Massive hype for movie didn’t produce hit many had expected.

For almost a year, the Internet has been buzzing with hype about a movie called "Snakes on a Plane." Eventually the mainstream media picked up the buzz.

The message was clear: "SoaP" (as devotees call it) was the most eagerly awaited movie of the year. Watch out, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg! Move over, Harry Potter and Spider-Man! Here comes the new blockbuster franchise!

But on opening night, people were not exactly camping out at theaters. The AMC chain reported none of its shows sold out.

"SoaP" won the weekend, opening at No. 1, but its $15 million haul was far less than expected. It seems a lot of people were amused by the title but had no real interest in seeing the movie.

The studio can’t blame bad reviews, because there were no advance screenings for critics. New Line explained that the movie was "for the fans." This prompted Entertainment Weekly to quip: "And we thought it was for the Oscar voters."

The movie’s less-than-stellar reception was more proof that Internet buzz does not guarantee a hit. Joss Whedon learned this last year with "Serenity." Kevin Smith learned it last month with "Clerks II." Most people still discover movies through broadcast and print advertising - and, yes, through reviews.

There were warning signs. When New Line focus-grouped "SoaP" earlier this year, they found much less public awareness than the fan sites had led them to believe. The studio had foolishly allowed a small but vocal band of enthusiasts to become involved in what the industry calls "the creative process."

Here’s what the fans wanted and got: more gore, more nudity, more profanity, more low-brow humor. This "Jackass" crowd didn’t just expect the movie to be stupid; they demanded it be stupid.

When Gannett News Service critic Jack Garner saw it, he described the paying audience as about 95 percent male and about 18 to 20 years old. It was like a frat party, he wrote, only without the keg.

Lesson: A movie that doesn’t appeal much to women or to people over 20 isn’t likely to become a blockbuster. Pandering to the frat-boy audience is not a good business strategy.

In reality, the over-40 crowd is the fastest growing audience for movies. AMC recently acknowledged this by devoting more of its screens to independent films. And, lo and behold, some of these adult-oriented indies have even come to Clarksville: "An Inconvenient Truth," "Little Miss Sunshine," "A Prairie Home Companion."

Why the indie influx? Maybe it’s because "sure things" like "SoaP," "Material Girls" and "Zoom" aren’t drawing as expected. They have to fill the screens with something - so why not try intelligent movies for a change?

What’s most sad about the manufactured "Snakes" phenomenon is how it’s all about marketing, hype and buzz. It’s all about selling, and much of the so-called journalism about this movie has been part of the hype. This is the same hype that insists we want to hear about JonBenet Ramsey and Janet March, 24 hours a day.

It’s hard to believe there was a time when Newsweek put Robert Altman’s "Nashville" on its cover because the magazine’s film critic - and his editors - believed so strongly in its artistic merit. ("Nashville" was clobbered at the box office by "Jaws," and the modern summer blockbuster was born.) Twenty-six years later, Newsweek had "Pearl Harbor" on the cover, even though its critic panned the overblown World War II spectacle.

As for shutting critics out of the process, New York Times critic Manohla Dargis put it best. Admitting that she paid no attention to reviews as a teenager, she added: "The real problem is that even if a kid wants [guidance] today, what they will find, overwhelmingly, is noise about celebrities and meaningless numbers indicating what big movie ’won’ the weekend box-office. Who talks about film as something greater than a vehicle for celebrity and consumerism? Very few, I think."

I like Los Angeles Times critic Kenneth Turan’s response to the gripe that critics are out of touch with "ordinary people": "I’m sorry, but we’re not supposed to be applause meters. If you wanted to go to a restaurant for a special occasion and someone said, ’Why not go to McDonald’s? More people go there than any other place,’ would that really be enough to convince you?"

When those much-derided critics finally got to see "SoaP," many of them enjoyed it, recognizing it for the gleeful, unpretentious mess it was. Nobody is going to this movie expecting another "Citizen Kane."

They also hailed "Snakes on a Plane" as a brilliant B-movie title, right up there with "Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers" and "Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors," though not quite on the level of "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies."

Now, there’s a title that would get the fanboy sites buzzing. Is a remake on the horizon?