What should this have been called? “Life” is why this flopped

I agree completely. The name tanked this movie. Should have been called something like Alien Resurgence. It had some big stars and effects, but it was just a typical monster movie. Giving it an arty title wasnt gonna bring in that fanbase.

Calvin!

I know you’re trying to get some ideas flowing, but all of those examples sound like film titles from the 1950s. Much worse.

All of those titles are cliche and terrible. Life isn’t a great title either, but it’s better than those SyFy channel original titles.

Life is better than most netflix produced films. They should have gotten netflix to produce it and then they wouldn't have to worry about the box office numbers - then again, it's possible that it may have recovered losses via streaming services.

As for the title - your examples are.... by far more cliche and prone to failure. Life is fine - Calvin is also a decent title, as suggested by another poster. Or they could go with the mission name title - or something along those lines.

Hmm... I keep thinking they should not have put Ryan Raynolds in this film, or perhaps kept him out of the trailer. In fact, I have a big issue with the trailer - the music did not convey the tone of the film well - the horror/action elements did not translate well, because the music was crap (in the trailer).... They should have gotten Michael Bay to do a trailer. He creates the shittiest scifi films, but he sells them with his trailers. And perhaps they should have gotten a bigger female star - and again, removed Ryan Reynolds, because his voice tone.... always sounds like it's on the verge of cracking a joke, which really doesn't fit this film (if they got got him to lower his voice, perhaps he'd still be ok).

"Mars Extinction", maybe? That was what they found out, IIRC. Then, the ending would let you know that it isn't going to be limited to Mars, as it did.

Even though "Life" is good, it could also be called "Resillience"

This word reflects both the astronauts and the organism.

I think they called it "Life" to indicate themes of the film. The astronauts find life, it is life like and unlike ourselves (alien, but still recognisable as life). Then it's a fight for that word: life. While I don't think it's a perfect title, it does speak to what the movie is.

The succinctness of the title is appealing, too. It's one word, and it's a BIG little word ("Life" as a concept is huge). If anything, I don't think the film lived up to its title, being as it was, basically a remake of Alien. The title hinted that they would discover things about the nature of life and what life is.

So, it's not the best title - I agree with you - but I think it's pretty good and mostly did what it wanted to do - what it was intended to do.

I'm not sure what I'd call it other than that, but the improvement would have to steer me towards the ominousness without hitting it too on the nose.