Aiming at Nothing

As silly as “Snakes on a Plane” is likely to be, I could get behind the production of a short (and by “short,” I mean 15 seconds long) movie about planes on a snake. It would be short because I don’t think even the biggest, badest snake would live very long if run over by a plane.

More disturbing to me though is that someone paid a lot of money to make a movie around one plot point and to name the film after the single plot point. Where’s the suspense? Having read the title am I supposed to ask, “Will there be snakes? Where will the snakes be? Will they be on a plane?”

I sincerely hope this doesn’t become a trend. The movie houses might as well go through their catalogs and rename previous films:

• Planet of the Apes – World Where Apes Can Talk
• The Usual Suspects – Pathological Liar With a Limp
• Office Space – Nerds In Some Cubicles
• Star Wars III – CGI Porn In Space
• There’s Something About Mary – Hair Gel That Isn’t Really Hair Gel
• The Matrix – People Who Are Also Batteries
• Brazil – Paperwork SNAFU In a Police State
• Firewall – Harrison Ford Will Do Anything
• Jesus is Magic – Sarah Silverman Says Naughty Things About Religion
• Titanic – Dead People On a Boat
• Ghost Ship – Dead People On a Boat
• Man on Fire – Man on Fire
• Crash – People Who Are Racist
• Brokeback Mountain – Gay Cowboys On Horses

I’m sure my good readers can think of others.