The Real Story Behind Those Film Titles

1. The Constant Gardener This film is about my dad. It involves a shed, a lot of pottering, possibly some tweed trousers and a fool proof plan for watering the lawn during a hosepipe ban. The Action centres around dummy runs of the Hosepipe Ban Plan where you cling to the edge of your seat as he attempts to outwit the hosepipe police (whom you never see, but the local news always assures you are there). There’s a hilariously tragic scene where the cat gets red paint in his ear fooling everyone into thinking he has a brain tumour that has burst. I kid you not.

2. Twenty Eight Days Later My Mother stars here as Neurotic Woman #1, it is set in the eighties with appropriate costumes, although My Mother still wears blue eye shadow and flares and uses words like groovy, it was the only time she was hip and she’s staying there. I am in my teens and the title of the film refers to the calendar she kept on the fridge door to remind her when to start worrying about a late period. Mine not hers.

3. Pride and Prejudice My sister returns to Africa to fight for lion’s rights.

4. Dumbo I marry my Husband, let my dad give me away unsupervised and without a map, ask my sisters to be bridesmaids and allow them to choose their own dresses; one is full length Barbie style pink designed to show cleavage and snag the Best Man, the other Hollywood red carpet in preparation for the real thing. My Mother is allowed to attend ungagged.

5. Forrest Gump A camping trip goes horribly wrong, two year old is being potty trained and sleeps with us in the tent. We rename the film Forrest Dump.

6. Rambo Husband’s chance to shine. Shot entirely in front of the bathroom mirror when he thinks nobody is looking. Straddles the comedy/horror genres.

7. Herbie Goes Bananas My brother takes to the weed, My Mother finds one of his Special Cookies and eats it. The police attend. The cleaner attends. There is an interesting scene with a broom handle and a jay cloth. No one ever mentions it again. Ever.

8. Jaws: My sister gets braces. My brother invests in industrial magnets. She spends a week stuck to the boot of his car. He cleaned her for free.

9. Dirty Dancing: Centres around the end of any wedding attended by my parents. A little too much sherry is imbibed, inhibitions are shed, as are clothes and they raunch around the dance floor convinced they are Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey. The image haunts you for months and causes intermittent blindness.

10. It’s A Wonderful Life It is, really, and I wouldn’t have them any other way