Arachnophobia(1990)

On Tuesday Alan started the lecture by introducing us to this movie, "Arachnophobia". Although I had watched this film before, I hadn't really looked at it as anything different than a creepy crawly movie.

The plot of the movie is pretty basic, just like a typical 1950's B movie. A group of scientists studying entomology are on an expedition to Venezuela gathering insects and research, searching for a new species. The entomologists stumble across two stunned spiders which appear to be like nothing they have ever seen before, a entirely new species.
One of the spiders bites one of the men and ends up hitching a ride back in the coffin along with the dead body. Unfortunate for a small town in California called Canaima, the deadly spider arrives and takes cover in an old barn spreading its offspring, causing havoc throughout the town and its people.

The thing that I really liked about the movie "Arachnophobia" was the way that the movie was directed. Although this film is meant to be a horror, it had a lot of comical moments throughout the entirety of the film.
John Goodman plays the comedy character Delbert McClintock, who is the towns pest control.

Another thing that makes this movie really good is how they choose to use the spiders. Unlike the movie "Them", which uses giant ants as their creepy crawlies, the directors in "Arachnophobia" wanted the spiders to take over the town by numbers and not size. This I feel adds an extra suspense to the horror of the film because until they appear, the spiders are silent killers.
The two images below demonstrate a few scenes from the movie were the spiders gather in their groups and try to take the Jennings house by force.

One of my favorite bits of this movie takes part in the cellar of Dr Ross. He is pinned down by several wine racks, his only way of defending himself is to fend off the giant spider by throwing bottles of his most precious wine collection. After throwing the first few bottles he comes across his most prized bottle of Chateau, which he hesitates to throw and says, "Not the chateau". This line did give me a chuckle, It really reminded me of a scene from "Shaun of the Dead" when they're going through old LPs trying to find ones appropriate to throw as projectiles towards zombies.