The 1997 giant snake horror film Anaconda is receiving a new reboot, courtesy of Columbia Pictures. Anaconda was not well received by critics when it came out in April of 1997 and was nominated for six Razzie Awards, including Worst Picture, though it failed to win any of them, and the film currently holds a 40% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It did open at the top of the box office and spend two weeks there, generating $136.8 million worldwide, more than tripling the movie's budget.
Anaconda starred a number of big box office draws, including Ice Cube, Jennifer Lopez, Jon Voight and Owen Wilson. While it wasn't a critical success, its commercial appeal led to the creation of a franchise featuring one theatrical sequel in 2004 and three other movies which premiered on television over the succeeding 11 years.
There's currently no producer for the new film, but The Hollywood Reporter has stated Even Daugherty will be responsible for writing the script. Daugherty does not have any significant screenwriting experience dealing with horror properties, which Anaconda will almost surely be. He does, however, have ample experience writing screenplays for tentpole franchises, penning the scripts for Snow White and the Huntsman, Divergent, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Tomb Raider. THR also reports the new Anaconda film will be a "re-imagining," rather than a sequel, and it will likely follow a similar concept to that of The Meg, which came out in August 2018.
In The Meg, scientists encounter a prehistoric shark of enormous size and scope, delving into science fiction territory with elements of action and horror mixed in. Action movie star Jason Statham starred and the film made $530.2 million at the box office against a $130 million budget. If Columbia Pictures is hoping for a re-imagining of Anaconda more in the vein of a monster movie, it's doing so at a time where there are never enough monsters to satiate audiences. The Meg followed the success of other similar movies from the past decade, including Clash of the Titans and Pacific Rim. Additionally, films in the Godzilla and King Kong universes continue to emerge, with the two monsters set to collide in Godzilla vs. Kong in November.
While there are plenty of monster movies in the making, with even a sequel to The Meg currently in development, films specifically featuring monstrous snakes have been hard to come by recently, with Snakes on a Plane being the most recent analog, coming back in 2006. There's opportunity here to revive Anaconda as a more ubiquitous big screen staple going forward, an opportunity Columbia Pictures clearly does not want to miss.
Source: THR
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