Titles

Unless you begin with a great title or inspiration strikes late in the 4th quarter, the naming of a screenplay can be a maddening process.

Woody Allen can always fall back on "Woody Allen's Fall Project", but for young producers, the title is an important first impression when going out to the powers that be -- financiers, dealmakers, cast, etc.

I'll be honest and say we've been hot and cold on our title CALVIN MARSHALL.

A long time ago the movie was called MVP, but it just wasn't quite right. And then those Most Valuable Primate movies started being released.

The next version was developed with another company and called POSTGAME. They tried to put their stamp on it with a more conventional structure. The resulting draft was a mess and thankfully was never made. The title POSTGAME always felt a little too generic -- an overused word in sports broadcasting.

When the script ended up at Broken Sky Films, we went back to the original draft and called it HANGING ON A STAR -- which is a Nick Drake song that was supposed to play at the second act curtain. It seemed like the perfect title because it carried Calvin's conflict and story without referring to sports.

But everyone thought this was a cheesy title, like a very broad Disney movie. I thought it could be indie and cool, especially with the tone we were going for, but no one agreed with me.

Most people seem to like the title CALVIN MARSHALL. Names as titles sometimes work well (JERRY MAGUIRE, BILLY ELIOT) so for now that's the title we're going with.

Broken Sky's second film (now in development) was originally called RODEO GIRL. Here's the imdb logline.

"After a brutal knife attack leaves a beautiful small-town rodeo star's face scarred for life, she finds herself in the middle of three violent and surreal tales that culminate one summer night in Southern California."

We've been brainstorming new titles because there's another movie out there called RODEO GIRL that will probably get made.

We're now using the working title RODEO BLOOD, which seems to capture the spirit of the movie better. RODEO GIRL could be a MOW on Lifetime. RODEO BLOOD seems more like the surreal, comic thriller that it is.

Some people say RODEO BLOOD sounds like a horror film but I'm not convinced it's an issue. THERE WILL BE BLOOD feels more like a horror film and it's not.