Arachnophobia Review

 

Arachnophobia is a 1990 black comedy horror film. The movie was produced by Amblin Entertainment, Hollywood Pictures, and Tangled Web Productions and distributed by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution. Arachnophobia was written by Don Jakoby, Al Williams, and Wesley Strick and directed by Frank Marshall.

The story is after a nature photographer dies on his assignment from Venezuela, the casket his body arrived in has brought back a very poisonous spider to rural California. Soon after the spider found a mate, now there's spiders all over this small town killing people, and it's up Dr. Ross Jennings and others to put an end to these deadly arachnids.

• Negatives

The only real complaint I have with Arachnophobia is one of the characters has arachnophobia, and it's obvious that by the end of the movie he's going to get over his fears, or at the very least not be as scared of spiders as he once was before.

• Mix

I've got nothing to say. Let's move on.

• Positives

One positive about the movie is the bits of comedy. There's a lot of good humor in this and it's very balanced. The jokes don't over step the more scary parts of the film. The best comedic moments came from John Goodman as McClintock. That character was just awesome.

What also made the movie a great watch was the spider effects. One part was actually spiders and the other part was some sort of puppetry or whatever kind of practical effects. But what I liked about it was for a majority of the time you couldn't tell which was which. That my friends is a sign of great special effects at work.

Another thing that made Arachnophobia a good movie was the performances. More specifically from Jeff Daniels and John Goodman. Like I said before Goodman's character was just hilarious. And Jeff Daniels was great as Dr. Ross Jennings. What made his performance so good was he just really nailed playing a very likable everyman.

The last thing I'll give the movie credit for is the very effective scares. And what made them work so well is you're always wondering where the spiders are, and even if you do find them they're always some place you could imagine a spider being. Like in the shower or on your lamp. The part that scared me the most was there was a scene with a couple and they're eating popcorn and there's a spider in the bowl of popcorn. I first saw this movie when I was ten years old and it appeared on television. When it got to that scene ten year old me thought, "Oh God. There could be a spider in my bowl of popcorn right now, and I wouldn't know until it was too late". I never finished that popcorn after that scene.

Arachnophobia is a very fun horror-comedy. It has good humor, great special effects for the spiders, Daniels and Goodman have great performances, and there are a lot of good scares too. The only issue was it's very obvious that a character is going to get over he's arachnophobia.

My final rating is Great.

Okay, I'm finished here. Come back on Thursday, Oct 21st for my review of the newest DC animated movie, Injustice. Until then, enjoy the rest of your day, and please give Arachnophobia a watch. It's a very underrated movie that really needs more love.