Plus it has Sam Jackson in it, who seems to be enjoying the popularity of it just as much as the rest of us.
Stoats on a Boat.
I’m so excited about this I can hardly… well… hang on… Turns out I’m not excited at all. They’ve made a movie. It might be pretty good. w00t. [throws confetti]
I’m predicting that this will be a horribly disappointing movie that people really want to be good.
Even if the movie is terrible, seeing it in the theater on opening night with hundreds of other people who are genuinely enthusiastic to be there will be a lot of fun.
Well, I hope it’s good, but I’m just not willing to get my hopes up for it, is all.
It turns out a theatre near by is having a Thursday night “Midnight” showing (it’s actually at 10 or 11) that my friends and I are planning on going to.
[tounge firmly in cheek]
I just regret that I have not had a chance to read the novel yet. I hate going to see a movie without first reading the book on which it is based, but I suppose I will have to make an exception this time.
[/tounge firmly in cheek]
My asshole friends in Chicago are making a big deal over the opening. They have this whole weekend planned, all revolving around Snakes on a Plane.
I hate them. I hate you all, you and your stupid movie that will probably never open in Bulgaria and it wouldn’t even be funny because Bulgarians wouldn’t even get why a movie called Zmyii na Edin Camolet is even funny.
Jerks. Have fun without me. See if I care.
I too will be there opening night, with a bunch of my friends, and I think it will be such an awesome time. I don’t expect it to be high art, just fun.
Jackson has stated that it may be called “Mo’ Mothafuckin Snakes on Mo’ Mothafuckin Planes”. That might be pushing it, but “Mo’ Snakes on Mo’ Planes” sounds feasible.
Having actually seen the book at the bookstore, I have to admit being astonished at the size of the thing. It’s a rather thick book, especially considering it’s based on a movie script and even moreso considering it’s based on a movie that doesn’t look like it has a particularly complex plot. Did they accidently hire a novelization writer who just got really into writing descriptions of the various snake species, lengthy characterization for the players, background stories, etc? And I checked, it’s not in 24pt font.
Turtles In The Chunnel!
Chunks in my bunk!
…so, a friend and I bought the novel, and it’s pretty much as awesome as you’d expect. Hokey backstories for every characters, overdramatic descriptions of all the actions, snake personifications, and my personal favorite sentence (the first encounter with Sammy J’s character):
LITERARY GENIUS, YO.
I’d just have to figure out a way to get one of those spring loaded jumping snakes into an unsuspecting person’s popcorn.
This is the most brilliantly marketed movie I have seen in a very long time.
I first hear about it back in August of ’05 with this blog entry. It links to an article in which Samuel L Jackson says that he insisted that the title of the movie be “Snakes on a Plane” rather than Pacific Air One-Twenty. My friend who sent me the article said that people were planning on seeing it because they expected it to be bad. They were making fun of the title and photoshopped posters like this one. We made plans to go see it when it came out with some of our geeky friends.
Our interest was fueled by the photoshopped posters and various ytmnds. If you go to ytmnd.com and search on snakes, you can see various ytmnds about the moving going back to August of last year. Some of my favorite ones are http://snakeburger.ytmnd.com/ , http://littlesoap.ytmnsfw.com/ , http://planesnakes.ytmnd.com/ , (warnings, sounds and cursing). Because we were making fun of it, the phrase “snakes on a plane” came to be used on forums and in irc chat topics to indicate pointlessness. The internet popularity was noticed by the producers who immediately capitalized upon it. They went back and reshot the movie, added the “motherfucker” line which was made up by the internet. They created videos which look like ones that fans would make. An example here of one that is thought to be official. (a fanmade one. There were photoshop contests on fark where people were told that their creation might get made into an official poster. LA Times noticed the phenomena and had an article about it which can be found here. At comic con, a huge convention for comic fans, Samuel L Jackson, a snack handler and the producers spoke to a packed room about their movie. I can’t find a good clip on what they talked about online, but it was hilarious. Further increasing the popularity is the SoaP parties hosted by websites like Fark. There is no fark party in my area, so I am going to get together with my fellow SoaP fans and throw our own.
I’ve had a lot of people say to me “why are you going to see that movie, it looks horrible!” But we don’t expect it to be good, we just expect it to be entertaining. I am going for the experience, the movie is only secondary.
A snake handler, not a snack handler. You can see a short clip of the comic con panel here (warning, lots of cursing)
Chimps on a blimp.
I think it’s safe to assume that any humor purposely placed in this movie will be on a level cavemen would find funny and that the residents of the Rose Valley might find it “low.” I also assume that most of Samuel L. Jackson’s oeuvre eventually makes it there; this isn’t Emma Thompson we’re talking about.
You can test the locals for which have potential as post-modern ironists when you explain, "It’s about Zmyii and they’re on a Camolet!" and sign up anyone who nods knowingly for the Bulgarian SDMB.
Only if the movie takes itself seriously, and I’m not sure that’s going to happen.