17 - Eight Legged Freaks (2002)

I was 32 years old back in 2002, when tonight's movie came out.  It was a couple years after the turn of the millennia, the world hadn't ended, and the doomsday-preppers were coming out of their bunkers, checking their watches, and looking sour-pussed and hung-over.  Kari Wuhrer was just off her spin in Sliders, and Scarlett Johanssen was still largely unknown, typecast as "the daughter of the lead character."  It wouldn't even be until the next year that she even started playing adult roles, appearing with Bill Murray in Lost in Translation.

Eight-Legged Freaks (2002) begins with the same origin story of every Marvel superhero and DC villain, Toxic Waste.  Wade, the mayor of the small town of Prosperity, AZ, is storing Toxic Waste in an abandoned part of an old mined-out gold mine under the mall that he owns.  It's a financially beneficial arrangement for Wade and the company storing the toxic waste, but there's only two problems.  One is that none of the townsfolk know about Wade's illegal storing of toxic waste under their town, and two, one of the barrels fell off a transport truck and ended up in a pond.  While Wade tries to get the townsfolk to sell off their land so he can legally dump the toxic waste under the town, the mine's owner, Chris McCormick, returns to inherit his land   And while Wade and Chris are butting heads over selling the mine, the toxic waste is messing up the local ecological chain.  Seems a bunch of crickets are able to digest the toxic waste, which is all well and good, but then a spider-collector with a roadside spider-farm tourist attraction starts feeding those same crickets to his zoo full of rare spiders...  and it's making the spiders grow...  and grow...  and groooowwwwww...

Kari Wuhrer plays Sam Parker, the best-looking Sheriff I have ever seen in a movie, and the one that all small towns about to be overrun with giant spiders deserve.  Firm but fair, ecological-minded but okay with bending the law a tiny bit to smooth over ruffled feathers, Sam's even a great mom to her kids, Mike (Scott Terra) and Ashley (Scarlett Johannsen).  Ashley is dating Wade's rogue son Bret (Matt Czuchry, from the Resident), and Mike is good friends with Joshua (Tom Noonan), who is the spider-collector.  As I said, it's a small town.  Everyone known everyone, it seems.  Leon Rippy plays the wonderfully-corrupt mayor Wade, and David Arquette plays Chris McCormick, who comes back to town to woo Sheriff Parker.  Doug E. Doug does a wonderful turn as Harlan Griffiths the radio personality, and Rick Overton is Deputy Pete Willis, who provides much of the comic relief alongside Doug E. Doug.  The spiders are all CGI, except maybe the ones inside the tanks at the beginning of the movie, and it really doesn't matter.  The special effects and the acting are decent enough.  This movie isn't about winning awards, it's about fun entertainment, and it delivers in a big way.  I caught this on IFC, one of the premium channels, if you want to watch it yourself.

Spoilers!  I love this movie.  I love Kari Wuhrer as the beautiful ass-kicking sheriff.  I love Scarlett Johanssen as the daughter, and then there's the son who tries to warn everyone and knows he's never going to be listened to because he's just a kid, but he keeps trying anyways.  I love that the crazy crackpot on the radio finally turns out to be right about something, and I love how they try to make David Arquette seem cool, but he's basically just a big dumb animal stumbling his way through life.  I love how everyone gets covered in spider guts and webbing, and I love how the residents of the entire town are all pissed at Chris for temporarily abandoning the Mine.  I love the old Barber, about to give Chris a shave, who seems more likely to cut the young man's throat... "Hold Still!  I wouldn't wanna CUT YA."  Hilarious.  I love how this entire movie plays it all totally serious, but everyone is still totally in on the funny bits.  Steady build of tension, and the entire last half of the movie is a running action-packed gun battle with a bunch of CGI spiders with green goo for blood.  Love it all.  Seen it before, would watch it again.  In fact, I DVR'd that shit, so I could watch it again this month.  Oh yeah.  Love me some DVR'd horror.

In other words, I am temporarily housebound, because my vehicle broke.  Going to have to get a new one, soon as I can start pulling money out of my ass.  Looks like I am stuck inside watching horror movies for the foreseeable future, a fate I wouldn't wish on anyone but myself.  :-D  Have a nice night, ppls!