Making a comedy out of a horror film taken as an unintentional comedy: Paul Rudd and Jack Black in their own 'Anaconda'

The comedians are the stars of an irregular film that shows sparks of wit sporadically, although it never manages to turn its starting idea into something truly consistent.

Anaconda (2025) is an experiment in the form of a ‘meta-comedy’ that aims to reinvent the franchise of the 1997 horror film – which was intended a priori to be a horror film. The film arrives in theaters with a cast that raises expectations and a really attractive premise: comic figures of the stature of Paul Rudd and Jack Black embark on a delirious adventure to make a kind of ‘remake’ of the original film from within the film. The idea, a priori, promises to be a riot and comes with narrative potential, which should guarantee laughter and a hooligan idea about cinema, nostalgia and the industry. However, in its final execution, the experiment encounters several obstacles that distance it from the round comedy it promised to be.

The film’s great asset is, without a doubt, its cast. Jack Black y Paul Rudd -two comedians with markedly different styles, but who are in the Olympus of humor- make up a duo with natural chemistry that few major studio productions dare to align as absolute protagonists. Black displays his usual boundless energy, while Rudd provides the calm counterpoint that softens and balances his partner’s stage explosions. This contrast should have been the comic heart of the film –and at times it is- but its virtues are often drowned out by the inconsistency of the script.

The presence of established supporting actors such as Thandiwe Newton and Steve Zahn further enriches the successful casting choice. The main cast breathes moments of true charm and group complicity.pointing to a comedy of camaraderie that, unfortunately, never ends up materializing coherently.

A truly striking premise that spreads

The intention of Anaconda -a ‘meta-cinematic’ satire about the obsession with reviving youth classics- was, on paper, truly striking. The story follows four middle-aged friends who, faced with their personal crises, enter the Amazon jungle to film their own version of the original 1997 film starring Jennifer Lopez. The clash between that absurd dream and the rawness of real nature (with a real anaconda emerging from its entrails) could have been fertile ground for a clever sitcom with notes on the self-awareness of cinema.

Just as nostalgia and friendship are effectively explored, the script seems – at times – to dilute its best ideas in ‘gags’ that never quite come together. The satire often feels superficial, and while there are flashes of wit, they are overshadowed by jokes that not only fail to be memorable, but seem shoehorned into the rhythm of the story. Anaconda can’t quite find the right tone between comedy, satire and absurd adventure. In some passages the jokes work – especially when they play with the ‘self-referentiality’ of the ‘project-within-the-project’ – but in others the humor seems forced or poorly refined. The film seems to walk an imaginary line without fully committing to a clear comedic direction, resulting in jokes that feel disconnected from the plot or don’t elicit the expected laughs.

“You never want to miss the opportunity to laugh at this industry”: ‘Anaconda’ is a meta-movie that reinvents and laughs at the 1997 film

Even comparisons with more inspired satirical titles (one cannot help but constantly evoke in the brilliant Tropic Thunder) show what Anaconda could have been: a comedy that not only laughs at itself, but also develops a strong and funny narrative arc. Here, however, the most powerful moments are isolatedrather than forming a sustained comic progression. In fact, the most accurate wit comes just before the credits, something that makes you think that it should have been a fun sketch or piece of a production made up of several stories.

Metacine beyond simple artifice?

The main attraction of the project was its status as a ‘meta-cinematic reboot’: the idea of exploring the motivations and frustrations of the creators behind a fictional ‘remake’. This layer, which should offer a sharp look at contemporary cinema and the culture of remaking classics (no matter how shabby they may be), remains poorly developed. the movie It stays closer to an easy ‘gag’ than an incisive criticism of the industrylargely wasting its more than original concept.

We are faced with a film that is driven by a brilliant cast and an original idea, but that fails to realize its full humorous and narrative potential. Black and Rudd, along with a cast that is totally dedicated (and seems to be having a blast), offer brilliant moments of complicity.but the script (and the lack of a defined tone) prevents those flashes from becoming a memorable and cohesive comedy. In this way, the film remains halfway between the ingenious and the failed: a curious piece that can entertain at times, but that fails to fully justify its own goal premise or sustain a comic rhythm that achieves its ambition since the announcement of the project. Once again, a film by Tom Gormican (The Unbearable Weight of an Enormous Talent) remains a very good idea that ends up blurring with the advancement of the footage. A shame.