Movie Review: Spiders (2000)

The movie stars Lana Parilla, Josh Green, Nick Swarts, Mark Totty, Jonathan Breck and Simona Williams.

My wife was trying to take it easy Saturday afternoon before having to spend her evening/night at work. And, as part of that, she ended up watching some movies. This happened to be one of them and, while I did, admittedly, have some doubts about it, I did think it turned out to be better than expected.

I usually like movies about deadly spiders, and bugs in general, because it is easy for them to leave you feeling uncomfortable and on the edge of your seat simply because you feel like something is crawling on you.  And, at least for the majority of this film, the writers did take full advantage of that.

The fact the spiders reproduce from humans added quite a bit to the creepiness factor of this film. I honestly cringed each time a new spider would “hatch” from someone’s mouth and go scurrying across the room. That sight, alone, made this movie a bit more memorable than I thought it was going to be.

My only real complaint about this film is it makes the same mistake many other movies in this genre make, having the spiders get larger. I’ve never understood why filmmakers continue to think larger bugs are scarier because that simply isn’t the case. In fact, I think this movie would have been 100 times better had the spiders stayed around the size of a human hand because it would have been easier for them to hide and surprise their victims. The movie still managed to be watchable. But, I think it would have been one of the scariest films I’ve watched had they not gone overboard with the spiders’ size.

The absurd size of the spiders toward the end of the film does keep it from being one of the better thrillers I’ve watched. However, overall, I thought it was a good attempt. I would still classify it as a “B” movie. But, it was a “B” movie that was entertaining to watch.

My Grade: B