Choosing a Documentary Title

I’ve just finished working on several ITVS applications and was struck by how some of the doc titles were memorable, some not so much.

Here are some tips for creating an enticing documentary title:

• Seek a word or words that are specific, memorable, even metaphoric. Examples include “Tongues Untied”, “Last Train Home,” “Finding Joe”, “Bull In A China Shop”, “Born in Goma”.  Note the use of proper nouns and specific images. Both are memorable.

• One word and two-word titles are popular because they are also easy to remember: “Honeyland”, “Capitalism”, “Connected”, “CitizenFour”, “Outfoxed”, “Icarus”, “The Secret”, “Senna”, “Freakonomics”, “Crip Camp”.

• Sometimes a word or phrase that is used in everyday conversation will help make your title memorable.  For example, “Tying the Knot”, a documentary about gay marriage, uses a common phrase and a metaphor, both easily recalled.  Michael Moore’s indictment of American health care, “Sicko” is also easy to remember.

• That said, take care not to use a common phrase that is too generic, too vague.  While I loved the film, David Weissman’s “We Were Here” does not strike me as a memorable title. It’s evocative, but I can never remember if it’s “We Were There,” or “Here We Were,” or something else. 

• Here are more examples of vague titles: “Stories We Tell,” “This Changes Everything,” “Rock Solid”, “Holly Hell”. All these titles could apply to many different topics.

• Avoid difficult-to-remember names like “Koyaanisqutsi”.

• Refer to a location, song or some other specific phrase that is used in the film. For example, my own PBS documentary “I Shall Not Be Removed: The Life of Marlon Riggs” gets the first half of the title from an activist song that Marlon actually sings halfway through the film. Scour your soundbites for specific images or places or other details that could serve as a title.  Note that some uses of place make sense and are easily recalled, such as, “The Mayor of Castro Street”; others don’t make sense, such as “Bowling for Columbine”. Huh?

•  If you’re working on a biography, get the person’s name in the title. Examples include “Tina,” “Tony Robbins: I Am Not Your Guru,” “The Times of Harvey Milk,” “Amy,” “Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool,” Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields,” “Spielberg”, “American Visionary: The Story of Barbara Marx Hubbard.”

Good titles are challenging to come by. So, take your time, organize a brainstorming session (show a clip from the film to inspire people) and narrow your list to five.  Then test the best choices by asking your contacts to vote on Survey Monkey.  If you can’t think of a title by the time a grant is due, then say you are taking the above steps and refer to your title as “tentative”.