COVID Film: Title Shuffle

Posted on by Thor

The working title for my film has always been COVID. I discovered that COVID is the title of a feature film coming out in December of 2023.

I was excited to rename my film COVID APOCALYPSE. Apocalypse tied in with the quote I had placed at the end of the titles. I spent a day redesigning the posters and press material. Then while online that evening I found out a book had the title COVID APOCALYPSE. WT actual F.

Hell, the distressed type on the cover was even similar to my poster design. The book came out 3 months before I started chasing a unique and searchable title for my short film. Unfortunately I had contacted the Chicago International REEL Shorts Film Festival and told them I was renaming the film to COVID APOCALYPSE. As I was scrambling to redesign everything they updated their website.

Yesterday I changed the title to COVID DYSTOPIA. So far I have not found a book or film with that title. But give it a week and I bet one will pop up. Rather than ask the festival to once again change the title, it will screen as COVID APOCALYPSE at that one screening.

A week ago, I  printed 50 post cards with the title of COVID. Those post cards will be real collectors items like the upside down airplane on a postage stamp.

I added COVID DYSTOPIA to the opening scene and the end credits. Lets hope it sticks.

COVID Film: More New Titles

Posted on by Thor

I spent much of the weekend redesigning the poster with a new title. I redesigned everything with COVID Conscious as the title. Conscious to me meant aware, so it made sense. In the designs I made the word Conscious partially transparent as if it were fading away. I planned to literally have Conscious fade away in the trailer.

As I was doing those designs I then considered Conscience, which is more about a moral awareness. I also thought Con-Science could have the meaning of science denial. I was at an inroads and tossed between the two options. I asked Pam her opinion and she offered other options like COVID Collateral, as in Collateral Damage. I thought collateral could however also be interpreted from a financial standpoint.

Since it is October we spent the evening flipping through horror movies on our streaming service. As Pam scrolled. I considered each horror title with COVID inserted. It was a fun game to rename every horror film with COVID themed titles.

As I went to bed, I was still blurting our COVID titles and with each absurd option Pam would simply say NOPE. As I woke up the next morning it hit me. The end credits of the film end with a definition of Apocalypse which is based on an early Greek meaning of the word. The definition is… “A revelation, a disclosure of truth in an age of falsehood and misconception.”  Of course!

When working at Disney Feature Animation I remember there was a time when they considered renaming the film Brother Bear.It turned out there was a TV show that also had the title Brother Bear. The Disney lawyers managed to the the rights to the title despite the fact that the TV Show had been around for years.

If I do an online search of COVID there are thousands of new articles that pop up from the past 4 years. But in the future if I search COVID Apocalypse, I will find my film and articles related to it. Thankfully I will not get tied in with the COVID feature film that is being released in December 2023. I beat them to the punch with the title but I’m not hiring lawyers to defend the film title of COVID.  Such a title will be lost in a sea of information and misinformation.

If folks search for COVID Film they might get information about my film and the feature film. If the feature film is a success, then it might not hurt my film’s exposure.