Comment Re:Why? (Score 2) 137
It's the "Snakes on a Plane" brand of marketing. If you can't market your movie as being a good movie, market it as being a funny ironic bizarre movie.
To be fair, I don't think "Snakes on a Plane" was ever quite that cynically-minded in the first place; remember that, back when it happened, the "self-consciously cheesy B-style-movie" thing wasn't such a cliche, and they apparently changed the title to "Pacific Flight 121" at one point before Samuel L Jackson supposedly made them change it back. (I wonder if "Snakes on a Plane" was only originally intended to be a working title reflecting a high concept movie).
Yes, they did reshoot and alter parts of the film in response to its pre-release Internet fame, but I don't think it started out as being cynical. It's only when soulless Hollywood t***s try ripping off and repeating the phenomenon that it leaves a nasty taste in the mouth.
Of course, the irony with "Snakes on a Plane" is that despite becoming a massively-popular Internet meme, this didn't translate into box-office success. Despite heightened expectations of its performance, the film itself turned out to be a relative flop, so go figure.