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Image credit: Snakes on a Plane: James Dittiger

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Snakes on a Plane

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That's the strategic position New Line's marketers have chosen too: engage the fans, but take Snakes seriously. Instead of cracking down on fan-generated content with cease-and-desist letters (and the initial inclination was to do so, says Emmerich), New Line has been quietly feeding items to snakesonablog.com, the hub of SoaP fandom, offering official materials for use on unofficial sites, and turning on the charm. Nonetheless, New Line execs are worried. ''What's unique about Snakes is that the idea of the movie has excited people. But that doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the movie we made,'' says Emmerich. ''I'm hoping it does. But I just don't know what people are expecting.'' And Schwartz thinks it's impossible to use the film as a marketing template: ''If this movie opens, I [still] don't think we've shown the Web can open a movie.''

Still, SoaP has many admirers in Hollywood, where every studio, mindful of the maturation of both YouTube and MySpace, is currently desperate to reach young pop junkies online. Case in point: Twentieth Century Fox, whose parent, News Corp., last year acquired MySpace, has just launched a new youth label called Fox Atomic. This fall the division will shoot a remake of Revenge of the Nerds, but it has already begun cultivating its audience via viral-video Web promotions. ''Snakes is a powerful indication of how you can use the Internet to engage the audience and capture their imagination with just a concept,'' says Peter Rice, president of Fox Atomic and Fox Searchlight. And Fox marketing president Pam Levine believes the kind of online creativity inspired by Snakes will soon evolve to a point where fans become less interested in playing with Hollywood movies and more interested in making their own.

All of these ideas amuse Jackson, but he would like to make one thing clear: ''Snakes on a Plane doesn't speak volumes about s---. I just hope people go to this film and have a good time. Laugh, scream, freak each other out.'' He also hopes movie critics — who will have to do without advance screenings — will leave Snakes alone. ''Those motherf---ers don't need to watch this. They need to send some 13-year-old kid with f---ing pimples that goes to the mall every Friday to watch movies. I respect the people who are going to see this film, because they know what they like to see,'' he says. ''They like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Hostel. Saw. They're not afraid to say they like it. I like those films too. I like seeing people getting f---ed up in strange and funny situations. There's a lot of us out there!'' On Aug. 18, you'll know where they'll be. The question is, Will they like the movie they helped to make?