Explainers

Rattlesnake on Netflix: Was it filmed in Tulia, Texas?

Carmen Ejogo in Rattlesnake
Carmen Ejogo in Rattlesnake. Pic credit: Netflix

Rounding out Netflix’s string of Horror/Thrillers for the Halloween month comes a feature about the lengths a mother will go to protect her child.

The film Rattlesnake stars Carmen Ejogo, who recently had a major role in True Detective Season 3. In the movie, her character Katrina Ridgeway has a daughter who gets bit by a rattlesnake. She soon finds a mysterious woman who makes the bite completely vanish. But in return, she must pay back the woman with the price of someone’s soul before sunset.

Most of the film is set in the small Texas town of Tulia and since the movie premiered, it has fans curious if this is where the film was actually filmed. Well, here is what to know about Tulia, TX and if Rattlesnake was filmed there.

Where is Tulia, Texas from Rattlesnake?

According to the Tulia Texas website, the city is real and can be found between Lubbock and Amarillo. If someone were to start planning a visit to this rural town they could visit the Swisher County Museum, the local library and a couple of different state parks.

If that doesn’t seem like enough adventure, visitors can go to a livestock auction and bring home a cow or horse as a souvenir to remember the time they spent there. Golfers can also practice their putting at the local golf course. Much like in the film Rattlesnake, this town’s real-life to-do list is not very long.

The National Catholic Reporter explains that each year, the town holds a picnic for anyone who has left the tiny town and wants to come back and remember their roots. The reason Tulia may have a claim to fame is that in 1999, a drug bust went down that the local people decided was not justified, so they planned to get justice by themselves.

After a group called Friends of Justice was formed, several people had charges against them dismissed. The group is still in existence today but is no longer in Tulia. The little town remains true to its Panhandle roots, where almost everyone knows everyone else.

Was Rattlesnake filmed in Tulia, Texas?

It does not appear Rattlesnake was filmed in Tulia, Texas. It’s possible they did some footage there but nothing from the reports indicates that the production did any filming in the small town.

That said, several articles confirm that Rattlesnake took advantage of the New Mexico tax incentives and did filming throughout the state. According to Ruidoso News, principal photography began in December 2018 in cities such as Santa Fe, Espanola, Las Vegas, Cochiti and Abiquiu, New Mexico. Abq Journal also states the filming crew was “taken by the beauty” of New Mexico while production ran for Rattlesnake.

It isn’t out of the norm for films to utilize a completely different location to make it seem like characters are in a different place. It’s usually necessary with filming budgets because every state has different tax laws for filming purposes. Many film crews will not even shoot in California anymore because of how expensive it is.

All this said, it definitely paid off because New Mexico’s rich desert landscape added to the isolated atmosphere of the film. Whether it makes viewers want to visit Tulia, Texas though is probably up for debate.

Rattlesnake is now streaming on Netflix.

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