THE GIANT SPIDER (2013)

THE GIANT SPIDER (2013)

Tagline: Eight creeping, crawling legs of sheer TERROR!

(Sci-Fi, Terror, Has Anyone Seen My Tarantula?) [G]

Note – This movie was never given an MPAA rating, but I think it would have been a G. 

In this one radioactivity has led to some crazy things including a cave-dwelling bat creature, but Phantom Lake’s latest menace is a gigantic tarantula terrorizing everyone it encounters. Unless it’s a goat, or you just don’t look very appetizing. Meanwhile, it's up to a newspaper reporter Howard Johnson, his fiancée Zita Marczak, the army, and a group of scientists to stop the terror. Will Phantom Lake survive?

First off, this is another “Mihmiverse Film”. The “Mihmiverse is a set of films that are created and directed by Christopher R. Mihm and his wife Stephanie. As a huge fan of 1950s sci-fi, all of their stuff is pretty much right up my alley. My advice if you are going to watch these things is just to embrace the magic and not get super nitpicky about every little thing. There are wonderful love letters to a genre I love dearly. 

With that out of the way, I think of all the sci-fi flicks Mihm has done, THE GIANT SPIDER is my favorite or super close. The spider effects are pretty camp, but we do get a lot of shots where an actual tarantula is used. It’s actually the director’s son’s tarantula. What is actually quite a bit BETTER about this movie than 1955’s TARANTULA is that we actually see the tarantula a lot. In the 1955 version, there are some shots of it, but most are in the dark, so you got more of a silhouette back then. In this movie, one of the coolest bits of design work was done on the up close of the tarantula’s face. It was meant to kind of mirror what was done with the scorpion faces in THE BLACK SCORPION, but it ended up being more effective and fun. Every time I saw “the giant spider's” face, I smiled. It’s pretty fantastic. 

Acting wise we get several “Mihmverse” veterans. Shannon McDonough takes on the role of Zita Marczak and does a pretty great job. She reminded me a lot of Lisa (played by Lisa Simone) in THE GIANT GILA MONSTER. This was Shannon’s last of 5 films in the Mihmverse as of the writing of this review. I hope we get to see her again. We also get Daniel Sjerven who plays Howard Johnson and does a great job. This is probably his best role in the “Mihmverse” and he’s done 8 films thus far. I am not sure if this was intentional, but Howard Johnson is actually a string of hotels. We also see the return of James Norgard as Dr. Gabriel and Michael Cook as Dr. Vincent Edwards who both really understand what the director is going for as well. The other stand-out is Billie Jo Konze who plays Dr. Victoria Hackett. This is not to say we didn’t have some other fun talents involved here.

Script-wise, the movie is pretty good. I think if I was going to critique anything, it would be that General Castle in general (see what I did there) is a bit overkill. He’s kind of like the J.K. Simmons version of J Jonah Jamison, but against the rest of the characters, it’s a bit much. The dialog for him is pretty sexist which was definitely something in the 50s, but a lot of the movies didn’t really focus on that. Maybe a slight “pour me some coffee” or “you don’t see many women scientists” here and there, but General Castle man wow. Yes, it’s comical, but the joke kind of wears thin if that makes any sense. 

Even with a few imperfections, for me, this is a glorious 7 out of 7. I love that it packs a lot into one film and gets the most out of a micro-budget situation. The entire cast was just a blast. So far in the “Mihmiverse”, this one is the best thus far. It’s also better overall than 1958’s EARTH VS THE SPIDER and basically on par with 1955’s TARANTULA just in overall execution. 

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF ALL FOR GEORGE PRODUCTIONS AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY. 

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