December 30, 2025
by Carla Hay
Directed by Tom Gormican
Some language in Portuguese with subtitles
Culture Representation: Taking place in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest (and briefly in Los Angeles and in Buffalo, New York), the action comedy film “Anaconda” (inspired by the 1997 horror film “Anaconda”) features a white and Latin cast of characters (with a few black people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A group of four American former schoolmates travel to Brazil’s Amazon rainforest to film a scripted reboot of the 1997 film “Anaconda,” and they become targets of a giant killer anaconda.
Culture Audience: “Anaconda” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and the 1997 “Anaconda” movie, but this tribute-styled “Anaconda” is just a series of mostly idiotic jokes and poorly conceived scenarios.
The action comedy “Anaconda” tries to be a satirical “movie within a movie” tribute to 1997’s campy horror flick “Anaconda,” but the results are like a toothless snake that frequently misses its target. The jokes and slapstick scenarios mostly fall flat, while the movie’s main characters are mostly witless and annoying. The 1997 version of “Anaconda” is actually funnier than this limp and scatter-brained mess.
Directed by Tom Gormican (who co-wrote the 2025 “Anaconda” screenplay with Kevin Etten), the 2025 version of “Anaconda” relies too heavily on jokes that assume that viewers have already seen 1997’s “Anaconda” (directed by Luis Llosa and starring Ice Cube, Jennifer Lopez and Jon Voight), a deliberately cheesy flick about people trapped in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest with a giant killer anaconda. There are several forgettable “Anaconda” sequels. The main “joke” concept of the 2025 version of the movie is that the people making an “Anaconda” reboot end up experiencing the same type of terror from another giant killer anaconda while making the reboot. Don’t expect an explanation for why this monster exists. There is no explanation.
The 2025 version of “Anaconda” begins in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest. (This movie was actually filmed in Australia.) A mysterious young woman named Ana Almeida (played Daniela Melchior) is being chased through the jungle by two men. Ana hops on a motorbike and speeds through the forest, while the two men try to follow her by going on a boat in the river. One of the men is killed by an underwater creature that is not seen on screen, even though it’s very obvious what this creature is, considering the movie’s title and subject matter.
“Anaconda” (which has sloppy editing) then quickly cuts to Los Angeles, to show actor Ronald “Griff” Griffin Jr. (played by Paul Rudd) getting fired for flubbing his lines during a guest appearance on a TV medical drama series. Griff is a struggling actor who is only able to get small speaking roles in movies and in television. Later, Griff (a never-married bachelor with no kids) complains about having to live in a small apartment with a roommate who’s 74 years old.
Meanwhile, Griff’s best friend from high school and college is Doug McCallister (played by Jack Black), who is also dissatisfied with his career. Doug (who lives in Buffalo, New York) is happily married to a generically written wife named Malie (played by Ione Skye), and they have a generically written son named Charlie (played by Sebastian Sero), who’s about 12 or 13 years old. Doug is a horror movie fanatic who has always wanted to be a filmmaker. But for now, Doug makes a living as a wedding videographer.
Doug is first seen in a meeting with an engaged couple (played by Anna Francesca Armenia) and Jarred Blakiston) and the groom’s parents (played by Lisa Kay and John Voce) to discuss what type of wedding video that Doug will make for the newlyweds. Doug tries to pitch a horror-themed short film, but these clients don’t like the idea and want a traditional wedding video. This scene is as boring and unfunny as it sounds.
Later, Malie throws a surprise birthday party for Doug at their home. Doug’s three closest friends from high school and college are at the party: Griff, who has traveled from Los Angeles to be at this event; Claire Simons (played by Thandiwe Newton), an attorney who is going through a divorce from her estranged husband, who left Claire for his dental hygienist; and Kenny Trent (played by Steve Zahn), who is in semi-recovery from alcoholism and other substance addiction issues. Kenny used to work with Doug, but Doug fired him when an intoxicated Kenny knocked over a wedding cake during a wedding that they were hired to film.
At Doug’s birthday party, Griff surprises Doug with a gift that’s a blast from their past: a VHS tape of a film that the four pals made when they were 13. The film, titled “The Quatch,” is about a Big Foot/Sasquatch-type monster that causes terror in a wooded area. Teenage filmmaker Doug (played by Jack Waters) wrote, directed and co-starred in the movie, which also featured Griff (played by Romeo Ellard), Claire (played by Aimee Bah) and Kenny (played by Reagan George) in the movie’s small cast.
Watching this movie brings back nostalgic memories to the four pals and reignites Griff’s interest in making a movie with Doug. It’s a dream that Griff and Doug had for years as students. Griff is also a horror enthusiast and has always wanted to star in a horror movie. However, sometime after college, Doug backed out of their plan to move to Los Angeles and decided to stay in Buffalo.
When the four friends are having lunch at a local diner the day after the birthday party, they start talking about 1997’s “Anaconda” movie, which was released when they were all in college. Griff then announces that he has the rights to “Anaconda” and says they should all make an independent film that’s an “Anaconda” reboot. Doug and Claire are skeptical but are eventually persuaded to do this project.
Doug is writing, directing, and editing the movie, which will also be called “Anaconda.” Griff and Claire (who used to be romantically involved when they were teenagers) will star in this reboot. Griff has the role of a snake tracker. Claire has the role of a woman whose family was killed by the anaconda. Kenny is the movie’s cinematographer.
And faster you can say, “flimsy movie idea,” the four friends are off to Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest to make this movie on a budget of less than $50,000. The first person they meet in Brazil is Santiago Braga (played by Selton Mello), who has been hired to be the movie’s snake handler. Santiago (who is eccentric and comes across as a Brazilian version of Rainn Wilson) has an anaconda named Heitor, whom Santiago describes as more than a pet. Heitor is also Santiago’s close friend, he says.
Ana, the woman seen being chased through the forest in the beginning of the movie, crosses paths with this motley film crew when she steals a boat named the Benedita, which was rented by Griff and his pals for this film production. Ana pretends to be the daughter of the boat’s owner and reluctantly agrees to take the crew to the Amazon Rainforest, which fits into her plan to go into hiding from the people who are trying to find her.
Ana’s backstory and a subplot about illegal gold miners are awkwardly shoved into the main plot about this hapless and haphazard film production. The film shoot is interrupted by the giant anaconda, which appears in random places when the film crew least expects it. (The movie’s visual effects are mediocre.) Far from being suspenseful, 2025’s “Anaconda” is a cowardly film because it uses the gimmicky trick of faking certain people’s deaths. (A mid-credits scene reveals one of these fake deaths.)
The performances in 2025’s “Anaconda” might gets some laughs, but the stars of the movie are doing the same types of characters they’ve done in many other movies. Rudd is the “neurotic guy with big ideas.” Black is the manically energetic “loose cannon.” Newton is the logical “voice of reason.” Zahn is the goofy sidekick who isn’t very smart.
The funniest scene in 2025’s “Anaconda” is a chase scene involving a boar that’s used as a decoy, but that scene isn’t enough to save a movie that spends too much time on dull “meta” jokes that are intended to lampoon Sony Pictures and greed in making “cash grab” movies from intellectual property. And don’t be surprised to see a “surprise” cameo appearance or two from certain people who were in the 1997 “Anaconda” cast. The problem with the 2025 version of “Anaconda” is it wastes so much time trying to poke fun at 1997’s “Anaconda” with stale jokes, it fails to come up with an original story that is genuinely and consistently entertaining.
Columbia Pictures released “Anaconda” in U.S. cinemas on December 25, 2025.