Take a deep breath … Top 10 Long Movie Titles!

I was looking for something different and odd to research in the world of movies and somehow I ended up asking myself… “what are the best long movie titles of all time?” Well, let me tell you, this took a little bit of research but was well worth it. Of course, not all of these titles are immediately recognizable. I suppose the Hollywood studios tend to frown upon titles that take longer to read than it takes to watch the movie. With that said, every single one of these movies are listed on the Internet Movie Database. So, here’s my list of the Top Ten Long Movie Titles (in no particular order):

1. ‘I Killed My Lesbian Wife, Hung Her on a Meat Hook, and Now I Have a Three-Picture Deal at Disney‘ (1993) — 16-minute comedic short film written by Jay Lacopo and Kamala Lopez, directed by none other than Ben Affleck. Plot: A first-time feature-film director is casting the lead actress. We meet him talking to his wife about the picture and the process. We meet the actress, Sandy, negotiating with her roommate and talking by phone to her mother. Then, we watch Sandy audition for the director at the call-back session; also attending are the casting director and the production company’s sycophants. The wrinkle is that the director is a homicidal misogynist, his wife is tied up and hanging from the ceiling, and Sandy has something in her purse that bodes a rocky future. — IMDB.com

2. ‘Long Strange Trip, or The Writer, the Naked Girl, and the Guy with a Hole in His Head‘ (1999) — Directed and co-written by Peter Wick and Hannah Logan. Plot: As magazine Writer Phil Austin arrives for work in the morning he is struggling to deal with the end of his relationship with his Editor Andrea, the end of his weekly column, and the cancellation of his book contract. Humbled, he reluctantly takes on an interview assignment, and heads for a strip club to interview Stripper Becca. She is looking for an escape from her present life, and Phil, feeling he has little to lose at the moment, agrees to drive her north into the sticks, to her Father’s Survivalist Compound, knowing little of what he is getting himself into, nor how far or where he is going. Once Becca’s brother Lars joins up, the road trip becomes a slow humorous descent into absurdity. — IMDB.com

3. ‘Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan‘ (2006) — Love it or hate it (and that’s no joke… there’s little gray area on this one), this was a funny movie, albeit often painfully awkward and ridiculously inappropriate. Sasha Baron Cohen has to be considered amongst the best modern sketch comics and I think we’ve only begun to see the extent to which he’s likely to take his own vision of what Andy Kaufman started in the 1970’s.

4. ‘Who Is Harry Kellerman and Why Is He Saying Those Terrible Things About Me?‘ (1971) — Directed by Ulu Grosbard and starring Dustin Hoffman. Plot: Hugely successful but impossibly neurotic songwriter Georgie Soloway is sliding into a mid-life crisis. He believes that all of his past romantic relationships have been destroyed not by his own failings but by the interference of the mysterious Harry Kellerman. Family, friends, and his psychiatrist cannot give him the help he seeks. When his father is diagnosed with a terminal illness, Georgie begins spending more and more time flying his personal aircraft, distancing himself physically, emotionally and mentally from the real world. — IMDB.com

5. ‘The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?‘ (1964) — Directed by Ray Dennis Steckler. Tagline: SEE: the dancing girls of the carnival murdered by the incredible night creatures of the midway! SEE: the hunchback of the midway fight a duel of death with the mixed up zombies! SEE: the world’s first monster musical! Plot: Jerry falls in love with a stripper he meets at a carnival. Little does he know that she is the sister of a gypsy fortune teller whose predictions he had scoffed at earlier. The gypsy turns him into a zombie and he goes on a killing spree. — IMDB.com [How could you not find yourself even the slightest bit curious about this one?]

6. ‘Night of the Day of the Dawn of the Son of the Bride of the Return of the Terror‘ (1991) — Written and Directed by James Riffel. Plot: The makers of this parody of “Night of the Living Dead” took George Romero’s classic and wiped the soundtrack clean, then redubbed it with comedic dialogue. — IMDB.com [Oh yeah, this dude made a sequel called ‘Night of the Day of the Dawn of the Son of the Bride of the Return of the Revenge of the Terror of the Attack of the Evil, Mutant, Hellbound, Flesh-Eating Subhumanoid Zombified Living Dead, Part 3‘ (2005) in which he gave the same treatment to the 1962 classic ‘The Brain That Wouldn’t Die’. Neither of these are high-brow art and neither is intended for little kiddies.]

7. ‘Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood‘ (1996) — Written by the Wayans brothers and Directed by Paris Barclay. Tagline: Finally, the movie that proves that Justice isn’t always Poetic, Jungle Fever isn’t always pretty, and Higher Learning can be a waste of time. — IMDB.com [This modern classic amongst the parody genre [a dying breed] has a title that is simply perfect, like Chris Rock reciting Shakespeare. Actually, I’d like to see him do that!]

8. ‘Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mama’s Hung You in the Closet and I’m Feeling So Sad‘ (1967) — Directed by Richard Quine. Tagline: This motion picture will probably do as much for mothers as ‘Moby Dick’ did for whales. Plot: A mother drops her son and husband off at a tropical vacation spot for a little rest and relaxation. The only problem is that the husband has been dead for quite some time, and his wife had him stuffed and carries him around with her. Complications ensue. — IMDB.com

9. ‘I Could Never Have Sex with Any Man Who Has So Little Regard for My Husband‘ (1973) — Written by Dan Greenburg and Directed by Robert McCarty. Plot: In this sex farce, two middle-aged pairs of aspiring swingers rent a summer cottage in Martha’s Vineyard. There they sit around discussing the pros and cons of having affairs. — IMDB.com

10. ‘Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb‘ (1964) — Saving the best for last… the late-great auteur Stanley Kubrick’s hilariously darkly comical anti-war opus. Anyone who hasn’t seen this film needs to be making arrangements to do so immediately. That’s an order!

Honorable Mention: ‘Caffeteria or How Are You Going to Keep Her Down on the Farm after She’s Seen Paris Twice‘ (1973) — A one-minute short film. Cast and crew: unknown? Tagline: The short and sweet story of a girl and her 26 cows. — IMDB.com

Lifetime Achievement Award: ‘Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask‘ (1972) — Written and directed by Woody Allen. The only reason this one didn’t make it is because it was the shortest of all the candidates I came up with.