In a David Lynch-like start, the camera skims the overblown colours of the Hawaiian beachscapes to lyrics about ‘A Perfect Day’. It can only mean trouble. Suddenly, a man suspended head-down is telling us to 'Run'. He's really addressing a chance witness to his imminent murder, but it’s also a timely warning to any nervous audience-members.

David R. Ellis previously directed ‘Final Destination 2’, the best of the teen comic horror trilogy that worked by letting you in on what was going to happen before it did, building up your expectations and just when your nerves are at breaking point topping it with a climax so audacious it makes you laugh. The same inventive techniques of the erstwhile stuntman enhance ‘Snakes on a Plane’.

Nathan Phillips (Samuel L Jackson) is tasked to escort Sean Jones (Nathan Phillips) the hapless witness, from Hawaii to LA. Whilst his charge is docile enough to heed his warning ‘Just do as I say and you’ll survive’, a planeload of fanged critters high on artificial pheromones plus passengers enraged at travelling ‘coach’ instead of first class make Bruce Willis’s job in ‘Five Blocks’ look like sleep-walking.

Samuel L Jackson’s screen presence and acting are solid, helped by Julianna Margulies as Claire, the rock-steady stewardess, but the real stars are the snakes, blurry-visioned heat-seeking weapons who pause only to snack on one another when not biting the passengers. They spring out of light fittings, over-head lockers and under-deck holds like elongated tubes of fruit pastilles, (there’s even one that spends the entire film wrestling with an Hawaiian neck garland between the aisles) not so much ‘speckled band’ as multi-coloured elastic bands. The Englishman gets it worst, a suited corporate type with an ironic bent. As we know, Americans don’t do irony and they don’t – or rather they do – do Englishmen.

Some of the jokes and the characters are off-target, as in the weak personalities of the secondary stewards, but most are hugely inventive and well prepared. The initial suspended-head-down shot is repeated with snakes throughout, whilst great play is made with the tangled wires of the planes electrics and their resemblance to the evil-minded slitherers – the films closest homage to ‘Alien’, apart from the giant python in the airducts. The formulaic passengers – egomaniac rock star, lady with yapping dog, children travelling alone are fine, if too numerous. On the other hand the ad-hoc use of onboard furniture - the escaped trolleys and inflatable life-rafts, especially the method by which an exasperated Jackson rids the plane of the stripy pests, are all pleasurably recognisable.

The end-story which involves finding a ‘hardcore snake expert’ is engaging and more could have been done with this geeky character, although he has some good lines, such as when he reminds the police agent the ground to make haste because ‘Time is tissue’ in collecting lifesaving serum. The pathos and passenger bonding moments work within the overall pattern of contrast making pockets of stillness in the tension. The ‘substitute pilot’ joke is a masterpiece of slow-realisation comedy.

As with Jacky Chan films, it’s a mistake to leave before the credits roll. The MTV –style ending with a spoof airport smuggling scene recalls the energy and exuberance of the best moments in this hugely entertaining film.


<Added>

The character played by Jackson is Nelville Flynn.