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Pest, The (1997)

The Pest is a film about Pest Vargas, a Latino con artist who owes the Scottish mob fifty thousand dollars. Pest is approached by a German named Gustav with a proposition where Pest could make fifty thousand dollars. He will give Pest the money if he can survive being hunted on Gustav’s island. Gustav hunts humans and cuts their heads off for his trophy room Pest accepts the proposition and uses his “street smarts” to outwit Gustav and receive the fifty thousand dollars.

Animal actors in this production were monitored through American Humane Society’s No Animals Were Harmed^® program.

Pest, The

Detailed Animal Action Report

When Pest is on the island he sees a large snake crawling across a tree limb. Later Pest is in the woods sitting down when a snake is seen crawling up his leg. Pest struggles with the snake, thrashing back and forth. A real and a fake snake were used for this scene. For the shot of the snake crawling up the leg, the trainer doubling for the actor, placed the real snake on his leg for the establishing shot and replaced it with a fake one. A fake snake was used when Pest is seen struggling with the reptile. When the snake is seen on the tree limb, the trainer merely placed the snake on his mark and retrieved him at completion of the shot.

Other animal action consists of a deer seen standing in the woods, a flock of sea gulls seen flying over the water and some cooked ducks seen hanging in a Chinese restaurant. The cooked ducks were the property of the restaurant. The production company obtained the cooked ducks from a Chinese restaurant. The ducks were not authorized for the specific purpose of making this film.

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