- Director: Don E. FauntLeRoy
- Writers: David C. Olson
- Stars: Crystal Allen, Linden Ashby, Danny Midwinter, and John Rhys-Davies
- Runtime: 1 hour, 29 minutes
- YouTube Trailer Link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeNnOMn80K4
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This one follows the third movie closely as a sequel, with surviving baby snakes, Alex, and Murdoch back for more. As well as a bunch of new snake victims. Greed and mistakes are still supporting characters as well. It’s on par in overall quality with the third film, maybe a hair better. And if you saw that one, you should see this one to see how things wrap up.
Spoilery Synopsis
With the retrieval of the blood orchid and the anaconda babies, the research continues in Peter’s lab. Now, the snakes can regenerate when their heads are cut off. We get a good look at the lab, and the big snake clearly wants out. It easily escapes and kills the scientist who had the snake at the end of the previous film.
At Murdoch’s house, Eugene arrives to pick up a million dollars if he’ll do a little job for Murdoch. Murdoch thinks the scientist stole the orchid formula and is offering it to the highest bidder. He wants Peter the scientist dead, and also Amanda if she should show up.
Meanwhile, in Eastern Europe (that’s where anacondas live, right?), a hiker gets lost in the woods. Alex has no idea how to read a paper map. He runs into Amanda and her two policeman assistants. They find signs of a big predator.
Not long after, Jackson, an archaeologist, tells his crew about the important discovery they’re about to make. They stop at a fallen tree and have to walk the rest of the way to their camp. They mention that there’s no cell service or radio out here.
Amanda’s group finds Peter’s enhanced orchids in his lab. She plants bombs to wipe out the flowers, but then the snake shows up and kills the two policemen. Amanda and Alex make their way out through a mine shaft. She hears the snake roaring behind her (do snakes roar now?) The snake is about to kill her when part of the roof collapses on it, and she gets away.
Jackson arrives at the dig’s camp, but there aren’t any people here. They’ve all gone missing. He soon finds their partially eaten bodies, but it’s too late in the afternoon to go back, so they have to camp there. By the time the rest of the team arrives, all the bodies have gone missing.
Eugene’s crew of assassins arrives at Peter’s lab.
Heather gets stung by a poisonous spider and gets sick, so they can’t all just walk out of the woods today. There’s a whole “we have to drain the poison” scene that looks pretty nasty. Jackson leaves her and Wendy at camp while they walk up to the excavation site. Jackson soon finds the bodies of the other team.
Alex runs through the woods, but Amanda has his lost car keys. She shows up and runs into the snake just in time to save Alex. She shoots at the snake, which draws the attention of both Eugene’s and Jackson’s groups. Everyone runs, but some of them aren’t fast enough.
Eugene then takes everyone hostage and insists that Amanda go and get the serum from the snake. Amanda explains to Scott about the serum, the orchids, and the snake. They stop at Peter’s house, and Amanda finds the serum. Some of it is spilled, which is going to attract the big one.
Something blows up, and everyone runs in different directions. Scott sacrifices himself so that Amanda can get away. She blows up the snake, but it soon starts to regenerate.
Murdoch shows up at Eugene’s campsite. Vasile, the policeman who we thought died, is there, and he wants more money. Eugene double-crosses Murdoch, but shoots Vasile by mistake. Jackson knocks out Eugene and takes his gun.
Amanda and Jackson confront Murdoch, who wants the serum. He lets them go; the two of them, along with Alex and Heather get into a car and drive off. Murdoch injects himself with the serum, which immediately attracts the snakes. He’s healthy now, a very healthy snack for the big snake.
Amanda stops the car and blows up all the orchids.
Eugene wakes up and finds everyone is either dead or gone. He jumps on the back of Amanda’s car to escape and shoots Amanda. Jackson and Eugene fight on the roof of the car, with the anaconda right behind them. Amanda pulls the pins on Eugene’s grenades, and he and the snake blow into a million pieces.
As everyone drives off, we see that there are still snakes out there.
Brian’s Commentary
The snake sounds like a roaring lion every time we see it. I’m not sure why Amanda was so intent on blowing up the flowers, since curing cancer is usually considered a good thing. They don’t really need the snakes, that’s just a side effect of the testing.
The film mostly continues the plot from part three, but also incorporates some of the ideas of the second film as well. There’s not much connection to the original at all.
It does wrap up the previous film. Otherwise, it’s pretty lackluster.
Kevin’s Commentary
In addition to the roaring lion that Brian mentioned, there’s often the sound effect of a rattlesnake.
Machine gun shooting 101 – it’s a lot more effective to aim at what you want to shoot rather than randomly waving the gun in the air while holding the trigger down. There was too much of that – from pros who would know better.
It was a missed opportunity not showing the blown-up pieces regenerating into new snakes after they left, but we’ll have to be satisfied with one still surviving being shown.
I thought it was consistent with the previous film, maybe a little better. I didn’t hate it, but it’s pretty middling.
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