Wikipedia:Naming conventions (films)
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This page documents an English Wikipedia naming convention. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should follow, though it should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception. When editing this page, please ensure that your revision reflects consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page. |
Conventions: Each word in a film title takes an initial capital, except for articles ("a", "an", "the"), the word "to" as part of an infinitive, prepositions, and coordinating conjunctions shorter than five letters (e.g., "on", "from", "and", "with", "about"), unless they begin or end a title or subtitle. For example: Angels and Virgins, End of the Spear, Failure to Launch, I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang. See Wikipedia:Naming conventions (capitalization). Film titles, like the titles of books and other works of art, are always italicized.
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[edit] Disambiguating
[edit] From other topics
Often, a film may share its title with other subjects that have articles on Wikipedia. For example, An American in Paris names both a Gershwin musical piece and a film. Dune is a geological term, a novel, a film.
- An American in Paris - Gershwin composition
- An American in Paris (film) - 1951 musical based on it
- Dune - a hill of sand
- Dune (novel) - Frank Herbert's 1965 sci-fi classic
- Dune (film) - appeared in 1984
When there is no risk of ambiguity or confusion with an existing Wikipedia article, let the title of the article be the same as the title of the film. But where it is the same as a subject in science, a novel, or whatever, unless the film title is the primary topic for that name, title the film article like this: Film Title (film).
[edit] Between films of the same name
When disambiguating films of the same name, add the year of original release as indicated by IMDb. For example, Titanic (1943 film), Titanic (1953 film), and Titanic (1997 film).
[edit] Additional disambiguation
In the rare case that multiple films of the same name are produced in the same year, include additional information such as the country of origin like Film Title (2007 US film) or a descriptive adjective such as Film Title (2007 animated film).
[edit] Film series articles
For articles on a series of films, the title of the article should be "Series name (film series)." If there are two series with the same name, use "Series name (YEAR film series)", where YEAR is the year of the first film of the series. When trilogies are often referred to as such by outside sources, their articles may be titled "Series name trilogy".
[edit] Foreign-language films
- See also: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) and Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English
Use the title more commonly recognized by English readers; normally this means the title under which it has been released in cinemas or on video in the English-speaking world. Normally, this will be an English language title that is recognized across the English-speaking world; however, sometimes different English-speaking countries use different titles, in which case use the most common title, and give the native and alternate English title(s) afterward.
Note: in the following paragraphs, the phrase 'the English-speaking world' refers to countries in which the majority of the population speaks English as their first language; it thus includes the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, as well as several smaller countries. It does not include countries such as India in which English is a common second language, but in which films are rarely produced in English.
[edit] Examples
If the film was released under the same English title across the English-speaking world, use this as the title of the article, and refer to the film by that title throughout the article. However, the first time it is used, follow it immediately with the original title in brackets, bolded, and with a link to the appropriate native language article.
- The Motorcycle Diaries (Spanish: Diarios de motocicleta)
If the English title means something different from the native title, use the English title, but in the first or second sentences of the article, explain the different meaning of the original title, putting it in bold too.
- Betty Blue is a 1986 French film. Its original French title is 37°2 le matin, which means "37.2 °C in the Morning".
If the film was released in the English-speaking world under its native title, use that throughout the article, but include an English translation in brackets after the first use. Do not put the English title in bold, as this is not an 'official' title. If the native title contains characters not in the Latin alphabet, such as syllabaries or Chinese characters, treat the romanization as the common title and include the native alphabet and any other transliterations.
If the film has been released under different titles within the English speaking world - if for example, some English-speaking countries prefer to use the native title, or if different translations are used in different countries - use the most common title throughout, and explain the other titles in the first or second sentence, putting each of them in bold.
- Shoot the Piano Player (French: Tirez sur le pianiste) is a 1960 French film directed by François Truffaut. It is released as Shoot the Pianist in the United Kingdom.
- Bande à part is a 1964 comedy-drama film directed by Jean-Luc Godard. It is released as Band of Outsiders in North America.
[edit] Rationale
Titles of articles should be the most commonly used title for the following reasons:
- We want to maximize the likelihood of being listed in external search engines, thereby attracting more people to Wikipedia. Using "The Seventh Seal" rather than "Det sjunde inseglet" makes the page easier to find with a search engine, since search engines often give greater weight to the title than to the body of the page. Since "The Seventh Seal" is the most common form of the title, it will be searched on more often, and having that exact string in our page title will often mean our page shows up higher in other search engines.
- We want to maximize the incidence that people who make a link guessing the article title, guess correctly: people guessing a different title may think there is no article yet, which may cause duplication.
- Using the full native title requires people to know that title, and spell it correctly.
Some users dislike the "redirected from" announcement at the top of the page that occurs when a user enters a foreign title and is redirected to the English translation. However, the benefit is that if someone reads or hears about "Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain", and wonders what film might be meant by that, the "(Redirected from Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain)" at the top of the page describing the film in question puts the reader at ease that this was the intended film: the "redirect" message indicates that the system hasn't been playing tricks, and that this was the page to which you were supposed to be led.
It should also be noted that the IMDb always lists films by their original-langugage title regardless of how common the translated titles are; therefore it has no bearing on debates regarding which title a film article should have.
