2014 Film OCD #13 - Tarantula is pretty clearly my least favorite Jack Arnold film of the handful Ive seen. Pretty clearly most of my problems with the film stem from the script, which is clearly aiming for being a Them! knockoff, as the desert cinematography is quite nice, the cast generally has talent (including an early Clint Eastwood appearance), and the special effects are quite spiffy. But, someone clearly gave them marching orders to make a Them! for the studio and it was made without understanding what really made the earlier film work. The earlier film had a sense of mystery, moved fast, and had the giant ants have goals such as expand the colony. (It also had a female scientist that goes by a male name, which this one copies without purpose.) Almost half the film passes before the giant tarantula does anything of interest and pretty much all it does is wander around the desert eating things. And theres only one of the creatures without the possibility of breeding, so the threat ends pretty much when the air force is called in. Them! tapped into the fears of unintended consequences of nuclear testing quite well, while its hard to hang much of weight on this one. Ive liked plenty of films that werent particularly weighty, but they usually had novelty or some originality in how the story was told, while this is by the numbers. By the numbers under Jack Arnold is still pretty watchable though. But its hard to work up much enthusiasm beyond admiration of the filmmaking craft.
Posted on: Sun, 02 Feb 2014 21:07:21 +0000
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