I'd sure like to get my hands on what the producers were smoking when they came up with the idea for this film. There is nothing about this movie that is the least bit scary – unless you count the acting. A whole lot of money must have changed hands to make the actors agree to be in this. There's no way it could have looked like a good career move, even on paper. I'm aware this film made a lot of money at the box office (I saw it for free on HBO and was VERY bored that night), but I just don't see how. Maybe if one of the lead actresses was naked. That would give some people something to enjoy. However, this film has nothing but bad effects and even worse dialogue. How could so many viewers be wrong?

The plot is as follows: A documentary crew rents a boat and sails down a South American river trying to find a lost river tribe that has never been filmed before. They pick up a strange guy, stranded on the river, who captures snakes for a living. He commandeers the vessel to chase after a giant snake that kills its victims by strangling the life out of them. Our heroes spend the rest of the film running/swimming away from said snake to stay alive. That's it. Nothing more. Quite engrossing wouldn't you say?

On top of the lackluster plot, there's nothing exciting or particularly scary about the snake attacks because they're not a surprise. How can they be? These people have nowhere to hide. Choices for safety: ratty old boat in the middle of a river or dense jungle swamp. Since no weapons exist to combat full body crushing, they're essentially up the creek. The people are just hamsters waiting for their turn to be lunch.

Plus, it's no secret who's going to live and die. The A list talent (for this movie) Stoltz, Lopez and Ice Cube are injured but live to tell the tale. The B-listers, the people whose names I don't know, get crushed and swallowed by a foam-rubber model. Jon Voight, being the bad guy, gets to die several times.