The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988)

September 9, 2015 4:45 PM

Released four years after the first Elm Street movie, The Serpent and the Rainbow (trailer) drops Bill Pullman into the middle of 1970s Haiti to investigate cases of alleged real-life Voodoo zombification. One of Wes Craven's more religious-themed movies, with a premise loosely based on the (arguably) non-fiction book by the same name, the film gives Craven a chance to build upon a real-world mystery in applying his signature concoction of visually stylish horror, twisting storylines, and the oft-blurred line between the dream world and reality.
posted by churl (5 comments total)

Man that movie was weird. It's been a long time, but my memory is of the weirdness being kind of to no meaningful end. I wanted to like it.
posted by latkes at 6:19 PM on September 9, 2015

its one of those "movies only shares name with book" type of things, like "World War Z". LOVE the book though.
posted by alchemist at 1:44 AM on September 10, 2015

I have very little recollection of this movie, that I saw in Spain when it was released there, except for one thing: after a villain met his comeuppance in a certain way, a Spanish teenager in the theater shouted ¡ Al infierno sin pelotas ! (this can be more or less translated as To Hell without nuts!), a line that still cracks me up 27 years later.
posted by elgilito at 5:36 AM on September 11, 2015 [5 favorites]

I have a fondness for this film. I somehow managed to see it in the theater, even though I wasn't old enough. I was captivated by the trailers of Pullman in the coffin saying "don't bury me, I'm not dead!". Our whole row of teenage boys was shocked by the torture scene - we'd never seen something like that and multiple guys instinctively grabbed their crouches in sympathy. Other males in the theater yelped at that moment as well.

Also features, in my opinion, one of Brad Fiedel's three best scores. (The others being Terminator and Fright Night.) Sadly never commercially released and had to be tracked down as a bootleg.
posted by kreinsch at 10:27 AM on September 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

In the Cut: The Serpent and the Rainbow [self-link]
posted by churl at 3:40 PM on November 10, 2015