Eight Legged Freaks Review
by Laura Clifford (laura AT reelingreviews DOT com)July 17th, 2002
EIGHT LEGGED FREAKS
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An exotic spider farm with an eccentric owner (Tom Noonan, "The Pledge") is the favorite after school destination of Cochise County Sheriff Samantha Parker's (Kari Wuhrer, "Anaconda") young son Mike (Scott Terra), although he's forbidden to go there. Pleasant Valley's corrupt mayor (Leon Rippy, "The Patriot") is secretly storing toxic waste in the faltering McCormick mines nearby. It is inevitable that these two combustible ingredients will meet and become the serious threat that are "Eight Legged Freaks."
Producers Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin ("Independence Day") were looking for a giant spider movie when they were introduced to New Zealander Ellory Elkayem's 1998 award-winning short "Larger Than Life." The threesome banded together to make a B-movie with a high tech sheen and a tongue in cheek. "Eight Legged Freaks" features lots of nudge-nudge jokes and pretty cool spider effects, but, as most self-aware genre hybrids do, runs out of gas in the third act.
We get our behavioral education on tarantulas, jumping spiders, trap door spiders and orb weavers as Joshua shows Mike his latest growth results (he's been feeding them insects caught from a water source we've seen get contaminated). Joshua's parrot prophetically proclaims 'I see dead people.'
Meanwhile mining engineer Chris McCormick (David Arquette, "Scream") returns home after having punched out the Sheriff's (now ex) husband ten years earlier. Aunt Gladys (Eileen Ryan, "The Pledge,") advises him to go tell the Sheriff how he feels right away. Bumbling Chris makes the first of many attempts, but, in a cute running gag, will be interrupted for the rest of the movie.
As paranoid conspiracy/alien invader prophet DJ Harlan Griffith (Doug E. Doug, "Cool Runnings") broadcasts to the town from an old silver trailer, pets begin to disappear, followed by ostrich from the mayor's farm, then Aunt Gladys. 'No one ever believes the kid' observes Mike, wielding a two foot spider leg he's found at Joshua's web-coated farm. A muffled scream from older sister Ashley's (Scarlett Johansson, "Ghost World") bedroom brings the adults to witness an oversized male orb weaver in action for themselves. Sheriff Parker enlists Deputy Pete (Rick Overton, the poor man's Jeffrey Tambor) to bring all police weaponry (including Lee Harvey Oswald's rifle) before rallying the town to gather at Prosperity Mall for a final showdown (shades of "Dawn of the Dead").
"Eight Legged Freaks" does a lot of things right. It features a strong central female character being ably assisted by a love interest (Wuhrer and Arquette work well together). The Deputy who's initially played for a dummy (a tip o' the hat to Arquette's "Scream" character perchance?) is heroic when it counts. The jokey film references are often subtle (watch for the townsperson amidst the armed mall mob who wears a hockey mask). The spider effects are fun, particularly the jumpers chasing dirt bikes through the desert and those trap door sneaks leaving a flurry of feathers where an ostrich used to be.
Even though this is a self-aware parody, the body build up began to bother me. Multitudes of people are attacked by spiders, but unless the person is one of the central characters, NO ONE EVER ATTEMPTS TO HELP THEM. Yes, it's fun for a while, but it runs out of steam completely around the hour mark.
"Eight Legged Freaks" would be great programming for the summer drive-in if there were any of those venues left.
C
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