Beware Boiúna (2026): A Very Serious Movie About a Giant Snake

Mike P. Nelson, fresh off his Silent Night, Deadly Night remake, heads deep into the Amazon for Beware Boiúna, and the results are a little murkier than his last outing, in tone if not in craft. There’s real heart buried in here, but the film is being marketed as considerably less serious than what actually plays out on screen, and that mismatch shapes a lot of how the experience lands. Nelson wants to make (and demonstrates here how capable he is) a movie with serious stakes. I am just not sure a giant snake movie is the vehicle to showcase that desire.

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The setup is straightforward. A group of medical missionaries head into the Amazon to provide humanitarian aid, and their presence, paired with a volatile run-in with a group of dangerous men, ends up waking an ancient, mythic serpent that decides it’s done sharing its domain. At least I think thats the story. I am never really sure if the big snake just exists or is actually the avening spirit we here about. Nelson leans hard into Americans as the bad guy capitalists here, and it’s not subtle, but I see you, Boiúna, I see exactly what you’re doing. The dialogue gets a little wooden and clunky in places, particularly around how the doctors should handle the Americans. Its at this moment it occured to me…this is, and I mean this with love in my heart, a very serious movie about a giant snake.

Logan Marshall-Green’s villain, Brennan, is the film’s weakest link, genuinely less compelling and less dimensional than the giant CG and practical snake he’s sharing scenes with, which is a strange thing to have to type out loud. Its not Marshall-Green is gamely doing his best to introduce a range of emotions that don’t seem to show up in the script. The film refers to Boiúna as “she” from essentially the first mention, and it’s a specific, deliberate choice that never gets fully explained or earned, and honestly it felt a little forced by the time the credits rolled. I think that adds to the confusion on where and why the snake is there. A bunch of people act very familar with her or at least the mythology. None of the characters make a ton of smart decisions once things go sideways, but that’s fine, this is a silly movie at heart even when it’s trying to convince you otherwise. But when you are trying to make something deeper than just a big dumb snake movie your characters need to make different choices than they might in a big dumb snake movie.

There’s a jarring gear shift partway through once the story loses one of its central figures, and the film pivots hard from there. It also isn’t shy about its influences. There’s an Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom lift almost too close for comfort, crocodiles and a rickety old bridge included, and the quicksand escape that follows after is genuinely clever, one of the film’s better setpieces. Late in the runtime, the movie flirts with redeeming its villain, and I’m still not sure why, unless it wanted extra credit for its own self-seriousness. I think he uses an actual line from Schindler’s List once the redemption arc is set in motion. There’s also a clear Aliens homage baked into the ending, and a groan-inducing beat where the American character swoops in to save the day, come on now.

Nelson loves Jessica Rothe, and it shows, she’s continuing to build a genuinely strong run of horror work, and both she and Kiana Madeira anchor the film with more conviction than the script sometimes deserves. The whole thing plays grittier than I expected going in, and the setup owes a clear debt to Green Inferno (gross comparison sorry to all involved) and Cannibal Holocaust in how it frames outsiders wandering somewhere they don’t belong. There’s also a sizable subplot involving the region’s Indigenous community that feels a bit rough around the edges and could have used a defter hand. Is it a real community? Did we consult on it to get it right?

Beware Boiúna opened Fantastic Fest as its World Premiere on Thursday, September 17, with Mike P. Nelson, Jessica Rothe, and Kiana Madeira walking the red carpet, ahead of the film’s theatrical release October 2. It’s got good moments scattered throughout and a creature worth the price of admission alone. I just wish we spent more time with the snake having fun watching it do cool stuff. It wanted us to feel something instead. Tickets and the full Fantastic Fest schedule are at fantasticfest.com/film-guide.