The Beijing News has calculated the title length data of about 3,000 domestic films over the past eight years. The four-character titles are the most numerous. The super-long titles are my favorite "Zhi".

"It's not that simple" behind the word count

  According to statistics, the number of titles from 2 to 9 characters is relatively large. The most are 4-character titles, reaching 967; the least are 1-character titles, with 9 titles.

  The title of a movie is the first impression a movie brings to the audience, and its quality will even affect the “out-of-the-circle performance” of the movie to a certain extent. Therefore, the title should be as short, plain, and clear as possible, taking into account the type, content and main features of the movie. Style, to a certain extent, is conducive to the spread of the film.

In this regard, the reporter of the Beijing News used the data entered by the Lighthouse Professional Edition since 2014 as the main data source, and counted the title data of domestic movies from 2014 to the present, from the concise "Shadow" and "Win the Championship" to the awkward reading. "What I Love Is You Love Me" and "Can You Just Like Me", interviewed experts from inside and outside the industry to discuss the length and length of film titles, understand the creator's behind-the-scenes setting of film titles, and investigate multiple audiences' opinions on film titles. Long and short views to understand the status quo of movie titles together.

  Favors "short", the four-character title is the most "favored"

  According to the reporter's incomplete statistics, from 2014 to March 2022, a total of 2,783 domestic films were released in the Chinese film market (excluding re-screenings and films produced without box office data), and the length of film titles ranged from 1 character to 18. Words are involved.

Senior cinema manager Li Yulin told the Beijing News reporter that the State Film Administration has no requirements for the length of film titles, and usually requires film producers to apply when the project is established. Many years ago, there were even titles with more than 20 characters. It's just that these cases have gradually decreased over the years.

The reporter screened and counted nearly 3,000 films and found that the number of 2- to 9-character titles in these films was relatively large, reaching 2,596, accounting for 93% of the total number of films.

Among them, the most commonly used and most popular movies with 4-character titles amounted to 967, accounting for 34%, such as "The Wandering Earth", "Operation Red Sea", etc.; the second "favored" was the 5-character title, There are a total of 475 films, accounting for 17%, such as "I am not the God of Medicine", "The Richest Man in Xihong City", etc.; the least used one-character title films are only 9, and the more famous one is "Shadow" directed by Zhang Yimou. ".

  Most domestic films still favor the "short" title format.

A concise title can improve the transmission rate of the core content of the movie, and can provide more convenience for the promotion of the movie, and the audience will have a deeper memory for the title of a few words.

For example, the top ten names of Chinese domestic movie box office names are basically within 7 characters in length.

Box office analyst Luo Tianwen said that "short and concise" has always been everyone's intuitive feeling about the title of a movie.

If the cast and content of some movies are not so prominent, there is no publicity point, and there is a long or even awkward title, sometimes the audience will feel alienated at the first time.

  2016 is the year of the feature film "Concentrated Explosion Year"

  The audience will guess the theme and content of the movie based on the title of the movie, and then decide whether to watch the movie; the film makers, distribution and marketing parties also try to use "fancy" titles to attract attention.

It is difficult to accurately express the core content of the film with some concise words, and sometimes the film is given a longer name.

The reporter found that only two of the eight years had more than 100 feature-length films (titles with more than 5 characters), of which 2016 was the year with the most feature-length titles, with 117 films, accounting for the total number of films. 31.5% of the annual domestic films.

Among the long-film titles, the seven-character titles are the most, including the high-box-office film "Smiling and Very Alluring" (270 million yuan), and the little-known "Xintianyou on the Toes" (1680 yuan).

Another year in which the number of long-film titles exceeded 100 is 2021. This year, there were 417 domestically released films, and 113 films with long-form titles. Compared with the past, the number of six-character titles and seven-character titles in this year was much larger. rise.

  This trend has also continued this year. As of the time of writing, of the 65 domestic films released in the first three months of this year, there are 27 feature-length films, accounting for almost half of the newly released films.

Especially the three love movies on Valentine's Day, "Wen Ruyan in Ten Years", "I Want to Love You in Your World", and "Don't Forget I Love You" are all 6 characters or more in length.

The reputation of these films was relatively poor, and even caused many audiences to complain, "The two are both 'I love you' and can't tell the difference, so I chose 'Yipin', and the result is too ugly."

Luo Tianwen believes that such a title is too focused on emotional expression. He wanted to make an emotional gimmick to attract the audience, but did not let the audience understand the essence of it. Although it is not easy to think that the title of a long title is difficult to judge, it will lead to the box office of the movie. The word of mouth is not good, but the long title sometimes arouses the curiosity of the audience, and sometimes makes the audience lose the patience of understanding.

  Romance movies like to use long titles

  From the title strategy and box office data of these movies, it is not difficult to find some patterns.

For example, in the top ten domestic movie box office list, the movie types cover comedy, action, animation, war, love, etc. These titles can tell what type it is almost at a glance, and can directly reveal the core content of the movie.

In addition, some movies have IP blessings because they are series movies. Although their names are very long, they already have a very high reputation, so there is no need to start a new short title.

According to statistics, the most popular feature films are dramas, followed by romance films.

However, due to the relatively general expression of genre division, drama films sometimes cover love, action and other genres, and the positioning is not too precise and clear, so it can be ignored.

But romance films focus on emotional expression. In the 8-year data, there are 146 romance movies with long titles. Ni Jun, associate professor and screenwriter of the Film and Television Department of the Central Academy of Drama, told the Beijing News reporter that in recent years, romance movies do have more and more titles. The longer the trend is, such as "Story Sadder Than Sadness" and "Love in Years", sometimes these long film titles that are difficult to read will have a certain impact on the spread of the film, and it is impossible to do these titles. At a glance, you need to further understand it yourself. Although it can tell the story of the movie, it can hardly be read by word of mouth, giving people a very "concave shape" feeling.

  Cartoons are also high users of long title titles. Many cartoons are series of movies, such as "Big Head Son and Little Head Dad" and "Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf" series. The title itself is very long.

According to the survey, the most common words in the title of more than 10 characters are zhi, you and me, love, youth, general mobilization, etc.

Some movies like to find some poems, aphorisms, song names, and afterwords for adaptation, or extract based on novel names and script lines. Such movies are also easy to become long film titles.

Li Yulin believes that, in addition to films with IP blessings, some feature-length films have some disadvantages in terms of communication. "The producers should not be too convoluted when creating, and the titles that are catchy and directly refer to the content of the film must be loved by the audience."

  Written/Written by Beijing News reporter Zhou Huixiaowan