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Overall Rating
  Awesome: 13.75%
Worth A Look: 42.5%
Average: 16.25%
Pretty Bad: 21.25%
Total Crap: 6.25%
6 reviews, 44 user ratings
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| Eight Legged Freaks |
by Brian McKay
"Do yourself a favor - stick to movies about spiders of the two-legged kind"
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So I'd been looking forward to this film for months, right? You got giant mutant spiders, shotgun-toting townspeople, and an unabashed B-movie flair. Add to that a clever ad campaign, including a blatant but funny attempt to ride the popularity of the recent "Spider-man" film, and I was ready for a sure-fire popcorn summertime winner. Boy was I wrong.The first problem with "8 Legged Freaks" is that it is horribly, horribly written. Every tired bit of cliched dialogue, every cookie-cutter "misfit" character, they're all trotted out here and put on display. If they were more cleverly written, or more focused in the vein of a parody or homage, then the film could have been salvagable. But it is nowhere near clever or funny enough to be an effective parody.
The second problem is, it's not scary either. The spiders are too comical, with their cute little chittering noises and squeaks, to be taken as any kind of serious threat. Even when it tries to make subtle nods to earlier (and much better) B-horror films, it comes off as a weak attempt to copy them, rather than honor them.
So what we are left with is an unfunny comedy. Or is it an unfrightening horror film? A little of both, but mostly it's just another poorly written, badly executed Hollywood cookie-cutter genre flick. Add to that mostly inane casting, especially David Arquette as the "hero" and Doug E Doug as a woefully hamfisted, unfunny, and unconvincing talk radio conspiracy theorist, and you have a recipe for tedium. Only Kari Wuhrer is enjoyable to watch as the local Sheriff, not only because she's easy on the eyes, but because she turns in one of the few performances that doesn't make you want to roll your eyes.
I could have forgiven a lot of shortcomings, if there had at least been lots of good, gooey, creative spider killing. Most of the time, however, it's just people being pounced on and dragged away by the arachnids, while everyone else screams and runs around. The few spider-splattering money shots are definitely not worth sitting through the rest of the movie for.If you want to enjoy a campy but fun B-movie, then go with a real B-film. Go rent "Evil Dead 2" or "Killer Klowns from Outer Space" Don't fall for mainstream Hollywood's pale big-budget imitation of better films made for a miniscule fraction of the cost but with ten times the creativity.
link directly to this review at http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=5599&reviewer=258
originally posted: 07/21/02 17:19:42
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OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2006 Boston Sci-Fi Film Festival For more in the 2006 Boston Sci-Fi Film Festival series, click here.
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USA
17-Jul-2002 (PG-13)
DVD: 01-Jun-2004
UK
N/A
Australia
26-Sep-2002
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