Wes Craven on his experience making The Serpent and the Rainbow in Haiti and the Domican Republic

One of the real underappreciated works of the eighties - The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988) remains one of the finest Voodoo themed films. I believe Serpent was dismissed due to the surreal dream and drug induced imagery - imagery which many felt was old news after Craven's Nightmare on Elm Street cornered the market on 80's nightmare horrors. Serpent however remains an intriguing look at the zombie myth - complete with one of the greatest buried alive scenes in cinema history.

Serpent is based on a work of nonfiction by the scientist Wade Davis - a man insane enough to have travelled to Haiti to secure a mixture of drugs believed to create real-life zombies. I haven't read the book but after watching the film one has to imagine that Serpent is VERY loosely based on a true story - the shit is way to out of control.

Craven's adaptation has us follow Doctor Dennis Alan (Bill Pullman) - a sort of scientist Indiana Jones - a man mad enough to take on extreme journeys to secure information. Pullman is hired by a firm to secure a sample of medicine used to create zombies in Haiti. It seems doctors have discovered their dead patients wandering around the countryside or living in asylums. Pullman's contractors believe the zombie potion may help them discover a new form of anesthesia - which they believe could save thousands of lives.

Dr. Alan finds himself in Haiti - close to the drug - when all hell begins breaking loose. Revolution is brewing - the head of Haiti's security, who also happens to be a sadistic voodoo practitioner, is infiltrating the doctors dreams and physically pursuing him, and it seems the whole country is either conspiring to kill him or rip him off.

Dr. Alan's adventures build momentum until the final slam bang last half hour of Serpent has its way with you. Zakes Mokae is terrific as the evil as hell head of security/Voodoo Priest. When his constant infiltration of the Doctors dreams doesn't scare Alan off, Mokae decides to torture him by strapping him in his torture chamber and driving a huge spike through his scrotum! When that doesn't work we arrive at one of the best sequences in eighties horror. Doctor Alan has the voodoo powder he has been exploring blown into his face! He knows exactly what is going to take place - he will seem dead to medical experts but able to see and hear everything that is happening - then after he is buried alive the drug will wear off with him six feet under! AHHH! After the powder is blown on him he stumbles around Haiti pleading with the locals to "Tell them I'm not dead! Don't let them bury me!" Great shit.

We next take on Alan's point of view as the medical examiners declare him dead at the hospital only to have Head of Security/Voodoo man show up to tell them he is claiming the body! As the doctors leave the Voodoo man gleefully talks to the immobile doctor telling him the shit has just begun! The doc soon finds himself in a coffin at the bottom of a grave with the smiling voodoo man placing a tarantula on his head to "keep him company." This is possibly the most horrifying buried alive scene in film (Critics lost their shit about how masterful Tarantino's Kill Bill Vol. 2 burial scene was. Please - Serpents burial scene is what nightmares are made of).

Serpent wraps up in a frenzy of hallucinations and violence - a rather bizarre, really terrific little pic.

The making of Serpent is as wild as the film itself. Craven explains, "We were right in the middle of shooting when all 2,000 extras went on strike. They surrounded the entire company and began throwing stones. They were ready to do us in. The producers and I had an immediate conference with them and negotiated a higher fee for them. At that point, we realized how dangerous it had become for us. We left the country the next day."