Eight Legged Freaks
Tags: psychedelic

Plot synopsis:
In the quiet mining town of Prosperity, Arizona, an accident involving a rabbit causes a barrel of toxic waste to land in a reservoir. An exotic spider farmer named Joshua (Tom Noonan) has been making regular visits to the site, where he collects crickets for his spiders. Although the spiders have ingested the toxins, he is oblivious since the arachnids seem unaffected. Joshua shows Mike (Scott Terra), a local boy, his collection, which include Jumping spiders, Trapdoor spiders, Tarantulas, and orb-weavers, including a female orb-weaver named Consuela. After Mike leaves, Joshua is bitten by an escaped tarantula and accidentally knocks down the spider cages. He is killed by the spiders and, after devouring him, the spiders grow to even huger proportions.On his way home, Mike is accosted by his mother, Sheriff Samantha 'Sam' Parker (Kari Wührer) and Deputy Pete pulling the toxic barrel out of the pond. Wade, the Mayor of Prosperity, is holding a town meeting in the mall about whether they should sell the mines and relocate. Chris McCormick (David Arquette), whose father owned the mines before he died ten years ago, shows up and stands against Wade's proposition. Chris also sparks a romance with Sam.Meanwhile, Harlan Griffiths (Doug E. Doug), the local radio DJ and an eccentric extraterrestrial enthusiast, is broadcasting his theory that various missing pets around town have been abducted by extraterrestrials. Inevitably his theory is dismissed as the product of a deranged imagination. Mike sneaks out on foot to find Joshua but finds the spiders missing, the farm covered in webbing, and the dead body of Joshua. Although he sees an enormous spider shadow in the mines and tells Chris that the spiders have grown to enormous sizes, based on a giant spider leg he found at the mine entrance, Chris disbelieves his story. Meanwhile, the mines have reopened with the miners searching for a famous gold lode.One miner is eaten by a gigantic spider, whose clan have made the mines their home. Seeing as the entire town is connected in some way to the mines, spiders show up in many different places. Deputy Pete Williams (Rick Overton) cat has a fight with one of the spiders in the air vents before being eaten, and some of the ostriches on Wade's farm are devoured by Trap Door Spiders, Ashley breaks up with her boyfriend Bret, and he and his motorcyclist friends are chased by jumping spiders, with him being the only survivor, accidentally cutting off the telephone line and being stuck in the mine. Chris finds out that his Aunt Gladys and her dog are abducted by a male orb weaver in their basement. Sam is convinced Chris and Mike are delusional. However, her skepticism fades and she realizes that Chris and Mike were right all along when she witnesses a giant male orb-weaver attempting to abduct Ashley (Scarlett Johansson), Sam's rebellious teenage daughter and Chris; Sam saves them both. Meanwhile Bret, still wandering the mines, gets a good peek at the giant Consuela during her feeding.Sam contacts Pete and tells him to bring all guns in the police station's possession and they escape to Harlan's trailer, knowing he has a radio station that he operates from within his trailer. As Sam broadcasts the threat over the radio, a giant tarantula, the "tank" of the horde, assaults the trailer but they manage to escape. As the town is besieged by vicious spider hordes, many people are killed and eaten, Chris tries to convince Harlan that the spiders are "from Earth" but ends up convincing him that they are "Spiders from Mars" to make him happy, Sam tells everybody to evacuate to the mall. Chris, Sam, Mike, Ashley, Harlan, Wade and many other townspeople all escape and barricade themselves in the mall (but the cowardly Wade flees into the mines and locks the gate before the attack) and defend themselves from the spiders. Meanwhile, Harlan and Chris climb onto the roof and ascend the radio mast and try to get a signal to call the US army as they are being attacked by the spiders, but are believed to be pranksters. Harlan jumps from the roof, after the tarantula breaks open the gates and lets the spiders enter the mall, and lands in some bushes, where he meets up with Pete. The two run from spiders as Chris meets up with the remaining townsfolk and goes down to the basement. Meanwhile, Bret, still wandering the mines, encounters the cowardly Wade before his abduction.While the townsfolk are in the basement, Bret arrives on a forklift that brings down the locked gate, and they all head to through the mines straight to the front entrance, discovering the methane-filled tunnels. After losing Norman and freeing Wade, Chris goes to look for his Aunt Gladys in the mines and finds her - and the gold his father was searching for, but is confronted by the gigantic Consuela. He uses perfume to distract the spider and then escapes using Bret's motorcycle. Chris then blows up the spiders and the mines utilizing Gladys's smoking addiction and the high concentrations of methane gas. The police finally arrive. They had not believed the reports of the spiders but believed Harlarn's theory that the assailants were extraterrestrial in nature, until Pete tells them that the assailants were "just spiders, that had ingested extremely high levels of toxic waste." He attempts to prove this by removing his hat, showing us that he is bald. He runs his hand back and forth over his head saying; "All new growth, just look at this, all new growth!"In the final scene, Harlan is heard making a radio report about the spiders. He concludes that the town has decided to cover up the whole incident, but have let Harlan continue broadcasting the incident, knowing nobody will believe him. He also mentions Chris reopening the gold mines and putting everyone back to work, but tells us "that is another story altogether." As the camera zooms in close on his mouth, it is clear that he now has three gold teeth.

Review: This looked like it would be a stupid movie, and it some scenes it certainly was, but it was so entertaining that I know I will watch this a number of times.This is a 1950s-type sci-fi flick with modern-day special effects.
The great thing about this title is it sets up the film perfectly--it's a parody, and a surprisingly entertaining and hilarious and fun one, too.David Arquette is the film's main character: the local boy who has returned after 10 years and still has a crush on cute Sheriff Sam Parker (Kari Wuhrer).
(Yeah, that was a pretty bad pun.)"Eight Legged Freaks" was one of the biggest surprises of last year, mainly because it was so darn funny and such a good spoof.
The people that went into this film expecting Oscar material were nuts.The most sad thing about "Eight Legged Freaks" is that the people going into "Men in Black II" were probably expecting something like this: something funny, smart, original, witty, and satirical.
the story is simple and ludicrous, toxic waste spill crossed with exotic spider farm = giant killer spiders attacking a town.FANTASTIC has everything you need from a movie, the conspiracy theorist nut job on the radio played greatly by the fantastic Doug E.
Doug, the town boy who has just returned to be the hero played by the ever excellent David Arquette who is the most perfectly cast B-Movie actor EVER!
and the really hot sherriff who is in love with the hero and vice versa, a great film, some ropey effects on occasion but it only adds to the brilliant and fantastic B-Movie feel of a truly great and memorable movie i hope more movies like this come along and quickly!.
My personal bias against him was dead wrong in this movie.'Eight Legged Freaks' is a throw back to creature films of the 50's and, as some other reviewers have alluded, to more contemporary films like 'Gremlins' and 'Tremors.' Horror-comedy is a difficult genre to work within but 'Eight Legged Freaks' manages to pull it off.
'Eight Legged Freaks' does what the best films should do: for two hours you forget you're watching a movie and you just enjoy yourself.
This and "Arachnophobia" are my two favorite spider films.This is a horror-comedy, a genre that's difficult to pull off effectively.
It must be very difficult to act with CGI, yet there are rarely, if ever, occasions when you see this cast looking even slightly lost.It may be a parody, it may be silly, but it's apparent that a lot of care went into making this, and the cast look like they're having fun - which always creates a good impression.
The eclectic bunch takes refuge at the Prosperity Mall and the little town is devastated by the spiders attack.This monster/comedy film with quite budget packs thrills, some good action and funny moments.
Emmerich is a good director, writer and producer who founded along with Dean Devlin the company Centropolis Entertainment and expert on making movies for the masses and specialist on large-scale disaster movies ¨Day after tomorrow¨, ¨ 2012 ¨, spectacular stories ¨ Stargate ¨,¨ The patriot¨, ¨Universal soldier ¨ and giant monsters as Mammoth and Sabretooth in ¨10.000 B.c ¨ , aliens in ¨Independence day ¨ , ¨Godzilla¨ and spiders in ¨Eight legged freaks¨.
As anyone who regularly watches big-bug movies should know, toxic waste and creepy-crawlies are not a great combination, the result usually being monstrous, over-sized critters intent on devouring humans and trashing cities.
Eight Legged Freaks is no exception, and opens with a barrel of radioactive goop leaking into a pond near the seemingly-soon-to-be-ghost-town of Prosperity (why do they always tempt fate by giving these places such silly names?); before you know it, giant spiders are everywhere, wrapping up victims and taking them into their arachnoid lardera network of disused gold mines.David Arquette plays Chris McCormick, owner of the mines, who teams up with various townsfolk who have managed to avoid becoming spider fodderincluding sexy Sheriff Samantha Parker (Kari Wuhrer), her equally sexy daughter Ashley (Scarlett Johansson) and geeky son Mike (Scott Terra), and conspiracy theory nut Harlan (Doug E.
Doug)to destroy the gigantic spiders and save the town.With a likable cast and a whole slew of impressive special effects, Eight Legged Freaks is an affectionate tribute to the B-movie monsterfests of the 50s.
Planting tongue firmly in cheek, writer/director Ellory Elkayem delivers an action packed, thrill-a-minute movie that will have arachnophobes squirming in their seats, whilst everyone else will be having a blast.Occasionally, the film's comedic elements veer towards the cartoonish a tad too much (the spiders make unnecessarily silly noises, do pratfalls, and in one silly scene, even have a wrestling match with a cat inside a dry-lined wall cavity), but, on the whole, the film is a great mix of the silly and the scary.I enjoyed Eight Legged Freaks very much (not least because Wuhrer and Johansson are perhaps the fittest mother/daughter combo ever to grace the silver screen) and highly recommend it if you're after a fun popcorn flick for a Saturday night..
Or will spiders rule the earth and lay waste to man kind?Eight Legged Freaks is unashamedly homaging "B" movie creature features from the 1950s.
Bartley's Arizona camera work.Whilst not having the savvy scripting of homage daddy, Tremors, or the star appeal of 1990's Arachnophobia, Eight Legged Freaks deserves its place amongst such fun and creepy company.
It rarely works out.But Eight Legged Freaks is an okay movie with okay CGI for the giant spiders.
Great spiders, good acting, not that bad dialog, and a lot of humor.Many films in this class take themselves totally serious (like the abysmal Alien vs Zombies), which this does not - a big plus in my book.
Now, this has just about everything you would want in a B-Movie horror flick.There is 18-year-old Scarlett Johansson, who plays the Sheriff's daughter, and giving us a preview of why she is such a hot actress today.Speaking of hot, the Sheriff, Kari Wuhrer, is smoking.There is David Arquette from Scream 1,2,3, and 4, who is just born to play B-Movie horror.The couple with their cat and the old lady (Eileen Ryan) with her dog are just priceless scenes.I guarantee that I would watch motocross racing if they added those jumping spiders.
When the alarm is sounded, it's then up to mining engineer Chris McCormack and Sheriff Sam Parker to mobilize an eclectic group of townspeople, including the Sheriff's young son, Mike, her daughter, Ashley and paranoid radio announcer Harlan Griffith and Deputy Pete Willis into battle against the bloodthirsty eight-legged beasts.This movie is bit tremors but instead there are big spiders instead of big worms.This movie is really funny, it's great Comdey/Horror/Sci-fi for the whole family.
unless one of your family members are scared of spiders.The acting this movie is really good from the whole and i really liked how the spiders looked, then are not that scary, i really like how they had all different kinda of big spiders as well, the attack are more funny most of the time.I going keep this movie 8 out of 10.
From the producers of 'Independence Day' and 'Godzilla' comes 'Eight Legged Freaks', an entertaining monster movie that redefines arachnophobia.Let me start of by asking if you do don't like spiders.Most people in the world hate spiders and I can't say that I blame them.What makes them creepy are their physical features.They have 8 legs.They have 8 eyes.They can be hairy.They also eat meat.Well, imagine a spider with all of these features and it was 5 times it's original size.I'm sure that not even the biggest fan of spiders would want that.In the town of Prosperity, Arizona, a barrel of toxic waste gets dumped into a body of water and whatever has been living in that lake has apparently increased in size.So a man who owns an exotic spider farm finds some crickets in the lake that are bigger then their normal size.He feeds them to the spiders and then they also increase in size.The spiders get out of their cages, kill the man, and are free to do whatever they want now that they are free.Now there's an interesting plot for ya.'Eight Legged Freaks' is great popcorn entertainment that will please all except those who don't like things that have eight legs and spin webs..
The only scary moment comes when you have to fear for the safety of a poor little trouble-making rabbit, right at the beginning.While based on a B-movie collage, this is definitely not a B-movie in terms of quality.Watch this film in the company of friends.
My Take: A hilarious send-off of the silly B-movies of the 50's.EIGHT-LEGGED FREAKS is a campy, big-bug B movie with all the usual refinements: actors with a B-profile resume, a script which is only about of town fighting against uninvited guests (in this case, giant spiders) and a special effects crew that could make this menaces into the new special effects creature in the book.
If more movies were as honest as "Eight Legged Freaks", then they would probably do better at the box office, and they would definitely get better reviews because the audience would already know what they are going to watch.
A movie designed to give you the feel of the cheesy drive-in horror films of the 50's, and director Ellory Elkayem pulls it off pretty well, although I probably would have enjoyed it better had they really made it cheesy.
I found it to have all the star qualities of a good monster film: likable heros, lots of action and scariness infused with humor, and most of all, very creepy and frightening monsters, in this case spiders.
Arquette and Sheriff Sam(Kari Wuhrer)summon help in fighting off the toxic waste induced giant spiders wreaking havoc on their tiny town in Arizona.
They terrorize the citizens of Prosperity, Arizona, where Kari Wuhrer plays the Sheriff, Scarlett Johansson her teen daughter, and David Arquette the Sheriff's love interest.The plot of terrorizing arachnids in an Arizona town automatically brings to mind 1977's "Kingdom of the Spiders" with William Shatner, but that movie took the topic serious and the tarantulas were normal size.The Arizona locations are great and the movie is consistently amusing as "Eight Legged Freaks" is just a fun flick, but the main highlight is the mother/daughter combo of Kari Wuhrer and Scar-Jo. Kari has a strikingly attractive face and personality and Scar-Jo was 17 years-old during filming and looks great in tight pants.On the downside the film seems too long at 99 minutes because there isn't enough depth to the characters and their story to warrant going over like 85 minutes.
Still, it's enjoyable with clever jokes and funny sound effects with okay special effects.This film makes fun of many clichés in B-movies and that's why it's so funny.
Ok, ok I know a little Nothing-Hill town under attack by genetically degenerated spiders is so B-grade predictable, but this movie tries to go one step ahead of its genre.
Its special effects are what make it worth a look, the crawling monsters are pretty well - and scary - portrayed, and as a matter of fact I will not recommend this film to those who suffer from arachnophobia, beware on advance it might no let you sleep for a week or so!
To state a more clear overview of the film, imagine that this movie is a re-edition of one of those good old classics like `The Visitor' but with worthy special effects such as the aliens of `Independence Day' or `Godzilla', like I say arachnophobians stay away, but if you are a fan of the genre then this movie is a must see.
I think that this film gives a good overview of what sci-fi remakes should be: being faithful to the original plot but spicing it with top of the line special effects and a little bit of funny quotes, like the movie `Mars attacks!' Predictable?
I would recommend this to any person who enjoys spoof movies, especially ones which contain campy humor; I'd also recommend it to anyone who's seen one or more of the old "giant spiders" movies, and couldn't take it seriously.
It may not have incredible acting, serious drama or anything that would set it in the bounds of a well-produced film, but its nicely directed action sequences, quick scene changes combined with the clever usage of many minor characters to create lots of scenarios makes it immensely enjoyable to watch.
Now along comes Eight Legged Freaks  anhomage to the monster movies of the fifties and a satire on the more recent films of this nature.
Spiders ingest radioactive waste, grow to enormous proportions, then attack a small townsounds kind of stupid huh.there's a good reason for that.it is.
Not bad for a movie with a title like `Eight Legged Freaks'.
It is of course also the goal for this movie to look like a poor  horror film from the fifties.Its done very well,great fun worth your while..
The script worked well, and it wasnt on too long either.Whether you love it, or hate it, Eight legged Freaks is the best monster movie we have seen for years.....
Who of you out there hate spiders?if you do, then i would give this one a miss, but if you think your brave enough, its definetly cinema quality, thats if you can stand David Arquette for 1 1/2 hours playing the same character "detective duey" out of scream, also starring are the sexy Kari Wuhrer from "anaconda and Slider the tv series" and a new star to hit the screens, who i see that has alot of potential Scarlett Johansson, watch out for this one.The graphics in this movie i will give an 8/10, very good except for the jumping spiders, if you see the movie you will no what i mean.The thing i loved about this movie is that its funny, unique in its own kind of way and action packed all of the last 50 minutes.And if anything the first 40 minutes is quite slow.a new director to hit our screens but a word of advice to him is to forget about Arquette.
Eight Legged Freaks was a great old fashioned monster movie.
Anyway this film was just really entertaining and I loved it, it was really funny and people are complaining about the acting, but it wasn't that bad, I mean most of the time they would have to be running for thier lives, it's not one of those really emotional movies where the acting has to be perfectly into what thier doing, it's still got quite good actors/actresses in it anyway, including David Arquette, Scott terra, and scarlett johansson.
Bottom line: Arac-attack/Eight-legged Freaks does not deliver on its promise of being an impressive horror movie.
"Eight Legged Freaks" is fun but not great to watch.The movie its story starts off well and promising but soon after that it starts falling flat when it begins to introduce and follow way too many characters.
It makes "Eight Legged Freaks" feel like a disjointed movie, filled with some arachnid attack sequence without feeling an obvious connection.
No way she would had ever played in a movie like this one now, at this moment.By no means a must-see but when you watch it you'll probably have a good time, if you at least know not to take it very serious all.6/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/.
Campy and spooky sci-fi homage to the big bug drive-in flicks of the 1950s relying on the old chestnut of toxic waste spawning a horde of gigantic voracious spiders run amok upon a small Arizona town with Arquette returning home to face the lethal threat with his amore Wuhrer, the sheriff and single mom providing a suitable duo to facedown the ensuing onslaught.
The film is mostly done with an old-school spirit and a lot of cheese, and the fact that some of it's good gives this one some of it's better scenes here in the manner of how the spiders not only get mutated and then later escape from their lab, their running around the outskirts of town grabbing animals and the rather fun encounters where the creatures hit the different home of the residents.
Eight Legged Freaks (what a stupid title), is a campy homage to the classic "big-bug" sci-fi movies of the fifties.
I just love movies like this.This movie reminds me of Lake placid,it has a lot of thrills and it's very funny too.The special effects are fantastic and the cast is pretty good as well.So if you want a good treat check out Eight legged freaks.
You can pretty much guess what happens next...This film is a tribute to every great sci-fi/horror movie since the 1950's.
Am I the only person who sees this as deliberate disrespect by the director to all those cheesy horror flicks from the 80's :)Watch this movie with some squeemish girls for extra laughs :) My wife is terrified of spiders but she loved it despite screaming several times.
Just expect to have a good time with this movie that does have a few surprises, easily regurgitated one-liners, and (as if there is any other reason than this) GIANT FREAKIN' SPIDERS.
This movie is almost like a cross between Tremors and Gremlins with the way the spiders mutated and tried to invade the town, and of course you have the one guy believing it is government cover up.
This is the best movie about giant spiders eating a town that I've seen in a long time.
attack isolated town' genre of film.Admittedly 'Eight Legged Freaks' doesn't have as good of a story or acting as 'Shawshank Redemption' but then 'Shawshank Redemption' doesn't have people being eaten by giant mutant spiders.
If you go in expecting to see a B movie about giant spiders them you will be happy with 'Eight Legged Freaks' because it delivers just that.