FBI agent Neville Flynn (Samuel L. Jackson) has had enough.

Here is a movie whos title alone made it an instant cult hit. From t-shirts, to flickr pools, to music videos, the internet community had embrassed this film with open arms. Wild speculation about what kind of film this was going to be started to spread. Was its unique title chosen on purpose? Did someone really take this film seriously when they gave it the green light? Is the plot campy on purpose?

When word got to the producers that the internet community was making fun of the title, they promptly changed it to: Pacific Air Flight 121. An upset Sam Jackson told an interviewer, “We’re totally changing that back. That’s the only reason I took the job: I read the title.”

Eventually, its seems, the producers embraced the buzz the film was recieving and decided to reshoot parts to add some camp, and to give the film a firm R rating. One addition, was a line that will go down in history as one of the greatest lines in a movie ever. The line itself originated as an internet parady of Sam Jacksons unique persona. After battling the rampaging snakes for some time, Sam stands up and yells: “Enough is enough! I have had it with these muthaf*kin’ snakes on this muthaf*kin’ plane!”

This is all I knew going into this film. Was I excited? Yes. Was I expecting a good movie? No. This film had been built up for so many months, that there was no way this movie was going to live up to what had become in our minds. Heck, on the way to the theater I was joking about how great it would be if the pilot were Christopher Walken.

I’ll try to keep things short. I really enjoyed this film. But something bugged me. You see, those changes (additions) that they made were great. They were funny, campy, just plain wonderful. But they accounted for probibly less than 5% of the film. The rest was the film the way the filmakers originally intended to make it. Which was rather straight forward, PG-13, popcorn action. In other words: Lame.

I wanted to see them take full advantage of the fact that there were muthaf*kin’ snakes on a muthaf*kin’ plane. I wanted to see snakes wrapping themselves around controls in an attempt to steer the plane into other aircraft. I wanted to see snakes hiding among the bags of peanuts. I wanted to see Sam Jackson violently swinging snakes around like a whip and sending them flying through the cabin. I know thats alot to ask, I know I was just getting my hopes up to high, but come on. Bottom line: They had a golden oppertunity here and they blew it. And the reason they blew it was because they didn’t realize what they had untill it was too late. (the change of the title, and the subsequent changing back is a good example of how clueless the producers were.) Perhaps Snakes on a Plane 2 will be the movie we were all praying for.

I did have alot of fun watching this film though, and I did get to see a guys penis get bitten by a snake while he was taken a leak. And that has to count for something. So I’ll give this film 2 1/2 out of 5 stars. Which is really about as much as anyone can really give a film entitled Snakes on a Plane.

-Matt