When a reboot of the 1997 cult film “Anaconda” was announced in 2020, there was great skepticism: Can a serious giant snake horror even work in cinemas today? Or isn’t such an oversized reptile automatically laughed out of the room by a modern audience anyway? Director Tom Gormican obviously felt the same way – and so his 2025 version of “Anaconda” turned out to be a meta-comedy in which Jack Black even ties a supposedly dead wild boar to his back while trying to film an unofficial “Anaconda” remake himself.
You can certainly understand the studio’s comedy decision in the current cinema environment – and the worldwide box office of 134 million dollars (on a budget of only 41 million dollars) also proved those responsible right. Nevertheless, many fans still had a secret desire that perhaps they would have preferred to see a real – that is, somewhat serious – remake. And this wish is now fulfilled with “Beware Boiúna”: “Silent Night, Deadly Night” director Mike P. Nelson delivers a dirty giant snake jungle horror that, despite its general straightforwardness, is particularly convincing due to an unexpected twist.
In order to stay safe from the giant snake Boiúna, Lena (Kiana Madeira) will use any hiding place!
The medical student Alli (“Happy Deathday” star Jessica Rothe) chugs through Colombia on a river steamer with her two colleagues, a captain and the boatwoman Lena (Kiana Madeira) to supply the neighboring villages with malaria tablets. The caiman, who first tears off an arm of one of the villagers in front of their eyes and then drags him under the water, soon becomes the least of their problems: Brennan Malloy’s (Logan Marshall-Green) squad is scouting the area for – if not illegal, then at least immoral – raw material operations. And at the end of the evening, Malloy’s drunken son Shawn (Jackson Bews) becomes so pushy with Alli that Lena knocks him out – and inadvertently causes his death.
The attempts to make the crime look like an accident fail – and so the medical crew’s only option is to flee to a nearby restricted area in the jungle. However, entering here is forbidden for good reason, after all, it is the territory of the legendary giant snake Boiúna, which, according to tradition, is responsible for maintaining balance and therefore alone decides who dies and who doesn’t…
The smaller, the nastier
Alli & Co. initially come across not the snake itself, but a dead caiman floating in the river. A spontaneous autopsy shows that the internal organs are completely crushed and the entire reptile appears to be covered in slimy gastric juice. The only logical explanation: Apparently a snake spat out the caiman’s hull. But how big does the animal have to be? The unsurprising answer: damn huge! The solidly tricked jungle legend does all the local legends absolutely justice, at least in terms of body size – although Boiúna, despite her balance-preserving “Mother of Water” function, ultimately develops hardly any more character than comparable giant snakes in earlier films. It fully fulfills its purpose, but nothing more.
However, Mike P. Nelson doesn’t just rely on his exotic-sounding title heroine: the film was shot on location in the Colombian jungle – and in “Beware Boiúna” it is actually presented in an appropriately hostile way. With interspersed shaky POV shots, Nelson’s regular cameraman Nick Junkersfeld creates an authentically dirty atmosphere, which is then fueled not only with mud holes that act like quicksand, but also with all sorts of other creatures. Particularly memorable are the mosquito-borne gadfly maggots that have lodged themselves deep in the back of Alli’s colleague Callum (Will Close) and now have to be pulled out one by one (!) (the instructions for this are not the medical studies completed, but a YouTube video).
Alli (Jessica Rothe) desperately wants to help the people in the jungle – but soon finds herself fighting for her own survival.
Attention: Although we are not revealing any specific twists, we will reveal below the general area in which there is a twist. For some this may be too much – so read on from here at your own risk!
Mike P. Nelson has presented two reboots, “Wrong Turn” and “Silent Night, Deadly Night,” each of which turned the original franchise inside out with radical new approaches. In comparison, “Beware Boiúna” seems surprisingly straightforward for a long time, especially since the “Doctors Without Borders” protagonists, including the illegal mining of raw materials in the rainforest, correspond exactly to what you would expect from a film like this. But “The Domestics” director can do it that way – luckily! – but don’t let it go: When it comes to the speed and order of the characters’ deaths, “Beware Boiúna” consistently subverts all expectations – and at the same time cleverly exposes the tried and tested viewing habits of a primarily white audience.
Conclusion: “Beware Boiúna” proves that a serious giant snake horror is actually still possible in 2026! Mike P. Nelson transports his cast into a believably inhospitable mud jungle, in which the small horsefly maggots that nest under the skin end up being almost even more horrifying than the gigantic reptile of the title. There is also a significant twist that not only comes as a surprise, but also fits perfectly into the film’s critical theme of colonialism.