⛩️ #38 In Japan, BASIC INSTINCT is called ICE SMILE

How Japan Re-titles Movies, This Week in History, and Much More

You love movies.

We all love movies.

Some of us are into our dramas, like Matt Damon’s ODYSSEY, or a weepy like Ryan Gosling starrer A STORY TO READ TO YOU.

Then again, you might be a fan of romantic comedies, like the Meg Ryan classics IF WE COULD MEET AGAIN or LOVERS’ PREMONITION.

And who doesn’t like Pixar, with its roster of monster hits: ANNA AND THE SNOW QUEEN, REMEMBER ME, INSIDE HEAD and REMI’S DELICIOUS RESTAURANT.

Never heard of these certified screen classics? Then you haven’t experienced the magic of Japanese movie re-titling.

So, in today’s edition of The Kyote you’ll find out how and why your favorite film is called something very different in Japan…

THE QUIZ

A picture that Japanese people will recognize instantly. Do you?

Question: who’s this guy?

Answer at the foot of the mail.

THE MOVIES

We’ve tried to create a taxonomy of movie retitles in Japan. The image below is the takeaway; read on for more details…

RETITLE CONCEPTS

1 Adding Prominent Character Name(s) to Title

Creatives take inordinate care with the names of their movies, making them as evocative and interesting as possible.

Then the translators take over, and all that goes out of the window. Often, especially in animation, your local distributor will erase your carefully-considered title and ram in the name of main character.

Hence in Japan, FROZEN is ANNA & THE ICE QUEEN, TANGLED becomes RAPUNZEL IN THE TOWER and RATATOUILLE is REMI’S DELICIOUS RESTAURANT.

Let’s not forget UP becoming OLD MAN CARL’S FLYING HOUSE — and you’ll notice some of these are also examples of Category #9: Changing Title to On the Nose Explanation of Film's Plot/Situation.

Adult fare doesn’t escape unharmed either: 2000’s ALMOST FAMOUS, upon which Kate Hudson is still coasting, became あの頃ペニーレインと, “BACK THEN WITH PENNY LANE”.

(Lest we give the impression of a cultural one-way street, the same has been done for Japanese movies translated to English: thus 魔女の宅急便 (“WITCH’S DELIVERY SERVICE”) became KIKI’S DELIVERY SERVICE when the Ghibli classic was released in the West).

2 Removing Prominent Character Name(s) from Title

A slightly rarer phenomenon, but Western movies named after their main character can be hard for Japanese people to pronounce — or remember.

Thus Tom Hanks’ 2016 pilot picture SULLY became ハドソン川の奇跡 (“MIRACLE ON THE HUDSON”), which is actually a superior title.

Meanwhile back in 1996, JERRY MAGUIRE morphed into THE AGENT (ザ・エージェント), while the 2016 Jessica Chastain/political lobbyist trying to pass gun control legislation drama MISS SLOANE gained the dreadful new title “INVISIBLE HAND OF THE GODDESS” (女神の見えざる手) — which makes it sound like some religious miracle picture (this is also an example of Category #13: Adding Poignancy/Poetic Illusion)

3 Adding Series Name

Hollywood creatives spend lots of time signalling how they are the creative geniuses on this particular project — even if it’s just another installment in a franchise they didn’t originate. This insecurity often manifests in dropping the name of the series…but don’t worry, in other countries they just add it back in.

Bond is prominent example, with YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE, LIVE & LET DIE and A VIEW TO A KILL becoming, respectively 007 DIES TWICE, 007: IT’S THEY WHO DIE and 007: BEAUTIFUL PREY. And let’s not forget FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE, or 007: CRISIS SHOT.

See also: THE FAST & THE FURIOUS aka WILD SPEED, found in Category #5 below.

4 Removing Series Name

Sometimes, however, your Japanese distributor has no faith in your ability to craft a franchise — and decides to remove the series name from your movie.

This happened in the case of the teen murder romp FINAL DESTINATION, whose second edition was titled — obviously — FINAL DESTINATION 2.

But not in Japan, where the sequel became a victim of both this category and #9: Changing the Title to On the Nose Explanation of Film's Plot/Situation, when FINAL DESTINATION 2 became plain old DEADCOASTER (デッドコースター).

5 Series Name Different in Target Language

THE FAST & THE FURIOUS doesn’t really work in Japanese, where “furious” bespeaks mere anger, rather than unrestrained energy — so the series is known instead as WILD SPEED…

…which is also an example of Category #3: Adding Series Name, as the various directors-for-hire try to add their tiny stamp to titles like 2017’s THE FATE OF THE FURIOUS or 2021’s F9, only to see their contributions erased with Japanese retitles WILD SPEED: ICE BREAK and WILD SPEED: JET BREAK…which are also examples of Category 9: Changing Title to On the Nose Explanation of Film’s Plot/Situation.

Come to think of it, the various WILD SPEEDS may be the ultimate example of the Japanese movie re-titling…

6 Evoking Unrelated Film or Series

If you’re a fan of 1980s action trash, you’ve probably seen the Arnold Schwarzenegger picture GORILLA.

No? It’s the one where he plays an FBI agent fired for being too brutal who gets his badge back by brutally murdering Chicago mobsters (don’t stress the logic, it’s the 80s).

You may know it by the original title, RAW DEAL — so how on Earth did it become GORILLA?

Well, it’s all down to Arnie’s then-rival for cinematic king of the steroids, Sylvester Stallone. His then-latest brutal cop film was called COBRA — so the local distributor decided Arnie should star in another animal-themed movie, which (in Japanese) has the same number of syllables. COBRA vs GORILLA became the box office dust-up — although sadly we couldn’t find the box office grosses to see if it was reptile or mammal who came out on top.

Lastly for this category we have the notorious example of 2004’s cult film NAPOLEON DYNAMITE, which was implausibly rechristened BUS MAN.

Why? Simple: in 2005, Japan went gaga for TV drama TRAIN MAN (Densha Otoko・電車男), about an “otaku” (geek) who falls in love with a woman he saves from a drunken asshole on a train — attempts to give up being an otaku to get the girl — comes to term with being an otaku — gets the girl by taking pride in who he actually is.

If you’ve seen NAPOLEON DYNAMITE you’re confused as to just what the link between the two is supposed to be. Don’t worry — there wasn’t. Good news: the distributors eventually saw the error of their ways!

Napoleon Dynamite’s “Best Hits” budget DVD edition, which returned it to the original title. The cover features a mea culpa about the previous re-title (“Bus Man”): “We got caught up in the Train Man craze and gave it a shitty title. Sorry.”

7 Changing Title to Match Translation of a Different Movie (AKA "the Cash-In")

This category is not for titles that over-reached for the zeitgeist, but instead the real travesties — those times where some crafty sales type slaps the exact title of a fair superior product on a stinker, hoping to fool bums into seats.

THE BROTHER FROM SPACE, AKA Fratello dello spazio, is an eccentric 1988 Italian sci-fi picture which answers the question — what if you did E.T. but nothing happens.

The alien is a dude a spacesuit for most of the runtime, and looks like an orange scrotum when you finally see it. Spoiler: it dies so a blind woman can get glasses (!)

In Japan, this piece of rubbish was retitled, shamelessly, E.T. IS BACK (帰ってきたＥ.Ｔ.)

We can only guess how many people were flim-flammed into seeing it in theaters.

* * *

Renoir’s THE GRAND ILLUSION is one of the greatest films ever made — an early prison escape movie about French soldiers held in a World War I German prison camp, starring Erich von Stroheim as the unforgettable Captain von Rauffenstein.

NOW YOU SEE ME, in contrast, is a silly 2013 picture based on the pitch magicians pull off heists. You know what’s coming next: the Japanese title of this disposable piece of content is GRAND ILLUSION ( グランド・イリュージョン). How dare they.

Still, it’s better than what happened with Will Smith’s laughable attempt at heartstring-pulling, 2016’s COLLATERAL BEAUTY — “a grieving, deeply sensitive, very attractive man (Smith) writes letters to abstract concepts like Death, Time, and Love, only to have these ideas personified reply to his letters” — vomit — which was inexcusably retitled 素晴らしきかな、人生！— literal IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE!

…we met more than one Japanese person who thought it was a remake of the classic.

8 Changing Title to Match Translation of Previous Version of Movie

Slightly obscure category here, but this is for remakes where the Japanese translator decides to retain the title of the original, even if it doesn’t particular fit the new version.

Hence 2010’s THE KARATE KID — another property from the Will Smith empire — kept the title of the Ralph Macchio original: BEST KID. We suppose Japan didn’t want to sully their martial arts tradition by having karate in the title in either 1984 or 2010.

Elsewhere, 2003’s THE ITALIAN JOB remake was given the same name as the Michael Caine original — staple of any British child’s upbringing — with the cutesy OPERATION MINI MINI (ミニミニ大作戦).

9 Changing Title to On the Nose Explanation of Film's Plot/Situation

Western filmmakers often want to play coy about the movie’s basic situation. Unfortunately, unless you’ve got certified star-power on the poster like Steve McQueen or Brad Pitt or Steven Seagal (for our Eastern European friends), foreign audiences need to know exactly what it is they’re going to watch.

So sometimes you have to throw out the tricksy title and just lay out the plot.

A prominent recent example was Pixar’s INSIDE OUT becoming INSIDE HEAD (インサイド・ヘッド) to really hammer home the concept.

The creepy Robin William killer movie ONE HOUR PHOTO was renamed to the rather more prosaic STALKER (ストーカー) — disappointing the Tarkovsky fans out there.

The original version of THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE became SUBWAY PANIC (サブウェイ・パニック), while the 2009 remake — which retained the same title in English — got a new moniker in Japan: サブウェイ123 激突 SUBWAY 123 CRASH.

BEING JOHN MALKOVICH suffered in translation when it was reduced to MALKOVICH’S HOLE (マルコヴィッチの穴) — presumably referring to the one in the film that leads inside his head…

This category sometimes results in absurdly long retitles: thus 2011’s Jennifer Garner comedy BUTTER morphed into HOW I CREATE MY CUTENESS: NATIONAL BUTTER SCULPTING CHAMPIONSHIP! (カワイイ私の作り方 全米バター細工選手権！)

Meanwhile, the one-continuous-shot-of-Tom-Hardy-in-a-car project LOCKE had the indignity of being sold on its short runtime with ON THE HIGHWAY: 86 MINUTES THAT NIGHT (オン・ザ・ハイウェイ　その夜、86分).

Now, onto the spoilers…

9spoil Changing Title to On the Nose Explanation of Film's Plot/Situation, WITH SPOILERS

Netabaré is the Japanese term for spoilers, and, yes, some re-titles just decide to just go ahead and ruin the whole movie.

Hence WHEN HARRY MET SALLY’s will-they-won’t-they dynamic was torpedoed as soon as the title LOVERS’ PREMONITION (恋人たちの予感) was slapped onto a Tokyo marquee.

1987’s Coen Brothers’ flick RAISING ARIZONA doesn’t have it so bad: it’s only the first act that’s ruined by 赤ちゃん泥棒 (BABY THIEF).

We don’t need to tell you that BONNIE & CLYDE has one of the most crackerjack endings in cinematic history — but you know exactly what’s going to happen in NO TOMORROW FOR US (俺たちに明日はない).

10 Changing Title to On the Nose Explanation of Film's Theme

Sometimes it’s not the story that gets outed, it’s the underlying theme. 1989’s DEAD POETS SOCIETY presents a class of schoolboys who are taught poetry in a way that doesn’t make them question their sexuality — this requires constant reassurance from teacher Robin Williams — and through this they learn that, yes, carpe diem.

In Japan, the film is called 今を生きる: LIVE NOW.

11 Changing Title to Evoke Genre Trope(s) in Target Language

Every society has its own literary tropes and illusions, and sometimes you can’t resist evoking them in foreign imports too.

1995’s SENSE & SENSIBILITY gained the title いつか晴れた日に (SOMEDAY ON A SUNNY DAY) to really make it seem like a Japanese romance — even though the Austen book got a better deal in translation, as 分別と多感.

Isn’t GORILLAS IN THE MIST about Dian Fossey's unwavering dedication to great apes over her personal relationships? Nope: it’s actually a romance called LOVE BEYOND THE MIST (愛は霧のかなたに)!

You may know the word saraba (さらば), analogous to the English farewell, implying something rather more than goodbye.

It’s also a great word to stick in the title of a movie, so the British classic QUADROPHENIA is さらば青春の光 (FAREWELL LIGHT OF YOUTH) — and also gave a prominent manzai comedy duo their name.

THE OLD MAN AND THE GUN is さらば愛しきアウトロー (FAREWELL, DEAR OUTLAW), while THE LAST DETAIL becomes the slightly baffling FAREWELL, WINTER SEAGULL (さらば冬のかもめ) — also an example of Category #13: Adding Poignancy/Poetic Illusion.

12 Exploitative

Every man wishes he had the balls of the title character in COOL HAND LUKE. As portrayed by Paul Newman, Lucas "Luke" Jackson is the archetype of he who refuses to conform or submit to authority, even when faced with outrageous punishment. Freedom, personal dignity, the struggle against dehumanizing forces — it’s all here.

Except, in Japan, Luke’s passive resistance to The Man was erased when the film was redubbed “VIOLENT JAILBREAK” (暴力脱獄).

Talk about missing the point…

* * *

Did the Japanese spot Spielberg’s potential early?

Because by the time of his theatrical debut, 1974’s THE SUGARLAND EXPRESS, some marketeer in Tokyo was dubbing it a direct sequel to his DUEL, which premiered on American TV but made cinemas overseas:

続・激突!/カージャック “CLASH, AGAIN! / CARJACKING”

…unfortunately for audiences expecting another high-octane crash fest, THE SUGARLAND EXPRESS is mainly a slow-moving criminal-and-cop-bond picture.

13 Adding Poignancy/Poetic Illusion(s)

Trash is trash is trash.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t try and sell it.

SISTER ACT is a Whoopi Goldberg chews scenery flick. Except in Japan, it’s LOVE SONG FOR AN ANGEL (天使にラブ・ソングを…)

Meanwhile, Tom Berenger glides around the jungle with a rifle in 1993’s SNIPER, a flick that somehow got made at a big studio (and found its level with no less than 9 direct-to-video sequels). In Japan, however, it gained an undeservedly poetic title with 山猫は眠らない — WILDCATS NEVER SLEEP.

14 Adding Disambiguation/Explanation

Sometimes you have a huge studio release with a title you can’t tinker with too much — but something about it is going to confuse local audiences. In that case, you might have to make the title really, really clear.

2021’s DUNE required some surgery to become DUNE デューン 砂の惑星, literally repeating the title: DUNE: DUNE SAND PLANET.

Rather more elegent was the Sandra Bullock astronaut pic GRAVITY, which became ZERO GRAVITY instead (ゼロ・グラビティ).

15 Adjustment of Grammar

Ordinal numbers — first, second, third — are not that difficult to grasp for non-native speakers of English. But once we get up there into fifths and sixths, there’s a real hurdle to pronunciation.

Thus THE SIXTH SENSE became simply SIX SENSE (シックス・センス) in Japan.

We also have by some measures the biggest movie franchise in the world disfigured by catering to local grammar rules, with PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN losing the “the” and becoming plain old パイレーツ・オブ・カリビアン “PIRATES OF CARIBBEAN”.

(This isn’t a hard-and-fast rule though; BACK TO THE FUTURE didn’t pander and kept the “the”).

16 Error in Translation (Accidental or Deliberate)

How can errors be accidental or deliberate?

Well, the first seems to have occurred with Kubrick’s DR. STRANGELOVE OR: HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB, which, when rendered into Japanese, gained the subtle but significant change to THE DOCTOR’S STRANGE LOVE (the rest of the title remain essentially the same, but clarified THE BOMB as a hydrogen one — 博士の異常な愛情　または私は如何にして心配するのを止めて水爆を愛するようになったか.

Lastly, a small but very deliberate change came to 1969’s Best Picture winner MIDNIGHT COWBOY, the film which gave us Dustin Hoffman’s Ratzo Rizzo uttering the immortal line Hey, I’m walkin’ here!

“MIDNIGHT COWBOY” was designed to evoke the old west, with Jon Voight’s naive out-of-towner becoming an urban cowboy in the hostile streets of New York, but in Japan, cowboy = Western, and if that wasn’t being provided, the local distributor wanted a new title…

…which was created with the neat elision of just one letter, 真夜中のカウボーイ becoming 真夜中のカーボーイ, and MIDNIGHT COWBOY being forever known instead as MIDNIGHT CARBOY.

Much more fitting for the traffic-choked streets of New York.

That’s it for the movie retitles: hit reply to comment which one was your favorite — or any we missed!

THE ANSWER

Question: who’s this guy?

Answer: an otaku who just got found out

In Japan, an otaku (ヲタク) is someone with an obsessive interest in some aspect(s). of pop culture. But some otaku are not out and proud: this picture is an otaku who just got found out by friends and/or family.

(Netabaré, as used in the article above, means spoilers — story being revealed. The equivalent for one’s otaku nature being revealed: otabaré.)

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If you liked this edition of The Kyote, check this out next: Four New Geniuses of Japanese Comedy

We’ll see each other again next week,

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The Kyote is published in Kyoto, Japan every Sunday at 19:00 JST