Snakes on a Plane - 27th August 2006

As the latest hot Internet craze, Snakes... could have been a victim of its own cult status. I have to admit my expectations were pretty high. However, it amazingly seemed to be 'so bad its good' without being that bad at all. It worked well as a perfectly serviceable disaster movie while having an extra layer of post-modern self-knowing thanks to the online buzz.

Okay, the concept (the snakes being on the plane part) was a little implausible but perhaps required less willing suspension of disbelief than several of this summer's blockbusters (M:I:3 I'm looking in your direction). And Snakes also managed to recognise and practically celebrate its own implausibility - at one point an FBI guy mentions the idea of someone putting snakes on a plane is completely ludicrous.

So, "plot" out of the way we can get on to enjoying the film. It was all extremely well-timed, a new threat appeared just after the passengers seemed to have conquered the last one and it was genuinely quite suspenseful. There were some good comedy deaths (boob-biting amongst others) and some rather horribly gory ones - the stiletto in the ear springs to mind. Some of the earlier scenes when the snakes first attack were really rather disturbing; but in a good way. The cast of characters was the eclectic bunch you'd expect from a disaster film; it was quite fun guessing which ones would die and the ones who survived had all learned a lesson by the end. Which was nice.

And of course there were the occasional nods to the Internet-based fans; most noticeably the "motherlovin' snakes"part and the pilot's warning the plane would "go down quicker than a Thai hooker." It was all good fun. And then at the end, they all went surfing!

Fantastic: 4 stars out of 5.