Movie titles translated into Chinese may be based on starring actor

The conventions for naming movies in Chinese are much different than those for English. For example, one-word movie titles (like Jaws) are thought to be dramatic and punchy in English, but are rarely used in Chinese. To explore some of these differences, let's look at mimetic naming in Chinese movie titles based on a few different factors.

Mimetic titles based on past movies of similar theme

In English, imitative movie titles are only acceptable for B-movies and for parodies (e.g. Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the Thirteenth). For Chinese movies, they are a bit more acceptable. I'll give two examples. The Korean movie My Sassy Girlfriend was a big hit when it was released in 2001. Since then, there have been ten other movies whose titles were translated as "My ____ Girlfriend" in Chinese. It might be true that a lot of these are B movies, and that list includes the American remake of My Sassy Girlfriend, but the list includes a diverse selection of movies such as Friends with Money (translated as "My Wild Girlfriend") and 50 First Dates (translated as "My Amnesic Girlfriend").

Mimetic titles based on no particular former movie

Another example of mimetic naming is the frequent use of the word zongdongyuan (總動員) in movie titles. Zongdongyuan literally means "general mobilization", but to get a better idea of how it is used in movie titles, think of it as "Mobilize!", "Move out!" or "All forces go!". Maybe the most natural translation is just to add the word "Ho!" at the end of the title. None of the movies are actually punctuated with an exclamation mark, but I think that is appropriate as an English translation. For example, the movie Elf was translated as "Elfs, Mobilize!", and the movie Robin Cook's Formula For Death was translated as "Bacteria, Mobilize!" There have been 45 movies titled using "zongdongyuan." I don't know how this meme started, but it is used so widely that it is clearly not seen as a reference to some former movie, it's just a snappy way of titling a movie.


Mimetic titles based on starring actor

Another instance of mimetics in movie titles is when the title of a movie is influenced by the starring actor's past movies. For example, Jim Carrey's Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was the first big Jim Carrey movie. "Ace" was translated into Chinese as wangpai (王牌, which literally means "king card"). When Cable Guy was released, wangpai was used in the Chinese title as a hint to prospective viewers that the movie starred Jim Carrey, star of Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. Later, wangpai was also used in the titles of Liar Liar, Bruce Almighty, and most strangely, in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is not a comedy, so I find the wangpai in the title misleading. Also, it does not follow that Jim Carrey fans are the most likely audience for it.)

Another example is Will Smith, who has made three movies using the word quanmin (全民, which means "the people"). The first movie was Enemy of the State, which was translated as The People's Public Enemy. Hitch was then translated as The People's Love God, and Hancock was The People's Superman.

The most extreme example of this phenomenon is Arnold Schwarzenegger. Schwarzenegger has made 14 movies that use the word mogui (魔鬼), which means demon. For 13 of those movies, "mogui" is the first word of the movie title; the one exception is the movie Last Action Hero, which was translated as "Last Demon Hero."

The Chinese poster for Terminator 4, or "Demon Terminator 4" as it is translated.

A few more examples are Brad Pitt, who has three movies that use the word huoxian (火線), which means "line of fire"; Matt Damon, who has five movies that use the word shengui (神鬼), which literally means "gods and ghosts", and which, based on its usage in movie titles, connotes stealthiness and intrigue; and Leonardo Dicaprio, who has three movie that also use the word shengui. (When Damon and Dicaprio starred in The Departed together, Damon already had three movies using shengui, and Dicaprio had two movies using shengui, so I suppose there was double motivation for including shengui in that title.)

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Data


Movies of the form "My ____ Girlfriend"

1. 我的野蠻女友 My Sassy Girl 2001
2. 我的夢幻女友 My Beautiful Girl, Mari 2002
3. 我的失憶女友 50 First Dates 2004
4. 我的超人女友 My Super Ex-Girlfriend 2006
5. 我的好野女友 Friends With Money 2006
6. 我的恐怖女友 My Scary Girl 2006
7. 我的雙面女友 Two Faces of my Girlfriend 2007
8. 我的人魚女友 The Mermaid 2007
9. 我的機器人女友 Cyborg She 2008
10. 我去世的吃醋女友 Over Her Dead Body 2008
11. 我的野蠻女友 My Sassy Girl 2008

Movies of the form "_____總動員"

1. 汽車總動員 Cars 2006
2. 未來總動員 Twelve Monkeys 1995
3. 海底總動員 Finding Nemo 2003
4. 危機總動員 Outbreak 1995
5. 鐵男總動員 The Longest Yard 2005
6. 精靈總動員 Elf 2003
7. 魔鬼總動員 Total Recall 1990
8. 奪命總動員 The Long Kiss Goodinght 1996
9. 晶兵總動員 Small Soldiers 1998
10. 鴿戰總動員 Valiant 2005
11. 機飛總動員 Hot Shots! 1991
12. 終極警探總動員 Striking Distance 1993
13. 異形總動員 Virus 1999
14. 機飛總動員2 Hot Shots! Part Deux 1993
15. 公仔總動員－校園驚魂記 Terkel In Trouble 2004
16. 靈異總動員 Bless the child 2000
17. 潛艇總動員 Down Periscope 1996
18. 危機總動員:疾素攔截 Con Express 2002
19. 癲瘋總動員 Cool Runnings 1993
20. 脫線總動員 Naked Gun 33 1/3 The Final Insult 1994
21. 蟑螂總動員 Joe's Apartment 1996
22. 綁票總動員 Screwed 2000
23. 天兵總動員 Renaissance Man 1994
24. 波霸總動員 Ladies in Operations 1991
25. 情色總動員 Preaching To The Perverted 1997
26. 病毒總動員 Contaminated Man 2000
27. 終極笑探總動員 Rent A Kid 1995
28. 絕地總動員 Queen's Messenger 2000
29. 奪寶危機總動員 Legacy 2000
30. 緝毒總動員 The Base 1999
31. 小鬼總動員 Bebe's Kids 1992
32. 全線總動員 Freedom Strike 1998
33. 整人總動員 Dirty Work 1998
34. 漢飽總動員 Good Burger 1997
35. 戰略總動員 The Pandora Project 1998
36. 細菌總動員 Robin Cook's Formula For Death 1995
37. 黑金總動員 Montana 1998
38. 布偶總動員 It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie 2002
39. 捍衛總動員 Iron Eagle Iv 1995
40. 神兵總動員 Tall Tale 1995
41. 截殺總動員 Falcon Down 2000
42. 瘋狂總動員 Going Berserk! 1983
43. 賭鬼總動員 Gambling Ghost Are Ready 1991
44. 黑色總動員 Tinseltown 1997
45. FBI捍衛總動員 Mistrial 1996

Jim Carrey movies with the word 王牌

1. 王牌冤家 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 2004
2. 王牌天神 Bruce Almighty 2003
3. 王牌大騙子 Liar Liar 1997
4. 王牌特派員 The Cable Guy 1996
5. 王牌威龍２：非洲大瘋狂 Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls 1995
6. 王牌威龍 Ace Ventura: Pet Detective 1994

Will Smith movies with the word 全民

1. 全民公敵 Enemy of the State （1998）
2. 全民情聖 Hitch （2005）
3. 全民超人 Hancock （2008）

Arnold Schwarzenegger movies with the word 魔鬼

1. 魔鬼殺陣 Raw Deal （1986）
2. 魔鬼司令 Commando （1986）
3. 魔鬼阿諾 The Running Man （1987）
4. 魔鬼紅星 Red Heat （1988）
5. 魔鬼總動員 Total Recall （1990）
6. 魔鬼孩子王 Kindergarten Cop （1990）
7. 魔鬼終結者２ Terminator 2: Judgment Day （1991）
8. 最後魔鬼英雄 Last Action Hero （1993）
9. 魔鬼大帝：真實謊言 True Lies （1993）
10. 魔鬼二世 Junior （1994）
11. 魔鬼毀滅者 Eraser （1996）
12. 魔鬼末日 End Of Days （1999）
13. 魔鬼複製人 The 6th Day （2000）
14. 魔鬼終結者3 Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines （2003）

Brad Pitt movies with the word 火線

1. 火線追緝令 Seven （1995）
2. 火線大逃亡 Seven Years In Tibet （1997）
3. 火線交錯 Babel （2006）

Leonardo Dicaprio movies with the word 神鬼

1. 神鬼交鋒 Catch Me If You Can （2002）
2. 神鬼玩家 The Aviator （2004）
3. 神鬼無間 The Departed （2006）

Matt Damon movies with the word 魔鬼

1. 神鬼認證 The Bourne Identity （2002）
2. 神鬼認證2：神鬼疑雲 The Bourne Supremacy （2004）
3. 神鬼剋星 The Brothers Grimm （2005）
4. 神鬼無間 The Departed （2006）
5. 神鬼認證：最後通牒 The Bourne Ultimatum （2007）

Searching for the title of a movie in Chinese

If you want to rent movies in Taiwan, it is helpful to know the Chinese title of the movie you want. In this post, I will introduce two websites that can be used to search for the Chinese names of a movie. The first site is from Taiwan and only lists the titles used in Taiwan. The second site is a Chinese knockoff of imdb.com (which does not have a Chinese site) found at imdb.cn.


For titles used in Taiwan

Use the search page for atmovies.com.tw. (Just enter the English title.)

Notes:

• I noticed mistakes in some titles, so if you can't find a movie here, you might want to try the methods described below.
• There are also pages where new movies are listed (in theaters and on DVD). Titles of Western movies are in both Chinese and English.

For titles used in China/Hong Kong/Taiwan

There are few ways to search for movies:

First method:

This method is described here.

Step 1: Find your movie on IMDB.com
I found Run Lola Run, an old favorite of mine: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0130827/

Step 2: Now, take that link that you just found, and replace the .com with .cn: http://www.imdb.cn/title/tt0130827/

Second method:

Search by movie title at imdb.cn.

Third method:

Search Google using the "site" operator:
Example: Using google.com to search for the movie The Prestige, I search for:
site:imdb.cn "the prestige"
Then click on the link that looks like a link to the movie.

Notes:

• Most movies have different titles in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Some of the entries do not specify which title belongs to which region. Some of the entries may be missing titles for some or all Chinese regions.
• The info is all in simplified characters, and you cannot search at the site using traditional characters.
• The site states that it "has no relation with imdb.com", but the web addresses are organized identically to imdb.com, which makes Method 1 possible. Some or most of the information is scraped from imdb.com. Another site that uses almost the same web addresses as imdb.com is mov6.com, so you can uses the trick described in method 1, but mov6.com only lists the title used in China, not Hong Kong or Taiwan.
  

If you know of a better bilingual movie database, please leave a comment. (Wikipedia is another option but is not as comprehensive as the sites in this post.)

Movie review: Cape No. 7

Taiwanese film Cape No. 7 has become the third best-selling film in Taiwan's history, knocking out Jurassic Park: The Lost World and falling behind only two others (Titanic and Jurassic Park). Many people are watching the film multiple times at the theater and the pirated version is popular too. The bus I was riding yesterday was showing a pirated copy of the film. My coworkers watched the movie at the theater then distributed the video file. It's pretty common for them to exchange pirated movies, but this time was different. The distribution was prefaced by a message saying that we should support Taiwanese movies by watching Cape No. 7 in the theater before watching the pirated version.

My coworkers are not the only ones expressing this sentiment. All kinds of people who have never had any interest in the local film industry are ecstatic about what the success of Cape No. 7 means for local movies and are urging others to watch the film.

Some people had described the movie to me as a romance, others as a comedy. Both descriptions were correct; it's a many-threaded comedy with a serious love story as its main thread. After seeing the movie, I tried to think of some films that I could compare it to, but I couldn't think of any. The closest thing to this movie that I could think of are the locally produced idol dramas. Some of these dramas combine silly humor with bad acting and stomach-turning romance. Cape No. 7 does better than most of these dramas but not well enough to be a breakout movie for Taiwanese cinema.


A short plot summary without spoilers: The angry youth Aga has failed to become a rock star in Taipei, so he returns to his small hometown in South Taiwan near Kending. His stepfather gets him a job as a mailman, but Aga doesn't have the heart to put any effort into the job. His stepfather calls an audition for a warm-up band for a Japanese musician's concert which will be held in their small town (Hengchun). This leads a reluctant Aga to get involved in music again with a ragtag band and struggle against his angst to make good. Meanwhile a young Japanese woman struggles impotently to make sure Aga and the band are up to snuff in time for their performance.

The humor is silly, but audiences starved to see Taiwan in a commercial film have found it endearing. Two of the funniest characters are over 60 years old. The audience got a kick out of hearing them swearing in Taiwanese. The oldest character, Uncle Mao, brags about his musical skills saying "Shi*t, I'm a national treasure!" Uncle Mao probably got the most laughs, followed by the stepfather, Hong Guorong. The stepfather is the town council representative, a local boss, and he introduces himself saying "My name is Hong Guorong. My main hobbies are arguing, fighting, killing, and setting fires." This kind of line has led one of my coworkers to quote lines from the film. These two characters, along with many other elements of the films are things that are uniquely Taiwanese, and people are overjoyed to see Taiwan in a feel-good movie.


The age of these characters is significant. Unlike most idol dramas, all but one of the characters in this movie are adults. While the two leads of the movie are young, there are enough older characters in the movie so that it doesn't feel like it was make for young people only, and the movie has been relatively popular with adults in Taiwan.

The movie is partly a making-the-band film. The first song, an angsty alt-rock song sung in English, comes from Aga and his failed band. The music gets sunnier and better when the band is formed and begins practicing. There is another song in the movie performed by Shino Lin, a minor character in the movie who was formerly a pop star before she was responsible for a DUI fatality. The band's musical numbers supply the film with its greatest source of emotion, coming to a climax with their big performance. The making-the-band premise gives the opportunity for a lot of fun, and I would have been a lot happier with the movie if this element had been expanded and the love story removed. The movie clocks in at 133 minutes and it has a number of threads that go nowhere. It could have been a tighter funnier movie with a lot of editing.

The love story isn't any better than that of a TV drama. The romance begins with the boy and the girl hating each other. In the process of creating conflict and tension for the story, both behave so obnoxiously that you wonder why anyone would like either one of them. They become loathsome to watch, and when they eventually fall in love, you don't care anymore.

In addition to the plot as already summarized, the movie has a story from 1945. From begin to almost end, the movie is intercut with scenes of a Japanese man aboard a ship, reading love letters written to the woman he is leaving behind in Taiwan. This element is very "cinematic", a self-conscious attempt to give resonance to the love story in the movie and to the film as a whole. Some people love it, others find it gimmicky and poorly connected to the main plot. I read the comments of some Taiwanese moviegoers who found the love letters in the movie very touching. Personally, I thought these scenes were boring. I could barely force myself to read the subtitles. (This might have been influenced by the poor quality of the English subtitles. The subtitles in these scenes were strange. Poetic phrases would be followed by poor grammar. It's also worth noting that the subtitles in general are not very good.)


If there were a list of "Stuff Taiwanese people like", this film would be on it. I think this is mainly due to the dearth of Taiwanese commercial films. There have been very few Taiwanese films in recent years, and the ones that were made are mostly art films or idol films that are only of interest to young people. Cape No. 7 is unique, being a music-based romantic comedy with characters that appeal to the young and old, and with many elements of the film lovingly poking fun at Taiwanese identity. The film clearly can't match American films for production value. If you are just looking for a music-based romantic comedy, I would recommend a movie like "Music + Lyrics" (with Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore) long before I would recommend this movie. But if you are looking for a feel-good film with a humorous look at small-town Taiwan, then Cape No. 7 is your only bet.