There has been no greater example of sibylline and sententious symbolism in movies than in the contemporary classic, Snakes on a Plane. It is a tragically overlooked testament to the hubris and sciolism of modern humanity. I believe that one day this magnificent work will be as salient and revered as Darwins Origin of Species or George Orwells Animal Farm.
Snakes, ladies and gentlemen...
...are more than snakes. The Snake, as such, is a metaphorical personification of our deepest and most atavistic desires: lust, sexuality, hunger. Hence, Snakes on a Plane is not, as you all might think, just a completely idiotic excuse for a totally lame plot: quite to the contrary, the Snake on a Plane is a subtle metaphor for the dichotomy of technologic progress contrasted with basic primitivity.
Fifty years ago, a man in a rubber suit trampling over toy trains, Godzilla, was known to represent our primary fear of atomic mutation. But how narrow, how hollow, how shallow is Godzilla compared to the Snake on the Plane! Isn't the snake - or, to evoke a Biblical image - the Serpent - the very essence of everything that makes technology (here: symbolised by The Plane) so fragile? And isn't snake poison known both as a deadly toxic and as healing medicine, as symbolised in the rod of Aeskulap?
Snakes on A Plane, ladies and gentlemen, is a deeply symbolistic film, a metaphorical mass for the most disquieting sides of modernity, a simile of the futility of Human Existence vis-a-vis of our own incompetence, and a terrible memento mori in our post-modern society. And Samuel "Loudspeaker" Jackson is nothing else but the Eternal Adam resisting to the timeless temptation offered to him by his own most ancient instincts which might, or might not present him with the easiest solution of all to escape the dilemmata of modern life - death! Thus, Snakes on a Plane will become yet another epitaph of diaphanous symbolism après la lettre.
Ladies and gentlemen, I thank you for listening.
Snakes, ladies and gentlemen...
...are more than snakes. The Snake, as such, is a metaphorical personification of our deepest and most atavistic desires: lust, sexuality, hunger. Hence, Snakes on a Plane is not, as you all might think, just a completely idiotic excuse for a totally lame plot: quite to the contrary, the Snake on a Plane is a subtle metaphor for the dichotomy of technologic progress contrasted with basic primitivity.
Fifty years ago, a man in a rubber suit trampling over toy trains, Godzilla, was known to represent our primary fear of atomic mutation. But how narrow, how hollow, how shallow is Godzilla compared to the Snake on the Plane! Isn't the snake - or, to evoke a Biblical image - the Serpent - the very essence of everything that makes technology (here: symbolised by The Plane) so fragile? And isn't snake poison known both as a deadly toxic and as healing medicine, as symbolised in the rod of Aeskulap?
Snakes on A Plane, ladies and gentlemen, is a deeply symbolistic film, a metaphorical mass for the most disquieting sides of modernity, a simile of the futility of Human Existence vis-a-vis of our own incompetence, and a terrible memento mori in our post-modern society. And Samuel "Loudspeaker" Jackson is nothing else but the Eternal Adam resisting to the timeless temptation offered to him by his own most ancient instincts which might, or might not present him with the easiest solution of all to escape the dilemmata of modern life - death! Thus, Snakes on a Plane will become yet another epitaph of diaphanous symbolism après la lettre.
Ladies and gentlemen, I thank you for listening.
