MovieChat Forums > The Battle of the River Plate Discussion > Which title?

Which title?

posted 12 years ago by hobnob53
4 replies | jump to latest

It doesn't happen much anymore, but into the 1960s it used to be quite common practice to retitle films crossing the Atlantic: changing American movie titles in Britain, and vice versa.

Normally I prefer the original title of a film, but in a few cases an alternate title seems more fitting. The case of The Battle of the River Plate is a close call to me. But the US title, Pursuit of the Graf Spee, strikes me as a slightly more apt title.

For one thing, it more accurately describes the action of the film. The picture is about the Royal Navy's pursuit of the German vessel, only one part of which involved the actual naval engagement. Most of the film centers on the chase, the later efforts to dislodge her from her safe harbor in Uruguay, and the Graf Spee's final actions. The film, in short, is about much more than the battle alone, which is of course a crucial event but only one portion of the overall narrative.

Also, "pursuit" is a more active, dynamic word, indicating movement and speed, while "battle" -- its reference to blazing pyrotechnics notwithstanding -- is a somewhat static term, lacking the sense of flow and plot development better conveyed by "pursuit".

Obviously this is one of those things where there's no right or wrong, and I'm sure most fans will prefer the original UK title. That's certainly not a bad or inappropriate name, but after much thought I come down narrowly on the side of the American retitle. As an American, I first saw this movie at age 8 or so under its US name (the American print is otherwise no different than the original British film, not edited in any way), but when I learned its actual title years later I rather liked it, and still do. But "Pursuit" gives a better impression of what the film is all about.

[–] Steve Crook 12 years ago

The story (as told in the UK) is that the American distributors at the time of the original release were afraid that nobody in the US would know where the River Plate was. Even worse, that some of them might confuse it with the River Platte - and think that it was a western

Steve

[–] hobnob53 12 years ago

I think we've had this discussion elsewhere, Steve -- I recall the "River Platte" business! (Actually, it's the Platte River, in Nebraska, and I guarantee you no more Americans would know where that is than they would the mistranslated River Plate!) I guess it could sound a little like a western.

Given that the battle was a major event for the Royal Navy, and its first major engagement of WWII, and drew so much notice in England, it was logical to name this British film after the battle itself. But many Americans, in 1956 at least, knew of the Graf Spee, the ship, more than the name of the battle, so using that title would be both more familiar and a bigger draw than Battle of the River Plate. Still, I think Pusuit was a more apt title, given the nature of the events described.

[–] Steve Crook 12 years ago

It wasn't that American people would have thought that it was a western, but the American distributors thought that they might.

Normally Powell wasn't pleased when his films were renamed for the American market. Especially the renaming of A Matter of Life and Death as Stairway to Heaven. The American distributors reason that time was that they didn't think that the American people would go and see a film with "Death" in the title, especially so soon after the end of WWII where so many people had died.

But the one renaming that he did like was when the American distributors renamed Contraband as Blackout. He agreed that that was actually a better title.

Steve

[–] hobnob53 12 years ago

At the risk of my citizenship, I'm sure most of my compatriots would have thought it was a western. Or, if any did make a naval association, that it was something out of the 18th century. Trust me! (Probably half the people at the distributors didn't know what it really was either.)

I'm not surprised Michael would be displeased at name changes. Normally the title is an integral part of the writer's, producer's and director's intentions, and you know what that means in a Michael Powell film especially. To oversimplify, British titles of that era tended to be more prosaic and even a bit staid, while American ones were more sensationalized, or at least dynamic, in each case reflecting what the filmmakers deemed most representative of their nation's character. So I can see that Blackout, a snappier, more portentous title, might grab one more than the more stolid, immobile Contraband.

Stairway to Heaven is similarly a more involving, active title (it's tough to find adjectives for this stuff), while A Matter of Life and Death is again a more static title -- dramatic but with no sense of movement (by which I don't necessarily mean "action"). But I much prefer the original title, as it really describes what the film is all about. Stairway is more literal, since there is of course an actual stairway to Heaven in the film, but to me, in addition to its inadequacy in describing the plot, it sounds like a musical...which is what I bet at least some people who went to see it in the States thought they were getting!

Curiously, I think the American distributors (Columbia Pictures) were right in saying that a film with "death" in the title might have harmed the box-office in 1946, right after the end of the war. Yet the paradox is that after the war there was an enormous number of films dealing with death and the afterlife -- which was also considered a direct consequence of the war, when, with so many dead, many people looked for answers to life, or some sort of reassurance that there was indeed an afterlife. Yet being too explicit in the title might have been counterproductive. Human psychology is strange.