Arachnophobia **** (1990, Jeff Daniels, Julian Sands, John Goodman) – Classic Movie Review 8793

The 1990 ‘thrillomedy’ film Arachnophobia stars Jeff Daniels as a nice arachnophobic doctor, Julian Sands as a crazy scientist and John Goodman as a bug exterminator, who fight off an attack of killer spiders at the doctor’s country home.

Director Frank Marshall’s 1990 ‘thrillomedy’ Arachnophobia from Walt Disney (Hollywood Pictures) and Steven Spielberg (Amblin Entertainment) stars Jeff Daniels, Julian Sands and John Goodman as nice arachnophobic doctor Ross Jennings (Daniels), crazy scientist Dr James Atherton (Sands) and bug exterminator Delbert McClintock (Goodman), who fight off an attack of killer spiders at the doctor’s country home.

It all starts when a huge South American killer spider hitches a ride in a crate with a dead body to the US, and mates with a local spider, breeds and kills.

The comedy fantasy horror movie Arachnophobia is tremendous edge-of-seat fun, with an expert balance of scares and laughs, motored by a wicked sense of humour that Alfred Hitchcock would have enjoyed. Indeed, Marshall wanted his film to be like Hitchcock’s The Birds: ‘People like to be scared but laughing, like a roller coaster. No one wants to be terrified.’

Arachnophobia is packed with very good-humoured performances from the genial leads and well-paced thrills from Spielberg’s producer Marshall in his debut as director.

It is written by Don Jacoby and Wesley Strick, from a story by Don Jakoby and Al Williams.

Also in the cast are Harley Jane Kozak, Stuart Pankin, Brian McNamara, Mark L Taylor, Henry Jones, Peter Jason, James Handy, Roy Brocksmith, Kathy Kinney, Mary Carver, Garette Ratliff Henson and Marlene Katz.

The filmmakers found their star spider in a bird-eating tarantula native to the Amazon, with an 8 inch plus leg-span. They found one in the US, which Marshall named ‘Big Bob’ after director Robert Zemeckis. To make it scarier, his team painted purple stripes on its back and added a prosthetic abdomen. The small spiders are Avondale spiders, a harmless species from New Zealand provided by Landcare Research in Auckland. The spiders were handled by entomologist Steven R Kutcher.

Arachnophobia is directed by Frank Marshall, runs 109 minutes, is made by Hollywood Pictures, Amblin Entertainment and Tangled Web Productions, is released by Buena Vista Pictures (1990) (US) and Warner Bros (1990) (UK), is written by Don Jacoby and Wesley Strick, is shot by Mikael Salomon, is produced by Steven Spielberg (executive producer), Frank Marshall (executive producer), Kathleen Kennedy, Richard Vane and Don Jakoby (co-producer), and is scored by Trevor Jones, with special effects by Chris Walas, production design by James (Jim) Bissell and art direction by Christopher Burian-Mohr.

In Jack Arnold’s 1955 sci-fi monster movie Tarantula! (starring John Agar, Mara Corday and Leo G Carroll) a scientist developing a miracle nutrient causes rapid growth, but a tarantula test subject escapes and grows larger and larger, creating a deadly problem.

Julian Sands (born 4 January 1958) went missing on 13 January 2023 while hiking in the San Gabriel Mountains northeast of Los Angeles. An air-and-land search found his car. Signals from mobile-phone towers show his last known location was near Mount Baldy.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8793

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