September 9, 2006

Snakes On A Plane (2006) ***

Seeing ''Snakes On A Plane'' in a movie theatre was like a screening of ''The Rocky Horror Picture Show''. Fans were waving rubber snakes, making rattle noises, and applauding furiously every time Samuel L. Jackson said something intense. Some of his lines actually weren't in the script. They originated in an anticipatory internet parody of the movie, and were added to the film long after the end of principal photography, during reshoots. It is probably the first known case of the film actually being co-written on the Internet, by its future fans. The blogs are taking over Hollywood! Needless to say, the film is great. It's campy to the extreme. Very funny, but also quite scary. Especially if you hate snakes. Predictably, the first victims of the snakes is a couple in a plane toilet. Their steamy attempt to join the ''Mile High Club'' is thwarted by an excited snake eager for a threesome. That scene, with Samantha McLeod, was also added in reshoots, due to intense pressure from bloggers. But the film also has a serious side to it. It is, quite clearly, an allegory about terrorism (it's no accident that it's being released just before the 5th anniversary of 9/11). The film was originally called ''Pacific Air Flight 121'' (a clear reference to ''United 93'') and it's quite obvious that the snakes refer to Islamic terrorists.