Paul Rudd and Jack Black are teaming up for a new version of the campy 1997 cult classic Anaconda for Sony Pictures, and to announce the release date, the pair made a hilarious video together (below). In the short clip, Black promises, “There’s gonna be a big f**kin’ snake, and it’s gonna rip.” Two comic legends and this description should be more than enough to put butts in seats come Christmas Day 2025, when the movie will hit theaters.
Little else is known about the project, which was first announced back in August 2024. Given the casting of Rudd and Black, it’s clear the studio, Sony Pictures, wants to take the Anaconda franchise into more intentionally comedic territory. It has also been suggested the film will be a meta take on the B-movie giant animal subgenre and the original specifically, with a plot involving two old friends who get dragged into the jungle to make a movie, only to get entangled with violent criminals and the titular serpent.
The new film, which may be titled The Anaconda, was written by Tom Gormican and Kevin Etten and will be directed by Gormican. This duo previously gave audiences the 2022 meta action comedy The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, which saw Nicolas Cage playing a fictionalized version of himself getting caught between a superfan and a CIA agent. The movie also starred Pedro Pascal, Tiffany Haddish, and Neil Patrick Harris.
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The original Anaconda, directed by Luis Llosa from a script by Hans Bauer, Jim Cash, and Jack Epps Jr., starred Jennifer Lopez, Jon Voight, Ice Cube, Owen Wilson, Eric Stoltz, and Danny Trejo. It follows a film crew in the Amazon jungle whose boat gets hijacked by a Captain Ahab-esque figure (Voight, playing a South American man) obsessed with capturing an anaconda. Voight’s accent and overall performance are so over the top, it has to be seen to be believed.
The film was critically panned upon release, though legendary film critic Roger Ebert did have nice things to say about it, calling the film “a slick, scary, funny Creature Feature, beautifully photographed and splendidly acted in high adventure style.” Given its unintentional humor, bad CGI effects, and Voight’s unbelievable performance, Anaconda has become a cult classic, one perfectly ripe for a meta comedy parody.
Anaconda spawned several sequels: Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid (2004), Anaconda 3: Offspring (2008), Anacondas 4: Trail of Blood (2009), and Lake Placid vs. Anaconda (2015), which pitted the giant snake against the equally massive crocodile from the Lake Placid series. Only Hunt for the Blood Orchid was released theatrically.
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Anaconda
Release Date
April 11, 1997
Director
Luis Llosa
Distributor(s)
Columbia Pictures
, Sony
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