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MOVIE REVIEW

Eight Legged Freaks

MPA Rating: PG-13-Rating (MPA) for sci-fi violence, brief sexuality and language.

Reviewed by: Ryan Izay
CONTRIBUTOR

Moral Rating: Average
Moviemaking Quality:
Primary Audience: Teens Adults
Genre: Sci-Fi/Suspense
Length: 1 hr. 40 min.
Year of Release: 2002
USA Release:
Scene from “Eight Legged Freaks” Scene from “Eight Legged Freaks”
Featuring David Arquette, Kari Wuhrer, Scarlett Johansson, Matt Czuchry, Doug E. Doug
Director Ellory Elkayem
Producer Bruce Berman, Dean Devlin, Roland Emmerich
Distributor
Distributor: Warner Brothers Pictures. Trademark logo.
Warner Bros. Pictures
, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company

“Eight Legged Freaks” tries hard to be so bad that it is funny. The story and script is purposefully cheesy but because it is a summer film, the special affects could not be bad. In fact, the spiders are the only halfway decent aspect of “Eight Legged Freaks”, and they get old after half the film.

There is a large amount of spider violence and jump scares in this film, but most of it is more disgusting than it is scary. Often, while being chased by large spiders, the characters utter obscene phrases. As far as a “PG-13” film goes, this one is average for what you would expect to see.

The story, or lack there of, is basically this: an exotic spider museum is exposed to toxic waste and the spiders naturally start growing and overtaking the small town in Arizona in which they reside. Prodigal son Chris McCormack, (played by David Arquette, who must have gone to “Keanu Reeves’ School of Acting”), returns home after his father’s death. He is reunited with town sheriff, Sam Parker (Kari Wuhrer), whom he was in love with before he left. None of this is really important though because the spiders are big and they’re killing people!. Watch out!

There is nothing close to spiritual in this movie, and although it’s all in good fun, don’t waste your time. Most people would be better off making another choice of a film to see.


Viewer CommentsSend your comments
Positive
Positive—I enjoyed this film tremendously and was uplifted by the teenaged girl’s openness FOR virginity! She didn’t go so far as to say that she was saving herself for marriage, but she did stand up to an obnoxious boyfriend. Also, even though she initially displayed rebellion toward her sheriff mom, she changed her attitude before the movie ended. My pre-teen grandkids noticed a “POD” poster on her wall, and that she dressed modestly most of the time.
My Ratings: [Better than Average / 4½]
Linda Lines, age 57
Positive—This was fun and entertaining, but you will take nothing with you to think about, so it is just two hours of escapism. If you want to be challenged, see Signs.
My Ratings: [Average / 3]
Mark L. Gilliam, age 40
Positive—I highly recommend this movies to teens and adults. It was a great movies. The movie wasn’t as scary as I heard to be, a few parts of the movie I jumped out of my seat, but mainly it was a pretty good film.
My Ratings: [Better than Average / 4]
Enoch, age 23
Neutral
Neutral—Basically, this is a 1950’s science fiction movie updated with 21st century movie technology. The film has to be commended for having a scene where a teenage girl won’t have premartial sex with her boyfriend, but the use of a sexual joke in the same scene kind of dilutes the message. People take the Lord’s name in vain a lot, especially during encounters with the title characters.

There’s not a lot of profanity. There’s not a lot of gore either, but the violence is of the “gross-out” kind. This film is not for small children or people who have a phobia about spiders.
My Ratings: [Average / 2]
Hillari Hunter, age 40
Negative
Negative—Eight Legged Freaks had everything to make it a classic… dark sets, good actors, great locations and, of course, huge spiders. So what went wrong? I don’t quite know but as a film it just didn’t work. There’s humour, chills, explosions and, of course, those spiders, all the ingredients for a classic B-movie legend, but alas it failed. This film was thin on plot and even thinner in the acting department.

This was nothing more than a glorified remake of Gremlins with spiders… Nothing offensive found here except a couple of cuss words, no sex or nudity, but there is a lot of gunplay violence and spider attacks. Very disappointing.
My Ratings: [Average / 3]
C St. John, age 31
Negative—Some of the greatest critics of the day (Leonard Maltin, Roger Ebert) gave pretty positive reviews to this movie. I relied on their opinions. Ahhhhhhhhh! Mr. Courtney Cox (Davy Boy) is just that. What a pitiful excuse for an actor! What a goofy movie! What a sad summer at the box office! What were Maltin and Ebert thinking!
My Ratings: [Average / 1½]
Jeremy Cutlip, age 23
Negative—Spiders exploded. That’s pretty much it. It tried, oh how it tried, to recreate the B-movies of years past, but it failed, failed flat on its face. The thing with the virginity—she was going to be raped, that’s different than holding yourself for marriage. As the fiancee of a girl who had to go through that a lot, I wished that he was the first to go.
My Ratings: [Better than Average / 2]
Alex, age 19
Movie Critics
…Fans of 50’s horror movies will enjoy this humorously updated action-thriller…[but there is] frequent, gross violence along with several crude sexual comments and vulgar language…
Preview Family Movie and TV Review
…7 scatological terms, 11 anatomical terms, 20 mild obscenities, 13 religious exclamations…
Kids-in-Mind
…operates in much the same vein as Tremors, but it’s not nearly as much fun…
David Levine, FilmCritic.com
Comments from young people
Neutral—I found this film to be thouroughly enjoyable. there were a few parts that I felt embarrassed about for a minute, but I didn’t think it was too bad for this day of age. when I was watching it I didn’t notice many cuss words, although I wasn’t looking for them, either. it was a really fun movie and there was a lot of laughing and clapping during it.
My Ratings: [Average / 2½]
amanda, age 15
Positive—This movie was really, really good in my opinion. It has comedy, adventure/action, suspense (believe it or not), romance and drama. David Arquette does a wonderful job as Chris, captivating the humorous, feel-good sweetness of his character as he has done before in movies such as, “See Spot Run.” I had been looking forward to this movie and it turned out to be better than I had expected. I loved it. There was little objectional content, very mild cussing, one scene where a girl’s boyfriend tries to have sex with her (he does not succeed and is zapped by a stunt gun—and this is not a graphic scene at all and is very brief), a mention of “probing” and the reasons for it and violence (not gory or graphic at all… but, instead—funny.) Wonderful movie! Go and see it! (DAVID ARQUETTE ROCKS… HE WAS HILARIOUS!)
My Ratings: [Better than Average / 4½]
Anna Arango, age 11