When I was young I used to lie in bed dreaming up titles of stories and movies I wanted to write. The titles always came first, before the plots. I would mull over such scintillating titles as Torture Me, Gently and The Decapitators, imagining how wonderful they would look up on a marquee or printed in lurid boldface on the cover of a book. Coming up with a perfect title is like finding a needle in a haystack. Can you imagine the thrill that went through Margaret Mitchell when Gone With The Wind came together in her head? Or the pride and satisfaction that came to the originator of Chu Chu and the Philly Flash?
The following is a selection of my favorite crackpot movie titles. Just stringing a bunch of words together like in Quackser Fortune Has A Cousin In The Bronx (1970) or Don’t Be A Menace To South Central While Drinking Your Juice In The Hood (1966) doesn’t elevate your movie. Whereas Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things runs trippingly off the tongue. And the movie’s a hoot, to boot.
Please Don’t Eat My Mother (1973) Basically a rip-off of The Little Shop Of Horrors with breasts added. Nerdy guy has a flesh-eating plant and spies on naked girls.
The Saga Of The Viking Women And Their Voyage To The Waters Of The Great Sea Serpent (1957) Roger Corman-directed quickie about Viking women braving the treacherous oceans (and bad puppet sea monsters) to get back their men, captured by a warrior tribe. You can’t go wrong with any movie co-starring Susan Cabot (The Wasp Woman) who is always fabulous.
Want A Ride Little Girl? (1974) (also known on home video as Impulse). William Shatner gives a true hambone performance as greasy psycho gigolo who tries to kill a young girl who witnessed him commit a murder. You haven’t lived until you see Shatner execute Harold “Oddjob” Sakata by rope and carwash.
I Hate Your Guts (1962) Here William Shatner is kind of brilliant playing a racist trouble-maker in this well-intentioned film about race relations directed by Roger Corman and also known as The Intruder.
I Wake Up Screaming (1941) No kidding. A terrific film noir starring Victor Mature, Betty Grable and Laird Cregar, who is astounding as a creepy detective.
My Friends Need Killing (1976) Vietnam vet goes on a killing spree. Sound familiar? With Greg Mullavey (Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman) and written and directed by Paul Leder– who was also responsible for the gloriously titled I Dismember Mama (1972).
Don’t Torture A Duckling (1972) Actually one of Italian horror director Lucio Fulci’s finest films. It’s set in a rural Village where a series of child killings has rocked the community. Florinda Bolkan is haunting as a gypsy witch in this virulently anti-Catholic shocker.
Kiss The Blood Off My Hands (1948) Burt Lancaster plays a fugitive on the run hiding out with a sympathetic nurse (Joan Fontaine) in this muddled drama. (But boy, what a title!)
Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things (1972) A troupe of bad actors sail out to an island and jokingly perform a ceremony to raise the dead, which only works too well. A low-rent Night Of The Living Dead, but not half bad.
Sometimes Aunt Martha Does Dreadful Things (1971) Weird film about two criminals who flee to Florida, where one dons (unconvincingly) the disguise of a woman to avoid capture. Actor Abe Zwick as “Aunt Martha” is pretty hilarious.
My Brother Has Bad Dreams (1972) The best! A nerdy, geek-like young man, who sleeps with mannequins and is haunted by his mother’s murder, brings home a drifter and gets psychotically jealous when his sister beds him down. I won’t reveal the jaw-dropping finale but suffice to say it involves a stolen motorcycle, a straight razor, mannequin parts, and a few hungry sharks.
Phffft (1954) A divorced couple (Judy Holliday & Jack Lemmon) keep running into each other in this romantic comedy by George Axelrod. Judy Holliday is always a delight, and Kim Novak makes a sexy cameo but the best thing about this movie is that goofy title.
Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mama’s Hung You In The Closet And I’m Feeling So Sad (1967) Based on an Arthur Kopit play, Rosalind Russell stars an eccentric woman vacationing with her son and dragging along her dead (stuffed) husband. This movie is a such disaster that I find it, kind of, fascinating.
I’m Going To Get You…Elliot Boy. (aka Caged Men Plus One Woman). An offbeat 1971 Canadian film about a dope who gets arrested for a botched bank robbery and ends up in prison fending off sexual advances from the other inmates. Probably should have been called Don’t Drop The Soap…Elliot Boy.
Don’t Worry, We’ll Think Of A Title (1966) The Dick Van Dyke Show’s Rose Marie and Morey Amsterdam star in this desperately unfunny Cold War spy comedy, that seems to have been written by someone who doesn’t know vaudeville is dead. I’ve tried, but have been unable to get through more that 20 minutes of this turkey.
Can Heironymus Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe And Find True Happiness? (1969) Writer/director/star Anthony Newley’s X-rated Fellini-esque musical fantasia about a womanizing singer (Newley). Joan Collins, who was married to Newley at the time, co-stars. This was such a bomb that the London News suggested “Every copy (of the film) should be quietly and decently buried.”
The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Crazy Mixed-Up Zombies (1964). Director Ray Dennis Steckler’s whacked-out “musical” horror movie about a schnook (Steckler) who gets hypnotized by a gypsy at a carnival and is transformed into a psycho killer. Steckler also did Rat Pfink A Boo Boo (a jokey Batman send-up). That movie was originally supposed to be Rat Fink A Boo Boo, but the guy who did the title cards fucked up so they just left it because they couldn’t afford to have it corrected.
Who Slew Auntie Roo? (1971) A fun horror film starring Shelley Winters that’s a macabre take-off on Hansel & Gretel. Directed by the wonderful Curtis Harrington, who also directed Winters in the equally wonderfully title: What’s The Matter With Helen?
The Rats Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here! (1972) Another Godawful talky, costume, horror epic from Andy Milligan. I remember buying a ticket because of the title but when the credits rolled and I saw “directed by Andy Milligan” I almost started crying.
Who Killed Teddy Bear? (1965) One of my all-time favorites, with a frequently shirtless Sal Mineo as a peeping tom bus boy spying on leggy Juliet Prowse. Co-starring Elaine Stritch and Jan Murray, it’s a sleaze masterpiece.
God Damn Dr. Shagetz (1977) Old people in a town kill young people for their pituitary glands. With Dean Jagger as the evil doctor who gives an amazing tongue-twister of a speech about killer doughnuts that should make you drop your drink. (This is also known as Dr. Shagetz and on VHS as Evil Town).
Your Vice Is A Locked Room And Only I Have The Key (1982) Terrific Italian thriller by Sergio Martino about a decadent writer, living in a villa in Verona with his abused wife (Anita Strindberg), who becomes a suspect when a series of women are found murdered. This even throws in some Edgar Allen Poe plot twists for good measure.
Just be glad you don’t own a movie theater and have to put some these damn titles up on the marquee.