Films with no title

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Films with no title are those movies whose title is not explicitly stated within their opening credits.

Up until the late 1980s, it was occasional Hollywood practice for a film to omit most of the opening credits and display only the company logo and movie title, such as in The Godfather, Star Wars, and Ghostbusters. However, Lethal Weapon 2 (1989) was the first of the regular summer blockbusters to establish the 'title only' style that would become commonplace for 'event' movies from that point on. (Ghostbusters II actually preceded Lethal Weapon 2 the same year, but didn't display its title — see below.)

This then evolved so that some movies either implied the title with the use of graphics, or discarded it completely.

1 Title via insignia
2 Title at the end
3 Title within narrative
4 No title at all
5 See also

[edit] Title via insignia

Instead of showing the film's actual title written out, a symbol is shown at the start to illustrate the title in some way. The film's full title is usually then seen written out during the end credits. Some examples are:

Ghostbusters II: instead of an actual title, the Ghostbusters cartoon logo appears where the title should be, holding up two fingers.
Batman Forever: the word "Forever" simply appears over the Batman logo.
Summer of Sam: "Summer of Sam" is not shown at the beginning, but instead the words "Son of Sam" appear written with blocks.
Kill Bill: Vol. 2: only the words "Vol. 2" appear at the beginning.
Batman Begins: just after the company logos, a swarm of bats engulfs the screen and the new Batman logo can be seen faintly floating towards the viewer.

[edit] Title at the end

The movie's title is left until the closing credits, creating the feeling that the entire film has been a cold open. Some examples of this:

Apocalypse Now Though the title of the movie appears as graffiti late in the film, which reads, "Our motto: Apocalypse Now".
Apocalypto
Collateral
The Constant Gardener
Dreamgirls
Gangs of New York
The Last Action Hero
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
Miami Vice
The Mummy Returns
Pan's Labyrinth
The Passion of the Christ
The Pianist
Van Helsing
Vanilla Sky

Fantasia, also the very first film to not have opening credits, originally premiered without even a title, except for a card appearing over the intermission. However, recent rereleased and video versions remove the intermission and place the title card at the start of the film.

[edit] Title within narrative

The Departed, besides having no opening credits (apart from those of the production companies), does not display its title card until 18 minutes into the film's narrative.