It’s been about a year since the Snakes on a Plane phenomenon hit the internet. Just over a month ago, the DVD was released, bringing the movie cycle to a near close.
I purchased the DVD today and was admittedly a bit disappointed. After all that transpired online with this movie, I expected New Line Cinema to release two versions of the film to DVD; one studio version, entitled “Pacific Flight 121,” and the final blog-inspired screen version, “Snakes On A Plane.” Alliance Atlantis (Canadian Distributor) opted to include only the theatrical release, coupled with a 10 minute featurette chronicling the online happenings of perhaps the greatest internet-hyped movie of all time.
The film opened on August 18th 2006, grossing only $15.5 million on its opening weekend. By the second weekend, it had fallen to 6th place with $6.4 million in box-office receipts. In the end, S.O.A.P. generated approximately $59,377,419 on the big screens worldwide. Echoing the sentiments of many publications, The NY Times reported that after all the “hype online, Snakes on a Plane is letdown at box office” and Entertainment Weekly reported that the film was an “internet-only phenomenon.”
It’s my estimation that the flaw was in the additional footage. Pushing a film from a PG-13 to an R rating was a bad business move by all means. The fans most likely to support this picture couldn’t get in to see it. But let’s be frank. The movie was pretty bad. So bad I loved it. Looking back, the studio should be happy with a near $60 million haul. After all, “Tail Sting” was a film with essentially the same premise as Snakes on a Plane, but with scorpions, and it was released directly to video back in 2001.
To recap the phenomenon, let’s take a look back at the year of Snakes on Planes.
Snakes on a Plane (S.O.A.P.) generated some remarkable internet buzz in early 2006. Some of the earlier conversations began around a blog posting from the film’s screenwriter Josh Friedman, “I find your lack of faith disturbing.” It seems Friedman was offered the opportunity to work on the picture and he jumped at it with one stipulation – the title was not to be changed. Of course, (as the legend goes) the title had indeed been changed to Pacific Flight 121, and having placed his foot in his mouth, his opportunity to work on the film disappeared. Blogging about his amazement created a link feeding frenzy and word spread quickly.
Shortly after, SnakesOnABlog.com appeared on the landscape. This blog, created and authored by Brian Finkelstein, was a brain fart waiting for reinforcements. Basically Finkelstein’s plan was to blog his progress in trying to get tickets to the premier of the movie. As the internet hype grew around the title of the film, people started to discover Finkelstein’s blog too. Finkelstein was quick to react and expanded his blog to included plot, soundtrack and poster submissions. Snakes on a blog was quickly becoming the “go to” place for all things snakes on planes.
March 2006 saw the launch of the blog SnakesOnStuff.com. These guys asked for photos of, well, snakes on stuff. Tons of photos were submitted, including snakes on hamsters, snakes on a baby and a new internet darling, snakes on a pug.
Snakes on a Plane then entered the western lexicon, reflected in the Urban Dictionary as
…a simple existential observation that has the same meaning as ‘Whaddya gonna do?’ or ‘Shit Happens.’ Taken from the upcoming Samuel L. Jackson movie of the same name, and immortalised by screenwriter Josh Friedman on his blog post of Wednesday, August 17, 2005.
Much of the fan art for the film included the now famous line “I have had it with these mother fucking snakes on this mother fucking plane!” and this inspired New Line to authorize an additional 11 minutes of footage (5 days of shooting) to include the now famous Samuel L. Jackson line. This additional footage pushed the rating of the film from a PG 13 to an R rating because of additional gore and nudity.
Another fan website “Blank on a Blank” called for video submissions to fill in the blanks. Many submissions showed how crazy this idea had grown: “Raccoons on a Space Shuttle,” “Ducks on a Motorcycle,” and “Sloths on a Tank” just name a few.
Rightly so, New Line Cinema offered premier passes to all of the leading S.O.A.P bloggers and to Dave Coyne, the comedian who did the impersonation “casting” video. They also threw a bloggers afterparty and showed them all a good time in appreciation.
Here are just a couple of the fan generated videos.
The most famous example, Snakes on a Plane Casting
The most bizzare example, Snakes on a Home Birth
I think S.O.A.P. has earned it’s inevitable place as a TV matinee staple, every Sunday on Spike TV for the rest of time.
S.O.A.P. A radical Do.
Too bad it’s radically done.
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10 Responses to “Did S.O.A.P. Fly?”
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February 4th, 2007 at 10:48 pm
A year after the hype… Did “Snakes on a Plane” fly?…
Its been about a year since the Snakes on a Plane phenomenon hit the internet. Just over a month ago, the DVD was released, bringing the movie cycle to a near close. But now that the numbers are in, did Snakes on a Plane deliver on the internet hype or…
February 5th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
…or was SOAP just another MIT here in this brightly colored thread we call an SNA. OK, my apology, this is not another rip on the overuse of computer acronyms… I’m just wondering about the effort put into considering the impact of the threads generated by “Snakes on a Plane”, which most likely will go down as just another ‘moment in time’ in this clever conversational cacophony we seem to disparately want to define as “social networking”.
Another moment in time like the “Dean Scream” or a “Dick in a Box”.
New Line Cinema’s failed attempt to “recapture” the buzz generated by the chatter around SOAP is no more surprising than relative failures of”Jaws II, Jaws III or Grizzly”… er, sorry folks; while you were in a meeting, we simply, moved on…
Of course, there’ll always be a lingering residual and maybe, if you’re lucky, the odd revival [I fondly go back to the Trunk Monkey from time to time, and reminis with friends while watching the ol' loose change comedies]…
At the risk of sounding like a sentimental old fool, again, here on Collin’s blog… Lessons learned: You can attempt to roll the schoolyard chatter into a more bites per minute mockery and give us a stupider, hungrier shark; OR you can resist the urge to simply put TWO horses heads into our beds and generate a quite lovely Oscar winning sequel… Either way; my pals around the water cooler will ALWAYS come up with better jokes about your products than your own creative department ever will.
All said, I can’t wait to see Hilliary’s attempt to “recapture the magic” of the first three weeks and four day of Howard Deans run up to ’04s primary campaign.
February 5th, 2007 at 6:57 pm
Oh, how I love this movie. I really did enjoy the blog documentary on the DVD but Collin, you are right, it was lackingon other extra features.
However, when I bought mine the day after it released, Blockbuster was giving out these 27 inch snake gummi-worms (gummi-snakes?) when you purchased the DVD.
They were super tasty.
February 5th, 2007 at 7:51 pm
wow… you kind of… well… nailed it!
thanks gordo.
SoaP is another example of something that happened, and we must move on. I would not tie a marketing plan around anything that went down with snakes on a plane. I would however, study it closely as a case study in PR. There is a lot to sink your teeth into there.
thanks for the comment.
collin
February 5th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
Zoe
Great to hear from you!
The candy snake sounds like a great promo. (It is my estimation that free Candy makes a great promo no matter what!) One of my favorite promo’s was for the John Waters movie “Pecker”. On the way out of the theatre, they handed out a tea-bag printed with a “Pecker” logo.If you have seen this movie, you will understand why it is funny. That was about 10 years ago… I still bring it up, I still laugh.
cheers
collin
February 6th, 2007 at 8:26 am
Samuel L. Jackson’s middle name is “mutha……
I am feeling a little nostalgic. It is was just over a year ago when I first saw the trailer for Snakes on Plane and fell in love. It’s not often that movies come out like this….soooooo bad but oh so good. Usually, movies are just bad.
It w…
February 6th, 2007 at 12:54 pm
I would not tie a marketing plan around anything that went down with snakes on a plane. I would however, study it closely as a case study in PR.
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This is the crux of what I will be looking for in your blog Collin… As marketers do we ‘actively’ try to create these moments in time; do we just let them happen; OR perhaps take the middle ground, do we somehow try to inspire them?
I feel a bit out of touch here as its been quite some time since I’ve worked on an inspirational piece… [I think you would agree, that I DO have experience with success on that end].
The best things I have seen often appear to me as to have been left to happen; and the worst are obviously attempts at trying to make things happen… So…
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On another note: I recently received an email from an old associate stating that he needed help on the a “next generation” Social Networking Application. I would only hope he’s not ‘trying’ too hard.
February 6th, 2007 at 1:23 pm
gord.
he probably is trying too hard.
collin
p.s. was it me? *^_^*
February 6th, 2007 at 2:31 pm
Tim R.
February 8th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
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That was a very interesting 45 minutes