take revenge.”
Disney recently re-released the original teaser trailer for the film that was seen in theaters. You can watch it here.
Budget: $32.5 million
Box Office: $475.1 million
Writer and producer Bob Gale told Empire Universal Pictures' then head Sid Sheinberg was the only person who wasn’t happy with the movie's title. According to Sheinberg, no successful movie ever had the word "future" in it. They turned to Steven Spielberg to keep the name in tact.
"Sid’s alternate title was Spaceman From Pluto, and that was because of the comic book the kid has in the barn. Every single person at Universal loved the title Back To The Future except for Sid. So we went to Steven and said, “Steven, what are we going to do? He means it. He really wants to change the title. And Steven wrote a memo back to Sheinberg saying, “Dear Sid, thanks so much for your most humorous memo. We all really got a big laugh out of it.” Steven knew that Sid was too proud to admit he’d meant it seriously. And that was the end of Spaceman From Pluto."
Budget: $19 million
Box Office: $381.1 million
Before the parody film was released in 2000, Writer Kevin Williamson immediately titled his 18-page draft for the horror film, “Scary Movie.” Years later when he finished the script, the Weinstein’s then Miramax purchased the screenplay for a reported $400,000.
According to an interview on Ain't It Cool between Bob Weinstein and Quentin Tarantino, the name was changed after his brother Harvey Weinstein watched the music video for Michael and Janet Jackson's "Scream" and he knew that was the title.
Budget: $14 million
Box Office: $173 million
According to CNN, writers wanted to call the Oscar-nominated picture “When I Grow Up.” The film originally had difficulties finding both a director and a star.
Budget: $18 million
Box Office: $151.7 million
The film's producer, Don Hahn, has previoulsy said one of Disney's most successful animated movies underwent a few name changes.
"We were thinking about the idea of how it’s a jungle out there and Simba has to exist in this jungle," Hahn said. "However, there was no jungle in our story; they’re out on a savannah. Another title we looked into was 'King of the Beasts,' which made more sense because a lion is the king of beasts—but then we threw that out because we wanted to focus on a simple story about a lion king."
Budget: $45 million
Box Office: $987.5 million
The Kevin Costner movie is an adaptation of W.P. Kinsella's "Shoeless Joe" so that seemed like the natural title for the film. However, Universal made a change to the name after previous baseball films failed to perform at theaters.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Phil Robinson tried to fight the studio in the name change, but it turned out the original title Kinsella wanted for his novel was "The Dream Field."
Budget: n/a
Box Office: $84.4 million
Disney's recent hit had a name change to reportedly to appeal more widely to boys.
"We did not want to be put in a box," Ed Catmull, president of Pixar and Disney Animation Studios, told the Los Angeles Times. "Some people might assume it's a fairy tale for girls when it's not. We make movies to be appreciated and loved by everybody."
"Tangled" directors Nathan Greno and Byron Howard later told EW the title was changed to encompass the dual team of Rapunzel and Flynn Rider in the film.
Budget: $260 million
Box Office: $591.8 million
While trying to figure out how to bring "Close Encounters" to the big screen it long went by the title "Watch the Skies" by Steven Spielberg.
Spielberg went back and forth between the names several times. In 1976, Columbia Pictures announced the name was "Watch the Skies" to avoid a possible copyright complaint from UFO researcher J. Allen Hynek over the term "close encounters." After Spielberg invited Hynek to join the film as a consultant and technical advisor and he accepted the film's name was officially made "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."
Budget: $20 million
Box Office: $303.8 million
(Source: "Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The Making of Steven Spielberg's Classic Film")
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