“It was what I thought it was and as long as it was what I thought it was going to be fine, which was the movie that I used to leave home for on Saturday afternoon and go and see so I could scream real loud, yell and freak my friends out and do stuff in. It was all about a Saturday afternoon excitement film.” - Samuel L. Jackson

Snakes on a Plane opens this Friday, and I couldn’t be more excited. However, seemingly unlike the rest of the world, I’m not throwing my hands up in forced ironic anticipation. It’s driving me crazy seeing this referred to as a “bad” movie when all reports point that it actually takes itself fairly seriously within its premise. Regardless of how it plays out you can be assured that many moviegoers hoping for another Scary Movie won’t be expecting the level of violence that has been promised.

What’s happening to modern audiences? Why are so many moviegoers attempting to be more “hip” than some of the movies they watch. And why horror movies? People can suspend their disbelief for a movie where a flying man wears his underwear on the outside of his clothes, but a plane full of snakes is pushing it. I regularly see people who can swallow Lord of the Rings and Star Wars without batting an eye organizing “bad movie” nights that are comprised of anything but. It’s gotten to the point where some amateur MST3K players have created a ridiculously unfunny script to be yelled out loud during screenings of Snakes on a Plane, not unlike The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

It may seem that my stance is at odds with the Samuel L. Jackson quote above, but it was his response in interviews that first enticed me into wanting to watch Snakes on a Plane. Since the demise of the Grindhouse and Drive-In circuits, the rise of a monolithic studio system and the retreat of independent horror movie mavens to video, it’s rare that a fast-paced, goal-oriented, exploitation film hits the local theatre. I crave something that delivers exactly what it promises with no frills or tacked-on moral or ulterior motive. And it’s not that I’m against screaming out loud or freaking out friends in the theatre, I just prefer it to be somewhat organic, responding to what’s actually happening onscreen as opposed to ignoring the movie entirely and trying to entertain a roomful of strangers with preconceived notions or, God help us, a script.

To help combat this trend, The Horror Blog will be spending the next week with an emphasis on Snakes on a Plane. Fasten your motherfucking seatbelts.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 14th, 2006 at 1:24 pm and is filed under Coming Soon, Movies, Snakes on a Plane. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.