Jaws 2 (1978) - Taglines - IMDb Jaws 2 (1978) Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water... One good bite deserves another! (1980 re-release) See also a list of 45 titles created 07 Apr 2012 a list of 35 titles created 27 Jun 2012 a list of 23 titles created 25 Aug 2013 a list of 33 titles created 17 Dec 2014 a list of 38 titles created 1 month ago IMDb Everywhere Find showtimes, watch trailers, browse photos, track your Watchlist and rate your favorite movies and TV shows on your phone or tablet! The 10 Best Movie Taglines The 10 Best Movie Taglines Comment [Updated with video] Since theatrical posters and advertising campaigns became just as important to selling a motion picture as the cast and crew assembled, the significance of a well-worded tagline was too large to overlook.

Whether relying on humor, wit, horror, or simply a playful tease of things to come, the best in the movie business have turned taglines into an art form, giving rise to some truly fantastic one-line summaries that didn’t just catch consumer attention, but occasionally ended up to be more immortalized than their respective films. Some might ask exactly how a tagline could communicate more than a film’s title, stars, director, or writer – but for the average moviegoer, a clever combination of words can turn a film from a curiosity into a much-anticipated theatrical experience. We’ve already taken the time to point out some of the worst taglines in movie history , but figured some praise was in order as well. There are plenty to choose from, but here is our list of the 10 Best Movie Taglines. – I Am Legend (2007) Technically, I Am Legend deserves as much credit for its chilling tagline as The Omega Man, also an adaptation of Richard Matheson’s original novel. But the promise that Robert Neville (Will Smith) would not be able to enjoy the peace and quiet of being the last man on Earth because of an unknown inhabitant is as effective as ever.

The single sentence manages to convey all the central themes of the film – isolation, paranoia, danger – to the point that the simple phrase could almost be considered an extremely short story in itself. The fact that the marketing department decided to leave the vampire/crazed remnant of humanity off of the theatrical posters and let the creeping fear of the unknown build tension instead, shows that they knew their tagline embodied the overall ‘less is more’ philosophy. – Shaun of the Dead (2004) Hollywood has turned the tongue-in-cheek one-liner into a fairly common trope for cheesy taglines, but the one chosen for Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead manages to escape criticism due to the simple fact that “a romantic comedy, with zombies” actually gives an accurate depiction of what message the film is seeking to send. The story may be set during a zombie outbreak, but as is the case in all of Wright’s films, love and friendship are the true core of the story. The horde of stumbling, flesh-eating zombies may result in some truly horrific violence and head-smashing, but the film is less about what you can survive and more about who you would want to survive beside.

In this case, it takes the end of the world for Shaun (Simon Pegg) to realize that his life needs direction, and to stop taking the love of his life for granted. In other words: it’s a romantic comedy. With zombies. – 8. The Prestige (2006) Not every tagline needs to steal the spotlight from the movie it’s marketing – some are simply clever enough to cast the whole film in a new light. For Christopher Nolan’s tale of two rival magicians in 19th century London, the tagline – “are you watching closely?” – makes perfect sense, spoken multiple times in the film. But when the credits rolled, it became perfectly clear that the question was being posed to the audience directly, with the director dropping more than enough clues about the final twist along the way. Repeat viewings are a must, and the tagline only gets better with age. – Cocktail (1988) Not everybody is a fan of puns, and movies featuring a sly wink or play on words tend to elicit more eye-rolls than awards.

But with Cocktail, a tagline was conceived (to a chorus of cheers and high fives, we assume) that managed to not only offer a pun for the ages, but actually capture the entire spirit and character arc of the protagonist Brian Flanagan (Tom Cruise). The tagline is serious, cocky, filled with bravado, but inherently implies that the film’s hero is… less than kingly when he isn’t tossing bottles and martini shakers behind a bar top. Those assumptions are a perfect expectation of the film’s conflict, while also capturing enough of the 1980s Hollywood love affair with Tom Cruise to make a movie about a bartender still sound like much, much more. – 6. Ghostbusters (1984) There are several entries on our list that made their way from film tagline to household phrase, but few are as widespread and well-recognized as that of Ghostbusters – specifically, the call and response of the movie’s theme song.

To this day, ask any group of people “who ya gonna call?” and you’re likely to hear a chorus of voices shouting “Ghostbusters.” What makes the popularity of the catchphrase even more amazing is the fact that it isn’t actually used in the movie, with the team’s slogan actually being “we’re ready to believe you!” Yet even the film’s initial tagline proclaiming the group of comically-un-heroic parapsychologists “here to save the world” made an exaggerated claim capture the spirit of the film when juxtaposed with the bumbling stars. – 5. Quiz Show (1994) The tagline of director Robert Redford’s Quiz Show may sound like it belongs to a film following a magician or con artist, but it actually belonged to a much less fantastical tale. Following the quiz show scandals of the 1950s (in which multiple game shows were revealed to be heavily choreographed and rigged by producers), the movie offered a star-studded re-telling of an era when game shows caught the eye of the United States Congress and the Supreme Court.

Besides being as coy and intriguing as a tagline can ever truly get, the line does for the scandalous period of television history what the film itself did for the scandal: heightened it to become the stuff of legend. In reality, the scandals were a simple case of producers manufacturing suspense and spectacle to please their sponsors. But in a movie as hard-hitting as Quiz Show, and with a tagline to match, the devious con made the American public the mark, with none of them the wiser. – 4. Jaws 2 (1978) With Jaws, director Steven Spielberg changed the world in multiple ways, from the simplistic-but-chilling musical score to the looming fear that every body of water could – could – contain a man-eating great white shark. So it’s somewhat surprising that the most clever and arguably well-known tagline from the series actually came from the film’s sequel, Jaws 2. To this day, there are likely those who have heard the tagline “just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…” without actually realizing exactly what movie monster helps complete the sentence.

It’s far more haunting than any of the original film’s taglines, and helped establish the villainous shark at the heart of each installment as a certified horror movie killer. – Superman (1978) It’s hard to think of a time before movie audiences were able to believe in superheroes, let alone flock to superhero blockbusters more than almost any other. But make no mistake: when the producers of Superman: The Movie set out to bring the most iconic superhero to live on the big screen for a new generation, they were doing so against overwhelming odds. The perfect tagline, then? A promise that the film would do what no other before it had managed to. These days, claiming a film will make audiences “believe a man can fly” would normally be left to director and actor interviews. But back in 1978, audiences needed it in writing. The film delivered, using a mix of wire work and projection to make Christopher Reeve appear to fly through the air. Had the film fallen short of the tagline, the modern age of superhero films may not have happened. So let’s all count ourselves lucky.

– Alien (1979) Little explanation is needed for Alien‘s tagline, as Ridley Scott’s sci-fi/horror film’s place in cinema history is already guaranteed. Audiences couldn’t have known that the glowing alien eggs seen in the theatrical posters would be the ultimate cause of the many, many screams uttered throughout the film, but the tagline made the film’s desire to shock and terrorize its audience clear from the outset. The tagline offered a brief lesson in physics by warning that sound can’t carry through the vacuum of space (a fact most films still choose to ignore), but also communicated how isolating and remote the film’s setting aboard the USCSS Nostromo would be. With a single alien, and a setting that made even a person’s scream disappear from their throat, the film’s tagline (like the film itself) proved that tension is infinitely more satisfying than jump scares. – The Thing (1982) Some taglines make a movie fan want to meet the mind that created it – and others are so clearly a sign of depravity that you would be better off avoiding those responsible.

For John Carpenter’s The Thing , the observation that as comforting as a thick coat may be in the Antarctic, “man is the warmest place to hide” still makes our skin crawl. Those who have yet to see the film won’t quite grasp the plot points and threads foreshadowed by the tagline, but those who have will recognize the fear, the cold, the paranoia, and the grotesque biology that made the film an instant classic. The simple sentence is disturbing enough to scare off the faint of heart, but pique the curiosity of every science fiction and horror fan in a heartbeat. – Honorable Mention: Day of the Dolphin (1973) There are times when those charged with concocting a tagline craft a masterpiece: a simple phrase so evocative, so witty, or so chilling that it sells the movie all by itself. But then there are times when the movie is so ridiculous, so far-fetched, and so hopelessly ill-conceived, that no tagline could be clever enough to fool audiences into thinking there is more to the film than meets the eye.

Mike Nichols’ The Day of the Dolphin is clearly a case of the latter, when – let’s be honest – the absurdity of the premise was its primary selling point (aside from star George C. Scott). Telling the tale of a humble scientist trying to teach dolphins to communicate with human beings takes a shocking turn when it is revealed that he has actually been training them – unwittingly, of course – to execute a strike on the President. The tagline has been singled out by many as an example of a “bad” tagline, but considering what they had to work with, we feel those responsible made the right call. – Conclusion That’s just a small sample of the many taglines that have shown how a few simple words can condense an entire movie universe. Every movie fan will have their own favorites which remain as poetic as they are attention-grabbing, so be sure to name them in the comments.

The 50 Best Movie Taglines in History The 50 Best Movie Taglines in History August 18, 2015 @ 8:11 AM Image of A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away (somewhere near West Orange, New Jersey) movies were simple things; made silently, photographed and projected in black and white. With time, their production grew more sophisticated. And as the movies themselves got more intricate, so too did their marketing. It wasn’t long into the history of movies that ads started carrying taglines; snappy ad copy designed to explain a movie’s premise at a glance and convince potential viewers to plunk down their hard-earned dollars for a ticket. Filmsite.org dates the practice all the way back to the silent era (“Love, Locomotives, and Laughs” read the tagline for Buster Keaton’s The General), but the practice as we know it really came of age in the late 1970s, as the blockbuster revolutionized Hollywood and ushered in a whole new era of movie advertising.

Today, the tagline is an essential part of every movie’s marketing campaign, plastered across billboards and posters worldwide and featured prominently in trailers and commercials. The best of them not only clarify a film’s subject, they become synonymous it; it’s hard to think of Jaws 2 without also thinking of its iconic tagline — “Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water...” In cases like that, the tagline is arguably superior to the film itself, and inarguably more famous. In making this list, there was just one qualification: Every tagline had to actually appear on its movie’s poster. If we couldn’t find concrete evidence that the sentence actually showed up on the movie’s print marketing (and wasn’t just, say, spoken by Don LaFontaine in a commercial or something), then it wasn’t included. Otherwise, anything was fair game. In a world where clever lines (and lots of puns) sold films, one man with nothing to lose selected these as the best ever made.

How movie taglines are born - The Boston Globe How movie taglines are born By Jon Mooallem | February 29, 2004 AMONG TONIGHT'S OSCAR nominees for best picture, "Master and Commander" doesn't have one. "Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" squeaks by with "The Journey Ends." "Lost in Translation"'s offering ("Everyone wants to be found") is cute, but lacking compared to last year's crop: the pathos of "Music was his passion. Survival was his masterpiece" ("The Pianist"), the cocked fist of "America was born in the streets" ("Gangs of New York"), the sass of "If you can't be famous . . . be infamous" ("Chicago"). 2003 was an off year for copy lines, those punchy epigrams printed above or below the film's title in posters and ads. As studios compete in an increasingly cluttered media landscape, a good line, according to one marketing exec, is needed to "reinforce that one iconic image." Writing ad copy for posters and trailers is generally the first step in marketing a film, setting a strategic direction for what are often multimillion dollar campaigns.

This April, the Key Art Awards, a pseudo-Oscars for film marketing sponsored by The Hollywood Reporter, will award its first "Best Print Copy Line" prize after 32 years of honoring virtually everything else -- from best trailer to best "theatrical standee," as those cardboard cut-outs standing by the popcorn counter are known. In-house copywriters at specialized poster design firms (virtually all in Los Angeles) may collaborate with freelancers and the studios' own marketing departments to churn out as many as 1,000 tagline ideas for a given film. Writers are shown a rough cut of the film, a script, or even just synopsis. Turnaround times range from a year to a few days. "I usually sit down and if it's there, it's there. It's not the kind of thing, at least for me, where you sit and stare at your computer screen," says Mike Kaiser of the design firm Concept Arts, who has been writing copy for 25 years.

(His father was a copywriter, and so is his son.) Kaiser will jump around a thesaurus or Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, looking for phrases he can "spin or twist." His most famous line -- "The first casualty of war is innocence," for "Platoon" -- grew from Senator Hiram Johnson's 1917 assertion "The first casualty of war is the truth." Stuart Bauer of the marketing firm BLT & Associates pored over countless radio stations' listener-favorites lists from the 1960s and `70s in search of tagline fodder for last year's "School of Rock." He ultimately pinched a line from Pink Floyd's "The Wall": "We don't need no education." Bauer's line for "Sylvia" ("Life was too small to contain her . . .") alludes to the title of Sylvia Plath's most famous work, "The Bell Jar." For "Scooby-Doo" ("Be Afraid. Be Kind of Afraid.") he reworked the seminal tagline for The Fly ("Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid.") Yes, even taglines can be respun into sequels of sorts.

Kaiser calls it a "cannibalistic effect," citing the numerous permutations of "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water . . ." (Who remembers that the line promoted "Jaws 2," not the original?) The tagline for "Seabiscuit" ("The dreams of a nation rode on a long shot"), he notes, echoes the "classic" line from "Rocky": "His whole life was a million-to-one-shot." Devon Hawker was one of several writers for the "Seabiscuit" trailer, which included the line. Before shooting for the film had even begun, his team pitched ideas using stock footage of old horse races and bits of "The Cider House Rules," which also featured Tobey Maguire in Depression-era clothes. Their copy aimed to get audiences past the horseracing, a minority interest, and on to the human story. "It was about the times and the broken people who were struggling to make a comeback," Hawker says. "`Long shot' was the closest thing to a horseracing term we ever got at." Indeed, strong copy can often distract an audience from less-appealing aspects of a film.

"Often the impulse that made someone make the movie is the very thing that is going to make people put their hands over their eyes and scream `no,"' says one veteran trailer writer. Sometimes, he says, copywriters get a film set entirely on a submarine only to be told by the producers, "Do whatever you want, but for God's sake leave out the [expletive] submarine." Kaiser sees some links between movie copywriting and political sloganeering. Both make "more a call to emotion than a call to intellect," he says. "You're looking for an active response rather than a contemplative response." Indeed, the Bush administration appears especially copy-savvy. The president's "Top Gun"-style speech on an aircraft carrier last May was in essence a live-action movie trailer, with the "Mission Accomplished" banner hovering above its hero like a massive tagline. John Kerry's campaign might want to listen to Kaiser, who suggests that a poster with the candidate's face and the slogan "Bring it on" -- Kerry's frequent taunt to President Bush -- would make "the perfect one-shot for a film on Kerry." Jon Mooallem is a writer based in Brooklyn. © Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.

30 Greatest Movie Taglines | GamesRadar+ 30 Greatest Movie Taglines GoldenEye (1995) The Tagline: "You know the name. You know the number." Why It's Great: Having been off our screens for a good few years, Bond returned in style, leaner, smoother and far less camp than he'd been in years. This tagline embodies all those attributes by oozing cool without trying too hard… If It Was Long-Winded: "You know the name. You know the number. Unless you don't, in which case we're talking about James Bond, 007." Prev The Forty Year Old Virgin (2005) The Tagline: "The longer you wait, the harder it gets." Why It's Great: There's nothing like a good double-entendre, is there? Well, it works for a sex comedy at least. Might not be such a good choice for a Holocaust drama… If It Was Long-Winded: "He's had to wait ages for sex, so understandably, his old chap has got really hard! Wait, that's not how it works, is it? Get the textbook!" Prev Kill Bill vol.

1 (2003) The Tagline: "Here comes the Bride." Why It's Great: It's a brilliant sort-of-pun, and works especially well when accompanied by the image of a blood-spattered, sword-waving Uma Thurman, looking just about as far from bridal as you could possibly imagine. If It Was Long-Winded: "He walked her down the aisle… someone will have to carry her up it again." Prev Chicken Run (2000) The Tagline: "Escape, or die frying." Why It's Great: Not only is it an excellent pun, but it also conjures a rather macabre image for a family film. Think we'll just cancel that KFC… If It Was Long-Winded: "If they don't escape, they'll end up in the deep-fat fryer, so don't think there's nothing at stake. Because there is." Prev Saturday Night Fever (1977) The Tagline: "Catch it." Why It's Great: "Small, but perfectly formed, it works brilliantly in tandem with the title. Anything longer, "Catch the fever" say, would have seemed corny, but this just works.

If It Was Long-Winded: "You put your right leg in, then your right leg out, in out, in out, you shake it all about…" Prev AVP: Alien vs. Predator (2004) The Tagline: "Whoever wins… we lose." Why It's Great: Cool in a geeky kind of way, this one-liner is far snappier and wittier than anything in the script. If It Was Long-Winded: "It doesn't matter whether the Alien beats the Predator, or the Predator beats the Alien, because both of them are monsters, and both of them kill humans." Prev Knocked Up (2007) The Tagline: "What if this guy got you pregnant?" Why It's Great: It swerves the more obvious marketing route of tapping into a young man's fear of responsibility by turning the tables to address the female audience. Seth Rogen's big schlubby face helps sell this one immeasurably. If It Was Long-Winded: "This is Ben. He's unemployed, fascinated by porn and lives with a whole bunch of his stoner buddies.

He just got you pregnant." Prev Office Space (1999) The Tagline: "Work sucks." Why It's Great: Not only is it a callback to director Mike Judge's work on Beavis & Butthead , but it also expresses a sentiment that every passerby can relate to on one level or another. If It Was Long-Winded: "Work sucks. Particularly if you work in IT for a dead-end company run by assholes." Prev Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986) The Tagline: "One man's struggle to take it easy." Why It's Great: It sums up Ferris' modus operandi in a nutshell. Just the right side of the kind of thing you might see printed on a t-shirt. If It Was Long-Winded: "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." Prev Star Wars (1977) The Tagline: "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away." Why It's Great: By employing the language of the fairytale, this one taps into the part in the human psyche that aches to be a child again.

And what better way than to rediscover that childlike sense of wonder than by buying a ticket to Star Wars ? If It Was Long-Winded: "Once upon a tim, there was a young man named Luke. Well, no, actually before that there was a boy named Anakin…" Prev The Truman Show (1998) The Tagline: "On the air. Unaware." Why It's Great: So catchy and so perfectly apposite, it's almost as though the tagline were written as a jumping off point for the film. And we mean that it a good way… If It Was Long-Winded: "Thanks to Big Brother , this is what we've all got to look forward to…" Prev Saving Private Ryan (1998) The Tagline: "The mission is a man" Why It's Great: Punchy, to the point, unhindered by emotion… it's a great tagline that manages to swerve many of the failings of the film itself. Controversy baiters? Us?

If It Was Long-Winded: "Oh say can you see, by the dawn's early light, what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming." Prev Buffalo Soldiers (2001) The Tagline: "War is hell… but peace is fucking boring." Why It's Great: It's a great scene-setter for this most unconventional of army movies. Indeed, it could be a direct quote from Joaquin Phoenix's tearaway soldier, such is its acerbic wit. If It Was Long-Winded: "A war film in peace time… wait, bear with us, it's really funny!" Prev Armageddon (1998) The Tagline: "Earth. It was fun while it lasted." Why It's Great: A witty, understated tagline for a film that could de described as neither. if only they'd used the same flair on the actual script. If It Was Long-Winded: "Already seen Deep Impact ? Come and see it again, now with added explosions." Prev Army Of Darkness (1991) The Tagline: "Trapped in time. Surrounded by evil.

Low on gas." Why It's Great: The second Evil Dead sequel deserves a glibly badass tagline, and this one duly delivers. Although we would have preferred, "Yo! She-bitch! Let's go." If It Was Long-Winded: "My name is Ash and I am a slave. Close as I can figure, the year is thirteen hundred A.D and I'm being dragged to my death. It wasn't always like this…" Prev Jurassic Park (1993) The Tagline: "An adventure 65 million years in the making." Why It's Great: It evokes a nice callback to Spielberg "adventures" of the past (the Raiders re-release was accompanied by the tagline, "The return of the great adventure"), and shows remarkable restraint in not actually using the word "dinosaur". Bravo! If It Was Long Winded: "We have a T-Rex… and a Brachiosaur… and a Triceratops… and Raptors!

Lots of Raptors…" Prev This Is Spinal Tap (1984) The Tagline: "Does for rock and roll what The Sound Of Music did for hills." Why It's Great: Wilfully stupid and totally unhelpful to the prospective punter, it mirrors the film's offbeat sense of humour to a tee. If It Was Long-Winded: "Imagine a concert movie that doesn't get a bit tedious after the first twenty minutes or so. You've just imagined This Is Spinal Tap !" Prev I Am Legend (2007) The Tagline: "The last man on Earth is not alone" Why It's Great: It's a clever bit of wordplay that manages to summarise the plot and arouse the interest all in one sentence. Instantly, the potential audience wants to find out what's out there with him… If It Was Long-Winded: "The last man on Earth has New York all to himself.

At least, he does until nightfall…" Prev Full Metal Jacket (1987) The Tagline: "Vietnam can kill me, but it can't make me care." Why It's Great: As an expression of counter-culture, stick-it-to-the-man bullishness, it's pretty much untouchable. It also sums up Kubrick's view of the conflict in Vietnam rather succinctly. If It Was Long-Winded: "We don't believe in war, we don't believe in peace. How did we end up here again?" Prev There's Something About Mary (1998) The Tagline: "Love is in the hair." Why It's Great: Okay, so it works a to better if you've already seen the movie. And it's a shameless, shameless pun. But taking all that into account, we still love it. Sorry.

If It Was Long-Winded: "Ben Stiller's making a tit of himself again… buy your ticket to find out how he manages it this time!" Prev Apollo 13 (1995) The Tagline: "Houston, we have a problem." Why It's Great: Not only is it already a famous quote instantly recognisable to those in the know, it also draws in the uninitiated by spelling out the gist of the film. There are some astronauts, something goes wrong… you get the idea. If It Was Long-Winded: "Remember that mission to the moon where the astronauts nearly didn't come home? This is the movie of that." Prev Black Christmas (1974) The Tagline: "Last Christmas, you gave me your heart… now I want your eyeballs" Why It's Great: Seasonal cinema is usually blighted by chocolate box imagery and artery-clogging candy cane sentiment. This, on the other hand, bucks that trend somewhat. Nothing says Merry Christmas like the idea of missing eyeballs… If It Was Long-Winded: "Last Christmas, you gave me your heart… now I want your eyeballs. And a Scalextric.

And a new bike (preferably a Raleigh). And Nintendo…" Prev The Fly (1986) The Tagline: "Be afraid. Be very afraid." Why It's Great: One from the less is more school of advertising, and another that's entered the cultural lexicon. When it comes to horror taglines, the vaguer they are, the more effective they tend to be. If It Was Long-Winded: "When a man has his genetic material spliced with that of a fly, the outcome ain't pretty…" Prev Shaun Of The Dead (2003) The Tagline: "A romantic comedy. With Zombies." Why It's Great: Hey, you can't fault it for accuracy! And as high-concept taglines go, we can't think of many that sound more appealing. If It Was Long-Winded: "Remember the Resident Evil episode of Spaced ? Well this is a bit like that, only longer." Prev Superman (1978) The Tagline: "You'll believe a man can fly." Why It's Great: It homes right in on Superman's most awesome ability.

Sure he has super-strength, and eye-lasers are badass and everything, but come on… who wouldn't want to be able to fly? If It Was Long-Winded: "You'll believe that a man can burn holes in things, just by squinting at them. Oh, and fly. He can also fly." Prev Close Encounters Of The Third Kind (1977) The Tagline: "We are not alone." Why It's Great: Beautiful in its simplicity, it establishes the film's sci-fi credentials, whilst hinting that this one will be a tale of wonder rather than horror. If It Was Long-Winded: "There are aliens out there, but not all of them want to kill us. Some of them are just plain curious." Prev Ghostbusters (1984) The Tagline: "Who ya gonna call?" Why It's Great: As well as being unutterably cool in its own right, this one also has the added side effect of conjuring Ray Parker Junior's theme tune in the head of the reader. See? It's playing in your head right now. If It Was Long-Winded: "Who you gonna call in the event of a haunting?

Because if you're after the fire service, they're on a different number…" Prev The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) The Tagline: "Family isn't a word. It's a sentence." Why It's Great: A nice play on words that encapsulates the quirky sense of humour on show in Wes Anderson's domestic dramedy. It's also a sentiment that most people can relate to… If It Was Long-Winded: "If you thought Ben Stiller had it rough in Meet The Parents , wait until you get a load of these guys!" Prev Jaws 2 (1978) The Tagline: "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…" Why It's Great: Jaws ' tagline ("Don't go in the water.") was simplistic but effective, and this one riffs on its predecessor to pleasing effect. Nearly the most famous tagline in movie history. Nearly, but not quite… If It Was Long Winded: "Remember Bruce? Turns out he wasn't the only man-eating shark in existence.

Who knew?" Prev Alien (1979) The Tagline: "In space no one can hear you scream." Why It's Great: It perfectly reflects the film's marriage of sci-fi and horror, in a very catchy soundbite. It's a deliciously ominous way to sell a movie, and one that was guaranteed to pique the interest of the horror crowd, who might not otherwise have assumed the film was aimed at them… If It Was Long-Winded: "Sound can't travel through a vacuum, so when the alien turns up, you won't be able to call for help. Unless you're on the Nostromo, where there is Oxygen." Prev The Greatest Taglines in Horror-Movie History | Movie News | Movies.com Movies.com > Movie News > The Greatest Taglines in Horror-Movie History The Greatest Taglines in Horror-Movie History The Greatest Taglines in Horror-Movie History Tweet Welcome to The Last Horror Blog , a biweekly column on all things horror. Horror distributors have understood the power of a captivating tagline for decades. In fact, I’d argue horror films beat out every other genre when it comes to creating unforgettable ad copy. Seriously, think for a few seconds about the ones you remember.

I bet at least 90% of you instantly thought of things along the lines of Alien’s classic “in space, no one can hear you scream” or Last House on the Left’s “To avoid fainting, keep repeating: 'It's only a movie, only a movie, only a movie...'” Horror films have had some truly unforgettable taglines over the years – presumably because the subject matter’s lurid and low-budget nature often allows for silly wordplay and a certain amount of campiness that would never work for serious movies. The best taglines are a lot like informercials merged with poetry, and crossed with the sideshow at carnivals of days long gone. They promise things, oftentimes impossible things, that we know we need to see despite our better judgment – and they do it in a way that is often surprisingly artistic. With that in mind, here are some of the best horror-film taglines of all time. Each is sure to evoke memories for those who’ve seen the films they’re promoting, but it’s my sincere hope that they might inspire those who haven’t seen these films to actually go and check them out.

“When there’s no more room in Hell, the dead will walk the Earth” – Dawn of the Dead Taglines come about in a number of different ways. Sometimes they’re crafted from the general theme of the film, sometimes they’re a play on words or a joke, and sometimes they’re pulled right from the film’s screenplay. The latter is the case with the unforgettable line that helped sell George Romero’s zombie magnum opus Dawn of the Dead. Ken Foree offers up the terrifying observation in the film as a possible explanation for why the dead have risen from their graves and started to chow down on anyone with a pulse. It’s a really great line partially because of the way its written (it has a certain solemnity to it, particularly in the way Foree delivers it in the movie), and partially because it could be plausible. Romero never really explains why his zombies have come back from the grave in any sort of definitive way – and this explanation seems as good as any. It becomes even more effective because of the biblical implications. If you’re a nonreligious type, you most likely assume there’s some scientific explanation behind this zombie apocalypse – which means if mankind can figure it out, things can get back to normal.

If Hell is just backing up like a clogged toilet, though? That’s a whole other ball game. This tagline sells the film – if you knew nothing at all about Dawn of the Dead and saw that tagline, I’m betting most of you would be all too eager to check it out. I know I would have been. “Herbert West has a very good head on his shoulders... and another one in a dish on his desk.” – Re-Animator Where Dawn of the Dead presents an air of seriousness, Stuart Gordon’s Re-Animator runs in the opposite direction, with equally effective results. Re-Animator is a hilarious and gory reinterpretation of an H.P. Lovecraft story (which is interesting enough, because Lovecraft has been described as many things, but hilarious is not one of them), and the tagline here really communicates that. We can tell from the blurb that it’s going to be gory (he’s got a head on his desk) and funny (also because he’s got a head on his desk).

The line teases the things that make Re-Animator so memorable, yet only scratches the surface of the insanity of it all – because, man, once you see the head on the desk, it’s even crazier than you imagined. This tagline really works because it’s one of the rare ones that lures you in by inspiring a lot of lurid thoughts about what this movie might be – then actually delivers things that are even crazier than what you imagined before seeing it. Plus, it gets bonus points for riffing on the classic Robert Bloch quote where the author reveals he really has the heart of a small boy – that he keeps in a jar on his desk. It’s a win-win. “Who will survive, and what will be left of them?” – The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Tobe Hooper’s 1974 tale of terror works overtime to capture your attention. It’s hard to pass up that title, which promises all sorts of horrible things, and then there’s the tagline, which basically confirms all the horrible images that popped into your head when you read the title are exactly what this film is going to give you.

However, what’s funny about TCM is that it’s really a fantastic exercise in marketing and subverting expectations. The title and tagline promise us a brutal chainsaw massacre, and we certainly get some deaths from the titular tool, but as countless critics have pointed out over the years, TCM isn’t nearly as gory as the marketing of it implies. In fact, for a film about a man wearing a mask made of stitched together human skin hunting down teenagers to chop up with his chainsaw for his cannibal family’s dinner, it’s pretty damn tame. “If Nancy doesn’t wake up screaming, she won’t wake up at all…” – A Nightmare on Elm Street When you couple the tagline with the title, the potential viewer already knows that the “nightmare” aspect of the film is really going to play into dreams somehow. Normally, you read a horror movie title with the word “nightmare” in it and it could have nothing to do with actually sleeping. It’s interesting that the blurb for Craven’s film doesn’t play up Freddy at all. There’s nary a mention of him, choosing instead to focus on Heather Langenkamp’s Nancy.

The poster that accompanies the line gives you a little hint as to what the disfigured killer is all about, the marketing basically keeps Freddy in the shadows – something that was eventually dropped in the sequels, which were progressively less interesting. “The night HE came home.” – Halloween The tagline for John Carpenter’s classic slasher flick is the perfect companion to the film it’s promoting. It's every bit as minimalistic as the feature, proving yet again that sometimes less is more. “The night HE came home” is simple and direct – so simple that it could really be for any movie. The emphasis on “HE” coupled with the title of the film certainly give it a lot of additional oomph. That “he” emphasis really ties it all together – you don’t know who “he” is, but no one who reads that tagline thinks this is a good thing. This isn’t your dad coming home from a tour of duty, in other words. This is some bad stuff headed your way, which ties in nicely with Myers personification as a force of nature in the film. That tagline is great because it’s so simple and vague – and even better because the “he” lives up to and exceeds everything implied in the line.

“They will make cemeteries their cathedrals and the cities will be your tombs” – Demons If Halloween’s tagline is a great example of how simplicity can work in a film’s favor, then this line used to promote Lamberto Bava’s splatterfest Demons is the counter. To be honest, the Demons tagline really oversells the picture – but I love it anyway. It’s got that cheesy apocalyptic grandeur that gets me every time. Unfortunately, there are no cities turning into graveyards in this film – the whole thing takes place inside a movie theater, where a strange mask starts turning the patrons into savage hell beasts. Demons is a great film (with a wildly out-of-left-field ending), and that tagline, along with the spooky looking demons on the cover, would get any self-respecting horror fanatic to shell out the cash for this film. Sure, the blurb might make you think you’re in for something more along the lines of Dawn of the Dead, but remember – sometimes taglines sell the sizzle and not the steak. In this case, the line and the film are awesome – just for very different reasons. “The good news is your date is here.

The bad news is he’s dead.” – Night of the Creeps Like Dawn of the Dead, Fred Dekker’s Night of the Creeps uses one of its best lines of dialogue as a poster tagline. It works just as well here as it did for Romero. Night of the Creeps is filled with classic lines, but few are more enduring than this one -- uttered by Tom Atkins as a horde of undead prom dates descend upon a sorority house. Like Re-Animator, this line lets you know that Night of the Creeps is going to be a horror film, but that it’s also aiming for a few laughs along the way. What’s really interesting about it is that it made me laugh when I saw it on the VHS cover, but it really cracked me up when it actually appears in the movie. That’s proof that a line is really great; when you laugh even more the second time you encounter it, you know it’s good. It’s essentially the perfect line in what might be the perfect B movie. “Abby doesn’t need a man anymore.

The Devil is her lover now!” – Abby William Girdler’s 1974 demonic-possession flick Abby would have been consigned to the annals of low-budget horror history decades ago if not for the classic tagline above. The story finds a female marriage counselor possessed by some sort of sex demon unleashed by her father-in-law (who performs exorcisms in Africa). It’s completely ludicrous and an obvious attempt to cash in on the popularity of The Exorcist. That being said, the tagline is absolutely classic. It’s got the perfect blend of cheesy menace crossed with sexual taboo. Oooh, Abby hooked up with Satan! It’s unfortunate that Abby isn’t nearly as entertaining as its tagline – it could have been one for the ages. “Man is the warmest place to hide” – The Thing John Carpenter makes his second appearance on the list, this time with the tagline for his stunning men-in-peril film The Thing. This marketing line is really great.

It gives us a hint as to what the thing of the title is up to, it creeps us out because being bodily invaded is not something most of us find agreeable, and it even teases the setting (Antarctica) by using the word warmest. Warmest really does double duty there – it hints at the locale while grossing us all out by thinking about something alien being all snuggled up in our soft and hot innards. It’s unfortunate that even such a great tagline couldn’t help The Thing find an audience at the box office back in 1982. The film was a commercial disappointment (it went up against the much more cuddly alien in E.T.), but don’t fret too much – The Thing has gone on to become a bona fide cult classic. It was just a few years ahead of its time. The movie – and the tagline – are still alive and kicking. “Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water” – Jaws 2 The Jaws franchise has had some great taglines.

From the original’s “It’s as if God created the Devil, and gave him Jaws” to the corny but fun “One good bite deserves another,” and then straight on through to “This time, it’s personal”, this is a series that has never hurt for entertaining lines on its posters. However, one of my personal favorites is the line mentioned above, used for Jaws 2. “Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…” Spielberg’s first film was a cultural phenomenon that made people nervous even in swimming pools. Just as that started to pass, here comes Jaws 2 reminding you there’s more than one huge great white out there in the ocean – and that you might want to reconsider swimming in the sea. Jaws 2 was certainly a lesser film than Spielberg’s earlier entry, but this tagline is excellent.

Question: Which film had the tagline 'just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water'?
Answer: JAWS II