While the previous installment of the Anaconda franchise was hardly a cinematic masterpiece, its awfulness was strangely watchable in a stoned-at-three-in-the-morning kind of way – however, that strangely seems to be exactly the result its producers were hoping for because barely a year later, a fourth installment reared its scaly head to once again slither it’s way into premiering on the SyFy Channel.
However, while all the other sequels thus far have contained an all-new cast of characters (couldn’t imagine J-Lo or Ice Cube returning for more of this shit, could you?), Anacondas: Trail Of Blood decides to not only pick up some plot threads from Anaconda: Offspring, but even brings back the rare couple of characters who didn’t end up being digested by the titular serpents.
However, how much mileage can possibly be left to mine from a series about mutant snakes? Well, apparently not a hell of a lot as it happens.
For those of you unfamiliar with the events of Anaconda 3 – which I’m assuming is probably most of you – the last time we trawled our way through DNA tinkered super-snakes and Romanian bio-labs, terminally ill fat cat J.D. Murdoch bankrolled experiments on the rejuvenating properties of the rare Blood Orchid in order to reverse the ravages of bone cancer. Needless to say, shit went sour and after a pair of giant, juiced-up anacondas gorged themselves on almost everyone except gutsy scientist Amanda Hayes and we pick up matters after a mutant baby “Dracanaconda” grown in captivity has grown to full size and promptly swallowed the shit out of the lone boffins who is trying to refine the orchid serum for an impatient Murdoch.
Murdoch, paranoid old fuck that he is, assumes that the lack of communication is an act of treachery and subsequently hires Eugene – a hitman who, with his black clothes, leather jacket and permanently affixed dark glasses, dresses like he’s going to a fancy dress party as a far shitter hitman – to tie off all loose ends and reclaim the serum.
Meanwhile, determined to tie off a few loose ends herself is Amanda, who has taken it upon herself to kill any remaining anacondas and wipe out the Blood Orchid once and for all and while embarking on her mission she not only runs into Alex, a lost paleontology student, but a gaggle of clueless explorers who, along with Eugene’s thugs, will make sure this latest psycho serpent will be well fed.
Can Amanda manage to finally halt a slithering threat that now has the recuperating powers of Wolverine? Will Murdoch receive his cure or just have to settle for taking his karmic medicine instead? Will you manage to remember any of the characters names two minutes after the movie ends? Only one way to find out – wikipedia. No, wait! The film! We have to watch the film.
If I had to put money on it, I honestly believe that the only reason that Anacondas: Trail Of Blood exists at all is because someone at SyFy possibly suffered from immense cinematic OCD and coughed up production costs simply to wrap up the various matters left open by the scrappy, crappy – but perversely watchable – instalment.
Obviously what we’re dealing with here is another, gottily made cash grab that dispenses with all but the most rudimentary plot strands in the vain hope that a sticking in a couple of familiar faces and a bunch of confusingly shot deaths will plug plot holes bigger than the ludicrous looking snake itself. Coming back for another go round is John Rhys-Davis – which isn’t that surprising when you consider the man would probably show up at the filming of a birthday party if his agent booked it – and while it’s always nice to see him in action, he’s possibly the most active sufferer of bone cancer in history, dashing from danger and waving a machine gun around despite apparently being a week away from death. Rejoining him is Crystal Allen who celebrates Amanda Hayes shift into bargain basement Sigourney Weaver territory by wearing a black vest instead of a white one and not much else as she leads one of the most poorly planned search and destroy missions I’ve ever seen.
Rounding out the rare cast members that you’ve actually heard of is Mortal Kombat’s Johnny Cage himself, Linden Ashby, who plays his rather over-emotional explorer by delivering hilarious bursts of over acting and semi-regular intervals. Still, as chuckle inducing as some of Ashby’s acting is, at least he’s doing something, because if the remaining characters taste as bland as they act, you wonder why the anacondas are bothering to eat them in the first place. Even the guy who insists on putting on an english accent so rough, he makes Jason Statham sound like Paul Lynde, vanishes into the background as adroitly as the Predator’s camouflage tech during the photo session at a wedding.
Of course, if the human characters have troubles making their roles convincing, the CGI Dracanaconda beats them all hands down – despite not having any bloody hands; lets put it this way, Kaa the snake in the original, animated, Disney version of The Jungle Book looks more realistic than this fucker. In fact, the design for the titular reptile, with its ridged head, knitting needle teeth and its ability to even heal an exploded head, means that the anacondas don’t even resemble actual anacondas any more and instead look more like alligators who have had their legs cut off and their body rolled out like Play-Doh worm.
And yet, despite all this and a jeep-based, action climax that ruins some decent stunt work with some staggeringly awful green screen, returning director and serial cinematic release bypasser, Don E. FauntLeroy still manages to give this malformed garbage a lively pace that makes sitting through this latest waste of time mercifully brief despite it having no legitimate reason to exist.
The last of the solo Anaconda films to date, Trail Of Blood ends the franchise in a far worse place than where it started, but at least they’re far more mindlessly watchable than the Lake Placid sequels that it would soon merge with to create a far more confounding hybrid.
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