The optimization process and recommendations:

1. Create Optimal Indexes (modified query below): The recommended indexes are an integral part of this optimization effort and should be created before testing the execution duration of the optimized query.
2. Replace Join With Exists To Avoid Redundant Grouping (modified query below): When a joined table isn’t used anywhere other than in the WHERE clause, it's equivalent to an EXISTS subquery, which often performs better. In cases where the DISTINCT or GROUP BY clause contains only columns from the Primary key, they can be removed to further improve performance, as after this transformation, they are redundant.

Optimal indexes for this query:

ALTER TABLE `movie_info` ADD INDEX `movie_info_idx_info_id_info_movie_id` (`info_type_id`,`info`,`movie_id`);
ALTER TABLE `title` ADD INDEX `title_idx_kind_id` (`kind_id`);

The optimized query:

SELECT
        DISTINCT title.id,
        title.title,
        title.production_year 
    FROM
        title 
    WHERE
        (
            title LIKE 'a%' 
            AND title.kind_id = 1
        ) 
        AND (
            EXISTS (
                SELECT
                    1 
                FROM
                    movie_info 
                WHERE
                    (
                        movie_info.movie_id = title.id 
                        AND movie_info.info_type_id = 8 
                        AND movie_info.info = 'USA'
                    )
            )
        ) LIMIT 75