Cool Names in Movies

[dean]

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It's because that's what the computers WANTED us to think! They make us think that the t1000 is human because we think that they'd be smarter than to make a terminator that is obviously a fake, because of the accent, so we believe that it is real!!

Wait, I'm confused now [take a breath] maybe he learnt how to talk in Austria?

Anyway, other cool names in movies are:

Ulysses Everitt [Oh Brother where art thou] it just sticks in my mind for some reason.

Jesus [The Big Lebowski]  After seeing that movie, I certainly know who not to f**k with.

Also Motoro Kusanagi has stuck with me [Ghost in the Shell]

There's plenty more but I can't think at the moment.


Oh, and I wonder how many leading characters are called Jack Johnson or John Jackson?

Just curious!

[Susan]

Obvious heroes in movies named John or Jack

John Rambo - Rambo
John Connor - Terminator
Jack Slater - Last Action hero
jack Burton - Big Trouble/Little China
John Anderton - Minority Report
John McClane - die Hard
John Matrix - Commando
John Kimble - Kindergarten Cop
Jack Traven - Speed
Jack Ryan - various
Col. Johnathan "jack" o'neil - Stargate..hehe

[AndyC]

I was kind of amazed when I saw Collateral Damage, and people actually acknowledged his accent. Then again, he was also pretty quickly pegged as an American by others.

I suppose in Total Recall, his alter ego was Hauser, and he did use the alias Brubacher. Yet Doug Quaid was the name someone deemed most suitable to give him with his new identity. I know it's the name from the story (well, Quail was anyway), but it's not as if three quarters of that movie wasn't made up anyway.



Post Edited (07-18-04 08:53)

[Vermin Boy]

Just watched Catalina Caper on MST3K last night, where the comic relief (you know, to lighten up the somber tone of a Beach Party knockoff) is a spy named "Fingers O'Toole."

Then, of course, there are the aliens in Buckaroo Banzai: John Bigboote, John Ya-Ya, John Many Jars, John Parrot, John Small Berries...

[JohnL]

>yeah, not to mention future america builds a robot with an austrian accent? They
>made the t1000 to blend in with humans, human skin..etc. Why blow it with a
>foriegn accent?

The T1000 didn't have an Austrian accent. Now the T800...

[pyratefancier]

What about Captain Jack Sparrow?

[loyal1]

Here are some names off top of my head:

Daryl VanHorn~Witches of Eastwick
Vincent Vega, The Wolfman,"Bad Mutha f**ka:"~Pulp Fiction
Mr. Pink~ Resivoir Dogs
Dr. Strangelove
Bigguus Dickus~Life of Brian
Roger, Victor, Clarence~pilots from Airplane!

But what about a heroine???  Most cool names listed in replies are male.  Hell I can't even think of one right now

[Susan]

> But what about a heroine???  Most cool names listed in replies
> are male.  Hell I can't even think of one right now

Well i don't know about heroines. I didn't name them but we all know the james bond girls.

Barbarella
Alabama Whirley (true romance)

I think there are actually alot of good names to be had with some offbeat comedies (like spaceballs) or sci-fi films.

[BeyondTheGrave]

for a heroine name Ellen Ripley i aways thought was a kick ass name.

"I know I know ive been exposed permeant psychoses..
at least the colors are nice"- Aeon Flux

[Vermin Boy]

Not heroines, but Kill Bill's Sophie Fatale and Gogo Yubari have pretty cool handles (and so does the main character, but I won't spoil that if you haven't seen it).

[Ash]

p***y Galore ?

[loyal1]

Not only is the name cool, but she is one of the best bond girls of all time in one of the best Bond films of all time!  Good call...

[Yaddo42]

Pike Bishop - "The Wild Bunch"
Alan Bourdillion Traherne (just call him "Mississippi") - El Dorado
Dr. Bruno Mabuse - many films
Harry Flashman - "Royal Flash"
Lemmy Caution - "Alphaville"
Duran Duran - "Barbarella"
Pretty much character Groucho Marx played in his heyday (Otis B. Driftwood, Rufus T. Firefly, Jeffrey T. Spaulding, Dr. Hugo Z. Hackenbush, J. Cheever Loophole, etc)
I'll also add a few W.C. Fields characters (Larson E. Whipsnade, Egbert Souse') T. Frothingill Bellows, etc)

I think that many of the 'Jack Ryan, John Connor, Jack Burton"-type names are picked because they sound all-American and regular to most viewers. The filmmakers want the hero to seem like a regular guy triumphing over evil. Just look how many Jims, Johns, and Jacks John Wayne played in his career, often with an Irish or Scottish last name, he sounds all-American. Of course he played his share of guys named Taw, Lon, Cord, Cole, Chance, etc. as well, but the regular names dominate especially if you add in the various Dans, Jakes, Sams, and such he played. And how could we forget Reuben "Rooster" Cogburn?

The names in many Stanley Kubrick films are apparently puns, anagrams, and inside jokes, from what I've read. The names of most of the main characters in "Dr. Strangelove" are weird, cool and fun to say (Maj. Lionel Mandrake, Major TJ Kong, Col. "Bat" Guano, Gen. Jack D. Ripper, etc.) but the best example from a book I read was the president, Merkin Muffley. The name was apparently chosen because the president was meant to be ineffectual and weak. A "merkin" is a fake set of public hair, or a toupee for your naughty bits (still trying to figure out when you would NEED such a thing). And a "muff" is coarse slang for a woman's naughty bits. So the name was meant as a double insult to the character.

[TadpoleBuckshot]

Mr. Pink - Reservoir Dogs
Buckaroo Banzai - right on vermin boy
Chunk - the goonies
Sauron - LOTR
Jar Jar - YAY!
TadpoleBuckshot - The Wacky Misadventures of Tadpole Buckshot in the 69th Quadrant of Uranus

[odinn7]

From Road Warrior (Mad Max II)-  "Greetings from the Humungus. The Lord Humungus. The warrior of the wasteland...the Ayotolah of rock and rolla!"