'Snakes on a Plane' Takeoff Gets Direct Link to Hollywood
By Jacqueline Trescott
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 8, 2006
The titles of movie thrillers tend toward the quick, macho, boom! variety. "Firewall." "Inside Man." "The Sentinel." Lofty, bold labels that resonate with gravity and danger and import.
Then there's "Snakes on a Plane."
Brian Finkelstein, a first-year student at Georgetown University Law School, saw the title of the upcoming movie and turned it into a joke. And the joke turned into Internet buzz, and the buzz has turned into a feverish parlor game, making Finkelstein a short-term celebrity.
"When I first heard the title, I was a little shocked. The title seemed so obvious. But then I became enamored of the title," says Finkelstein, 26. To monitor the summer movie's pre-release life, he started a Web site, Snakesonablog.com.
"I thought it would be a joke for me and my friends. I never thought it would generate this excitement," Finkelstein says.
What he has inspired is a raucous conversation, mainly online, about a movie due in theaters Aug. 18. Other blogs appeared. New Line Cinema, the studio behind the horror-action flick, is paying attention. When the director went back to do more filming, he says he incorporated some of the blogger's ideas. At least the tone of them.
"The manna-buzz the movie is getting right now is a nonstop joy ride. It's a blessing," says "Snakes" director David R. Ellis. The movie is easy to imagine: Samuel L. Jackson, an FBI agent, is escorting a witness on a plane over the Pacific Ocean. An assassin wants to kill the guy and decides to scare him and every other traveler with a crate of snakes. In the film's trailer, big and bad Jackson says, "Enough is enough. I've had it with these snakes."
"You don't have to be hip to get this movie. Any person with the slightest bit of irony gets it," says Jeffrey Wells, editor of the film news blog Hollywood-elsewhere.com.
That's exactly what Ellis thought. "When they called me and told me the title, part of me said, 'That is a genius title,' and another part said, 'You got to be kidding,' " recalls Ellis, who directed the thrillers "Final Destination 2" and "Cellular."
It's obvious, it's fun, it's chilling. Though Jackson may not be his usually menacing self, next to his co-stars -- 500 live snakes, from a 20-foot python to a 5-inch eyelash viper, according to Ellis.
"No one is going to expect the subtle changes of 'Shawshank Redemption,' " says Finkelstein.
With lightning speed, Finkelstein's Web site became not only the place to exchange views about the title but a forum for satirical cartoons, poems, music videos, animated videos and submissions for trailers. The songs ranged from "Fly Snakes Fly" to "Baby, Baby, Baby (Shed Yo Skin)." And the posters took off on other movie products, suggesting "How Snakes Got Their Groove Back" and "Camels on a Submarine."
"They have a market for their movie before the movie is done," says Finkelstein, who is claiming 10,000 hits a day on the blog.
Finkelstein grew up in Westchester County, N.Y., and graduated from Tufts University. He worked backstage in a few theaters and festivals, mainly in Boston, before moving to Washington.
Even during the principal filming, Internet film junkies began to talk.
"We had changed the name of the film. 'Snakes on a Plane' -- it was hard to get some actors to read it," says Ellis. (The studio tried out other titles, including "Pacific Air Flight 121.") "Then we found out the Internet folks were really mad at us for changing it. Sam [Jackson] went on talks shows and said we are changing it back. We were listening to them."
As this conversation was bubbling up, New Line last month ordered five more days of filming. In an unusual move, the studio said it was adding footage to get an R rating (as opposed to the more common practice of modifying racy scenes to earn a PG-13). The Internet fans wanted Jackson to sputter, "I want these [bleeping] snakes off the [bleeping] plane." And then there's the question of who first dreamed up the idea for a snake biting off someone's privates: Ellis says the production team had the idea before the Web chatters suggested it. Only in Hollywood.
The attempt to get an R rating was unusual, but the buzz showed what kind of audience -- and its age -- the film would get. "With a PG-13, you are only allowed to say [bleep] once. And R-rated horror films do really well," says Ellis. "PG-13 animations do well, but a PG-13 horror film, I don't know. And we added a little bit of nudity."
New Line, for its part, isn't saying much. "We are delighted that fans have taken an early interest in 'Snakes on a Plane.' We plan to build on the growing buzz over the next few months as we head into the August release," says its official statement.
Wells thinks New Line should push up the release date and take advantage of the buzz. "If you wait until August, the fans are going to be saying, 'Oh, this is finally out.' " But he observes, "The fact that people are making up songs -- how many people are making songs about 'Mission: Impossible III?' With the excitement, it is going to be a lot of fun when it opens, the sort of communal experience."
Indeed, Ellis says the studio considered moving the opening date earlier in the crowded summer blockbuster release schedule. "We definitely looked at it. There were two weekends that are free. We didn't want to go up against 'MI 3's' second weekend. So we are going to stay there, and the challenge is to help the buzz and help it grow," says Ellis.
Suspicious minds may wonder if New Line is paying Finkelstein to maintain his site as some sort of grass-roots marketing initiative, but he says that's not the case. "They have given me absolutely nothing. In fact, I am in the hole for the Web domain and the design," says Finkelstein, who did the design himself. "I do them for fun." The studio confirms it has not paid him.
Finkelstein says he has had a few "private conservations" with New Line folks, and he always asks first if the movie studio is going to sue him. "They say no. But they let it be known they knew what was going on. It is to their benefit to let it continue," he says.
And for Finkelstein to enjoy his spring moment. While he's writing a term paper on the Fourth Amendment and curtilage, he's been giving interviews to "Paula Zahn Now" on CNN and "Countdown With Keith Olbermann" on MSNBC. One of his early wishes was to attend the premiere, and he has 500 signatures on the Web site in support of his goal. "I have never been to a Hollywood premiere," says Finkelstein. Ellis says he should stop worrying. His tickets are ready. "We talked about Brian in the marketing meeting, and we have got to fly him out," says Ellis.
Snakes on the red carpet, natch.
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