'Snakes' on a Hype Hangover

Aug. 21, 2006 — -- You've heard the jokes, bought the T-shirts and laughed at the Internet parodies, but would you still see the movie? "Snakes on a Plane" just may simply have suffered from too much buzz -- or perhaps moviegoers never expected anything more than a hysterically funny title

After months of hype, the Samuel L. Jackson thriller emerged from its opening weekend as No. 1 at the box office. But it was a rather anemic victory. With estimated ticket sales of just $15.3 million, it just barely squeaked past Will Ferrell's "Talladega Nights," now in its third week.

Moreover, had the film not opened on Thursday, when it earned more than $1 million, it would have finished in second place.

Certainly, in the months leading up to its release, no one expected the $30 million movie to become such a sensation simply because of its campy name. Now, some film experts believe the film has lost its underground "cool factor."

"'Snakes on a Plane' stopped being hip months ago, probably around the first time it got mentioned on 'The Tonight Show.' Anything that's on the radar of Jay Leno is instantly unhip," says film critic Joshua Tyler of CinemaBlend.com.

"The trendy types who were into it at first have long since rethought their position and are already boycotting."

Perhaps film studio New Line Cinema got over-enthusiastic when "Snakes" became an Internet obsession. "I think the hype was misunderstood. People were eager to laugh at it; they weren't necessarily eager to see it," says Devin Faraci of film site CHUD.com

"It was seen by many as a corny idea rather than something they wanted to spend $10 and two hours watching. To put it in schoolyard terms, they were laughing at the film, not with the film."

Given its modest budget, New Line says the film is already on its way to turn a healthy profit, and the attention "Snakes" garnered in the week leading up to its release became the talk of Hollywood.

Other movies, notably "The Blair Witch Project" a few summers ago, developed a self-generating Internet buzz, but it's a hard force to harness -- or measure.