Snakes on a Plane

Image by Andrew Huff, https://www.flickr.com/photos/deadhorse/110659441

In this week's chapter, I make a reference to Snakes on a Plane, the 2006 movie starring Samuel L. Jackson that's about—you guessed it—snakes on a plane. That's pretty much it. There's a plane. There's snakes on it.  I'd never watched the film before this week, and the only reason I streamed it was that I knew I was going to make that reference, and generally, when I make a pop culture reference, I like to know what it is I'm referencing. 

But is it really necessary for anyone to see this movie? Not really, which is probably why it didn't rake in as much at the box office as the studio expected. 

I'm not demanding that Amazon return the $3.99 I shelled out for the rental, or that the universe give me my 105 minutes back. But the title (and the knowledge that Samual L. Jackson is the kind of person who would agree to be in a movie called Snakes on a Plane) is definitely the best part of this thing. If you never actually see the movie, you're not missing out.

Personally, I think if you're going to make a movie called Snakes on a Plane, you ought to lean into the comedy aspect of it more. When I did laugh, it was usually at a particularly clichéd bit of dialog or because the CGI didn't hold up by today's standards. For a film to work as "camp," it needs to be so bad it's good, but I'm not sure this movie made it all the way around the loop. 

It's actually difficult to say what genre this movie belongs in. I think the writer intended for it to be horror, but it isn't particularly scary (although I suppose it might be if you have a phobia of either air travel or CGI snakes). I'm not even convinced that it has enough action to be called an action film. One of the characters on board the plane is supposed to be a kickboxer, but do we ever see him kickboxing with a snake? Feels like a missed opportunity to me.

I think part of the problem may have been that the people who made this film were confused about what they were making, or else they couldn't agree on it. There was one scene where a couple goes into the airplane's bathroom in order to join the mile high club which felt particularly out of place. As it turns out, it only exists because the studio did five days of reshoots in order to achieve an R-rating, in response to what they thought "fans" wanted.

Snakes on a Plane should probably be seen as a cautionary tale about what can happen when you try to hard to create something marketable instead of focusing on making the end product enjoyable. It could have been a cult classic, but instead it's a B-movie/pop-culture reference that would have faded into obscurity by now if it weren't for the title.