The obsessive compulsive in me can’t help but organize things in pointless lists. Ever make a mental note of things that share some obscure relational similarity? I do. I can’t quit. Here’s an example: movies with numerical film titles. 1
In the interest of keeping this list reasonable, I’m not counting foreign films or sequels. As a general rule, most sequels suck anyway, with few exceptions (the Godfather, Indiana Jones, and original Star Wars trilogies come to mind). Bonus points for titles with two distinct numbers (example: “Nine to Five”). Partial credit for titles with non-whole numbers (example: “Nine and 1/2 Weeks).
For proof of some of these films’ existence, I’ve provided extensive hyperlinked evidence to the great online database of film, Internet Movie Database. This is a fact that only further proves my obsessive compulsiveness, don’t you think?
See the bottom of the page for some final analysis of all this mess.
Table of Contents
x < 0
x = 0
(0 < x < 1)
x = 1
- Air Force One
- The Man With One Red Shoe
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
- One True Thing
- One Little Indian
- The One and Only
- One Crazy Summer
- One Fine Day
- It Happened One Night
- One On One
- Six of One 4
x = 2
- 2 Days in the Valley
- Two Girls and a Guy
- Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
- The Man With Two Brains
- The Man with Two Faces
x = 3
- Three Days of the Condor
- The Three Amigos!
- Three Kings
- The Three Musketeers
- 3:10 to Yuma 5
Three Wishes - The Three Faces of Eve
- Three O’Clock High
(3 < x < 4)
x = 4
- Four Rooms
- ID4
- Four Weddings and a Funeral
- Born on the Fourth of July
- Four Days in September
- The Four Musketeers
x = 5
x = 6
- Six Pack
- The Sixth Sense
- Girl 6
- Six Degrees of Separation
- Six Hours to Live
- Six of a Kind
- Six Pack
- Six String Samurai
- The Sixth Day
- 6 Days 7 Nights 8
- Six of One 9
x = 7
- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
- 6 Days 7 Nights 10
- The Seven Year Itch
- Series 7: The Contenders
- The Magnificent Seven
- Se7en
- The Seventh Sign
- Seven Years in Tibet
- Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
- Seven Faces of Dr. Lao
- The Seven-Ups
x = 8
x = 9
x = 10
x = 11
x = 12
x = 13
x = 14
x = 15
x = 16
x = 17
(20 < x < 50)
- Catch-22
- 28 Days Later…
- Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo
- Thirty
- Miracle on 34th Street
- The 39 Steps
- Summer of ’42
- 48 HRS.
- Attack of the 50 Foot Woman
(50 < x < 100)
- 52 Pick-Up
- 54
- Car 54, Where Are You?
- 55 Days at Peking
- Passenger 57
- Sixty Glorious Years
- Buffalo ’66
- Dancer, Texas Pop. 81
- Winchester ’73
(100 < x < 500)
(500 < x < 5000)
(5000 < x < ∞)
Analysis
Curiously, all of this data roughly fits a normal curve (otherwise known as the “bell curve”):
…where the x-axis represents the number in the movie title, and the y-axis represents the number of instances each number occurs in different movie titles.
Footnotes
- Post thumbnail is taken from the opening credits of Errol Morris’s documentary The Fog of War
- Partial credit! Fractional or irrational numbers
- ref: 2
- Bonus! Two numbers in a single title.
- ref: 2
- ref: 2
- ref: 4
- ref: 4
- ref: 4
- ref: 4
- ref: 2
- ref: 4
- ref: 2
i know this may necessitate a new graph, but the spanish teacher in me cannot help but suggest a title for the x=15 category (seeing as it is currently blank). it is not a foreign film, but it is about a foreign culture. it is called Sweet 15 and is about a Hispanic-American family and their daughter’s Quinceañera.
Also, have you considered adding the movie Pie into the x=3.14 category (it is a movie that might be worth its own category), or generating a new category for 3< x < 4 (did I state that little math ditty correctly? it's been a long time since this spanish teacher did anything remotely resembling an algebraic equation...)
What a great idea about Pi! How in the world did I miss that one? I’m supposed to be the math nerd. And what a great film, too! Yep, you got the nomenclature right. 🙂
I’ll add both, Patty. Thanks!
too hilarious.
the formulaic graphing is enough to make me laugh out loud.
maybe you can get a theorem named after you. The Lund Theorem. Kind of has a nice ring to it. Movie-goers everywhere would finally have a practical application for math.
😉
Good idea, Patty! I’ll get right on the patent filing!
I am aware this is over a decade later, thought I would throw out ‘Five Easy Pieces’ (1970) featuring Jack Nicholson.
Nice addition! I’ll add it to the list…