The book was better. That’s the punch line I’ve been toying with for “Snakes on a Plane.”
Why? Because the closest I’ve come to seeing one of the most hyped movies to hit the multiplex in a long time was starting to read, then thumbing through, then putting down the thriller’s “novelization.”
“Based on the Motion Picture,” says the trade paperback cover. And Christa Faust (was there ever a name that more invited a crack about the bargains writers make to pay the rent?) does a credible job of making beach-reading prose out of a screenplay’s shorthand.
Believe it or not, this is no critics’ lament. I stopped reading because a.) even a lite page-
turner takes longer to praise or pan than a summer flick, and b.) I didn’t want to spoil my own guilty pleasure when I slide into a seat this evening, popcorn in hand.
Usually I get to view films before they are released to the public. Not this time.
“I know critics are mad at me beause they haven’t been able to see it,” said “Snakes”
director David R. Ellis on the phone from Los Angeles the other day. “They assume that means the film is bad.”
He’s right, of course. That’s precisely what many of us of us imagine is going on here. After all, there are plenty of movies that skip reviewers, going straight to the audience, and pretty quickly after that to DVD.
But as distributors become more savvy about the built-in audiences for certain films (horror chiefly, but urban and so-called blue-collar flicks, too), they find they can reach to their tried-and-trues without critics who can be all thumbs.
By now, you likely know that Samuel L. Jackson is an FBI agent charged with getting a witness to a gang hit from Hawaii to L.A. Only one problem – insert perfect title here – the mob boss is perversely inventive.
Other reluctant herpetologists on Pacific Air Flight 121 include a whipsmart flight attendent on her last trip before entering law school (Julianna Margulies), a rapper and his bodyguards, an heiress, and a “which team is he batting for” flight attendent.
“Snakes on a Plane” is trying to pull off a kind of post-modern coup. Few movies have lived up to their cult-aspiring machinations. One could argue that’s part of what distinguishes a cult classic.
Yet, it’s silly to ignore the strange hoopla about the thriller on a jet. Let’s begin with one of the most ridiculouly naked titles this side of the porn industry. As ace snake wrangler Jules Sylvester said on the phone with a laugh, “They’re not trying to hide anything with that title.”
Nor are they backing away from the violence in their film, pushing past the PG-13 rating studios favor for summer fare.
“They wanted me to make it PG-13,” Ellis said. So, he and Jackson reluctantly gave distributor New Line the movie they asked for. But the director, star and Internet enthusiasts won out.
“We really had to go for it.” Ellis said. New Line gave him the money to shoot five more days. “We increased the violence. And there’s more nudity for the Mile High Club.”
Also, “Snakes” couldn’t keep a PG-13 and hold on to the kind of obscenity-laden Samuel L. Jackson phrase perfected with “Pulp Fiction,” and parodied by Dave Chappelle.
An R meant, Ellis admitted, “We got to have Sam say the line the Internet wanted him to say.” Quoting it here would resemble the early rounds of “Wheel of Fortune,” there’d be too many blanks.
The other day, a colleague forwarded a poster mash-up of the campy horror of “Snakes” with the real horror of Islamist terrorists. Called “Liquids on a Plane,” it features a mock up of Jackson, saying … well, it’s just as unquotable as the movie.
Ellis admits to his own web-spawned faves.
“I liked that DC Lugi one where he sings ‘Someone Tell Sam Jackson He’s My Bro.”‘ Dressed in Bono drag, the
youtube.com performer croons “I know you can’t talk without cussing at all.”
Whether it turns out to be a good movie, or better, that marvelously elusive beast, a great-bad movie, “Snakes on a Plane” has quickly wriggled its way into the collective Internet imagination.
There is already an entry for the movie on Wikipedia. Google the title and you get 15 million hits – up a million from when distributor New Line sent out production notes with urban legends about the movie.
Sure, those numbers are squirrely, but they say something teasing about the interest in a movie that’s hasn’t been seen. This isn’t passive interest. This is the kind of participatory imagination that makes SimCities so successful, that fuels the countless Web-based backstories for the “Lost” characters.
Even snake wrangler Sylvester, 39 years in the reptile-handling biz, hasn’t seen anything quite like it.
“Unbelievable isn’t it?” he said. “It seems to be nonstop. I get 10 calls a day from different people worldwide.”
As one of those callers, I had to ask, What was his casting process for the 450 snakes he handled on that plane?
“If he bites me. He’s no good,” he said. “If I can’t put him on me, I can’t put him on an actor.”
“Snakes on a Plane”
R for language, a scene of sexuality and drug use and intense sequences of terror and violence|1 hour, 45 minutes|THRILLER|Directed by David R. Ellis; written by John Heffernan and Sebastian Guitierrez; photography by Adam Greenberg: starring Samuel L. Jackson, Julianna Margulies, Nathan Phillips, Bobby Cannavale, Flex Alexander, Todd Louiso, Sunny Mabrey, Kenan Thompson |Opens today at area theaters.
