Anaconda (2025) Review

The Anaconda series has received a reboot with the team behind The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, and they give their version a meta, self-aware approach.

Doug McCallister (Jack Black) and Ronald “Griff” Griffen Jr. (Paul Rudd) are best friends who had Hollywood dreams when they were young. However, their careers didn’t pan out the way they thought they would: Doug is a wedding videographer in Buffalo, and Griff is a bit-part actor in TV shows and commercials. When Griff returns to Buffalo, he tells his old friends he has acquired the rights to the Anaconda series and convinces them to go to Brazil to make a reboot. However, filming goes awry because of a real anaconda and criminals operating in the Amazon.

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent was a pleasant surprise back in 2022. It was a self-aware action comedy that made fun of Nicolas Cage’s fandom and showcased the actor’s willingness to poke fun at himself. Sony had success turning the police procedural show 21 Jump Street into an action-comedy in the early 2010s. That experience seemed to have disappeared when they made the Anaconda reboot.

This was a film that used its self-awareness as a comedy clutch. The characters constantly made references to the original film: they mentioned key scenes and talked about the performances, particularly Jon Voight’s weird accent. Tom Gormican and Kevin Etten were trying to emulate Wes Craven’s approach when he made New Nightmare and the Scream movie. However, Anaconda took the lazy route since it was just references; there was no insight or invention. It didn’t help the film that Anaconda (2025) was an attempted satire and commentary of a specific film, not a whole series (Nightmare on Elm Street) or a genre (slashers).

The team seemed like they wanted to repeat The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent formula. Both films have movie-themed plots about people in the film industry getting roped into a larger scheme. Nick Cage was asked by the CIA to spy on his biggest fan, whilst in Anaconda (2025), a film crew was getting chased by a snake and illegal miners. Anaconda’s plot was similar to Tropic Thunder and Strange Wilderness, where a group of incompetent filmmakers end up going into the jungle for a project, but end up getting themselves over their heads when in the wilderness. There was also a bit of The Fall Guy in Anaconda (2025) since filmmaking skills played an important role in fighting the villains.

Anaconda (2025) was a less assured film than The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent.  The film goes off in different directions. It was a film with wacky characters in the form of Kenny the cinematographer (Steve Zahn) and Santiago (Selton Mello), the snake handler, whilst on the other side of the scale, there was Daniela Melchior as Ana Almeida, the badass guide who played her role straight. The tone was all over the place as it went from meta references, broad humour like a recreation of a scene from Friends, a fun monster movie, and a more serious crime story. It was unbalanced.

When Doug and Griff were coming up with ideas for their Anaconda movie, they talked about the potential themes. The theme of this reboot was middle-aged people fulfilling their forgotten dreams. It was Doug and Griff’s last chance to make it. I have worked in the film industry, and I can relate to them as the pair seek that one great idea, whilst also accepting their personal responsibilities. When the characters nerd out when speaking about films, I was thinking, ‘Oh God, that is what I must sound like?’

Anaconda (2025) attempted to bring in an environmental theme. The human villains were illegal gold miners whose crimes polluted the environment, and Santiago said he saved his snake because of this. However, this idea doesn’t go anywhere and was added just to give the film a crime element.

Anaconda (2025) was an underwhelming experience. It wasn’t as smart as it thought it was, not funny enough, nor able to blend its different plots and tones.