KnowledgeHive

There seem to be several strategies when translating the name of a film into another language, and none of them work perfectly. You can go for a literal word-for-word translation, try to describe the film in the title, guess what the name might be based on the poster, or make up something completely new. Here, we explore a number of American movie titles in other languages.

To start, we’ll test you to see if you can guess the original movie title based on the movie posters we’ve mocked up. Then, we look at a few particularly fascinating title-changes, and try to group them into categories.

Can You Guess The Original Titles Of These Films?

Israeli (Hebrew) Title: אהבה בשחקים

Brazilian (Portuguese) Title: Onze Homens e Um Segredo

Japanese Title: マルコヴィッチの穴

Romanian Title: Închisoarea Îngerilor

Danish Title: Drengen, der druknede i chokoladesovsen

German Title: Ich glaub’, mich tritt ein Pferd

Other Classic Movie Titles In Other Languages

More famous examples of bad translations include the Japanese title of Army of Darkness (1993), Captain Supermarket (キャプテン·スーパーマーケット), and the unfortunate coincidence that the Chinese title of As Good As It Gets (1997) could also be translated as Mr. Cat Poop (猫屎先生). There’s also a myth that the French title for The Matrix (1999) was The Young People Who Traverse Dimensions While Wearing Sunglasses (Les jeunes gens qui traversent les dimensions en portant des lunettes de soleil), but it was really just the less exciting Matrix.

American Slang In Movie Titles

One of the biggest issues with movie titles in other languages is dealing with words and expressions that are specific to one language. Director David O. Russell tends to use English idioms and slang in the titles of his films. For instance, “hustle” is a difficult word to translate, seeing as the connotation goes beyond cheat or swindle; it can mean anything you do to make money and was also the name of a ’70s dance craze. It suggests everything that the film American Hustle (2013) is about: con artists, briefcases full of cash, polyester and disco. But somehow the subtlety gets lost in translation.

• American Bluff — France
• The Great American Swindle (La gran estafa americana) — Spain
• United States Cheat Bureau (美国骗局) — China

Silver Linings Playbook (2012) faced a similar problem. Although several countries translated “silver lining” (as in the nice part of a dark cloud) as something like “keep on the bright side,” France and Sweden made up completely new titles.

• Happiness Therapy — France
• You Make me Crazy! (Du gör mig galen!) — Sweden

I Huckabees (2004) had the nerve to use a heart symbol in the title. While this shouldn’t have been too confusing (most countries opted for “I Love Huckabees” in their own languages), a few countries decided to name the film after particular details of the plot.

• Strange Coincidences (Extrañas coincidencias) — Spain
• Multinationals Go Home! (Multik haza!) — Hungary
• The Psycho-Detectives (Os Psico-Detectives) — Portugal

At the far end of the American slang spectrum, Keenan Ivory Wayans’ blaxploitation spoof I’m Gonna Git You Sucka! (1988) was way too culturally specific to even try to translate.

• Overdose of Gold (Sobredosis de oro) — Spain
• Run, Run … Then I’ll Take It! (Scappa, scappa… poi ti prendo!) — Italy
• Ghettobusters — Germany

Bad Titles Never Die

The Die Hard series has titles that are notoriously hard to translate. Direct translation attempts miss the mark, so every country seems to have found a different strategy for naming these über-American action films.

Die Hard (1988)

• Die Slowly (Stirb langsam) — Germany
• Very Hard To Die (Πολύ Σκληρός για να Πεθάνει) — Greece
• Action Skyscraper (Aksjon skyskraper) — Norway
• The Glass Trap (Szklana pulapka) — Poland

Die Hard 2: Die Harder (1990)

• The Jungle 2: Red Alert (La jungla 2 — Alerta roja) — Spain

Die Hard: With A Vengeance (1995)

• Die Hard: Mega Hard — Denmark

Live Free or Die Hard (2007)

• Die Hard 4.0: The Most Expensive of Your Life (Die Hard 4.0 – Legdrágább az életed) — Hungary

A Good Day To Die Hard (2013)

• Tough Nut To Crack: A Great Day to Die (Kietas riesutelis. puiki diena mirti) — Lithuania

The Robots Are Mobilizing

The Chinese characters for “story” used in most movie titles, zǒngdòngyuán (总动员), literally breaks down into “general mobilization”, which sounds militaristic and vaguely threatening. This trend is particularly apparent in Pixar films.

• Toy General Mobilization (玩具总动员) — Toy Story
• Super People General Mobilization (超人总动员) — The Incredibles
• Seabed General Mobilization (海底总动员) — Finding Nemo
• Food General Mobilization (美食总动员) — Ratatouille
• Machine Implement People General Mobilization (机器人总动员) — WALL-E

Speaking of machine implement people – or robots, as the characters 机器人 can also be translated – when The Terminator came out in 1984, most countries opted to keep something close to the original title, but a few went rogue.

• Electronic Murderer (Elektroniczny morderca) — Poland
• The Dealer of Death (A halálosztó) — Hungary
• The Relentless Exterminator (O Exterminador Implacável) — Portugal

Side note: when the dubbed version of Terminator 2: Judgement Day came out in Spain (soberly titled, Terminator 2: El juicio final), Arnie’s famous “Hasta la vista, baby” was changed to “Sayonara, baby” in order to maintain the spirit of the catchphrase being in a foreign language.