Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Toronto, ON, Canada Gender:  Posts: 3,295 Thanks: 9 Thanked 44 Times in 34 Posts Points: 187,115.97 Bank: 87,527.80 Total Points: 274,643.77 | Snakes on a Plane - Cult Phenomenon of 2006 (or is it?)
If the old topic wasn't closed, I would have posted this there. From last Saturday's Toronto Star: Quote: For a good time, just add snakes
Snakes on a Plane: The best/worst movie title ever
Blog obsession gives movie a built-in fan base
Jan. 28, 2006. 01:00 AM
MALENE ARPE
POP CULTURE WRITER
So, you're on a plane, right? And you're all uncomfortable and the fat guy next to you smells bad then ... crap. It just got worse, 'cause the whole stinking plane is full of snakes!
The most highly anticipated action movie of the year is neither the new Superman nor X-Men 3. And forget about The Da Vinci Code and Ultraviolet.
The movie engendering the highest level of fevered anticipation on the Web is Snakes on a Plane.
It stars Samuel L. Jackson as FBI agent Flynn who is transporting a witness to a crime when someone opens up a big box of snakes in a bid to kill the witness. Thus, we have a Plane! Full! Of! Snakes! See, as opposed to, say, a cryptic and confusing title like V for Vendetta, with Snakes on a Plane, what you think you're going to get is exactly what get: A planeload of snakes. And who doesn't love that?
According to movie lore, when New Line planned to change the title last year to Pacific Air Flight 121, Jackson insisted the original name stay, telling an interviewer: "That's the only reason I took the job: I read the title."
Good thing too. Thanks to the glorious title, and the ass-whupping star power of Jackson, the movie has become a Web phenomenon.
The fan base for the movie, which is scheduled for release on Aug. 18, is growing daily, as witnessed by a cottage industry of phony Snakes on a Plane spinoffs:Variety even ran a story headlined "New Line's `Snakes' slithers into zeitgeist."
This is the kind of free publicity you get when you stop making boring movies like Capote and Syriana and Brokeback Mountain and stuff where you don't even know what they're about until you end up sitting there looking at boring stuff because you thought Breakfast on Pluto was some amazing space war movie and The Squid and the Whale was totally about underwater monsters fighting to the death at like, 20,000 feet under the surface!
Which they're not.
So that's why Snakes on a Plane — Snakes! On a freaking plane! — is so awesome. The title says it all. And all is good.
We've managed to get hold of a couple of pages of the script. And it's full of snakes. Crawling around on a plane. Consider it our own contribution to New Line's brilliant — if completely unintentional — free publicity campaign: Int. Plane. Day. Handheld camera zooms in on colourful snake slithering around old lady's feet. Flynn, who's been looking at his witness with grim concentration, notices the snake from the corner of his eye.
Flynn: F--k! It's a motherf--kin' snake. It's on the plane!
Old lady passenger: Oh my God. Oh my God. There's a snake in my loafer.
Close-up of Flynn looking angry and squinting and determined. Another snake hisses in a coffee cup. It's the coffee cup belonging to Flynn's witness.
Flynn: You bastard-ass snake-sucker. Get away from my witness. His testimony is going to bring down the f--kin' cartel. The cartel! I'm gonna take that snake and...
The witness makes a whimpering sound and points wildly to at least 500, maybe 800 snakes emerging from luggage bins, serving carts, lavatories and the bras of a cheerleading squad. Flight attendant faints.
Flynn: That's it, f--king snake-ass reptile, you hissed at the wrong goddamn guy! Prepare to reach thy righteous damnation! I'm gonna Raid your python ass, son-of-a-low-born-dog...
Witness whimpers and cowers. We see snakes of various sizes and colours crawling out of the pants of passengers. Some passengers start foaming at the mouth. Flynn draws his awesomely huge gun and aims at a pile of snakes.
Flynn: (in flinty voice) Yo, snake. Rattle this!
Snake guts fly everywhere. Some of the guts hit a girl with red hair.
Flynn: (to the witness) Well I'll be. It's a goddamn Copperhead! (Laughs, then turns back to snakes.) You want some more of this? Huh! Do you? I'm f--kin' going. (Laughs.)
Inside cockpit. Pilot is sweatin and shaking, trying to radio for help.
Pilot: Repeat. We have snakes on the plane. 11-3. Over. Repeat. Plane full of snakes. (static) ... Vector 10-3.7X. Snakes. Everywhere. Over. Repeat. Argggggg ...
Snake bites pilot in the eye. Eye juice squirts gratuitously. Or maybe there should just be a popping sound, like a burst balloon. In any case, he moans in agony and dies. Shot to establish the plane is now without a pilot. Plane shakes violently.
Passenger: We're going down! (screams)Flynn: The only motherf--kin' thing going down is that cottonmouth boa garter pile of sh-- over in that corner by that old dead lady with them ugly-ass loafers.
Flynn aims. But he's out of bullets. He throws the gun down.
Flynn: I never lost a witness yet and no cobra-ass heap of snakes is gonna make me. (Looks at witness) With the lord as my shepherd, you will stop whimpering. ... Fool.
Flynn picks up a big wooden stick. (Note: must find way to show why there would be a big wooden stick on the plane. Consider writing in an ice-hockey participant.)
Flynn: I'm gonna mash me some snake.
Raises stick.
Cut to control tower.
Flight controller: We've lost contact. We've lost contact. X-five-longitude! Last thing I heard was something about rakes on the main. Or maybe it was lake on the plains. Or cakes on the train. Why would the pilot of a plane be talking about cakes on a train? Or. Oh no! The plane! It's full of snakes! Lord have mercy on us all!
Int. Cockpit. Day. Captain's body lies prone on the floor. Giant albino python coils itself around captain's seat and studies the control panel. Flicks a few switches with forked tongue. Gingerly lifts up headset with its mouth. We can hear urgent voice of flight controller. Python winks ominously at camera.
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