Scott LeBrun Near the small town of River Falls, a bird spider that's grown to enormous proportions is discovered inside a mountain cave. It's supposedly killed by the authorities, and taken to a temporary holding spot in a high school gym in preparation for transportation elsewhere. Wouldn't you know it: the beast hears the strains of some groovy rock 'n' roll and comes back to life! Among the intrepid heroes who must destroy the monster for good are the local sheriff (Gene Roth) and know-it-all science teacher Art Kingman (Ed Kemmer).Considered by some to be one of director Bert I. Gordons' best "giant thing on the loose" sci-fi thrillers, "Earth vs the Spider" benefits from a fairly snappy pace, and special effects that aren't TOO, too bad. Even though his character should know that spiders are arachnids and not insects, Kemmer is a decent enough lead. Roth is an absolute hoot as the lawman who is understandably skeptical of the idea of a giant spider. Eugene Persson and June Kenney are reasonably engaging as the kids who get themselves into tons of trouble by heading back to the caves to retrieve a bracelet. Hal Torey is good as Perssons' dad, as are Jack Kosslyn as Mr. Fraser, June Jocelyn as Kenney's mom, and Hank Patterson as Hugo the janitor. The eight legged menace is appropriately creepy, and it's amusing that these filmmakers have the thing screaming like a banshee.One effective, unnerving touch is to see two dead bodies that are victims of the creature. And another is a tracking shot that shows some of the devastation wrought by our villain, ending on a crying child.After this, Mr. B.I.G. wouldn't make another special effects, size oriented picture for several years, until he made "Village of the Giants". The man sure knew how to promote himself: posters for his past work can be seen at a theatre.Seven out of 10.

thejimdoherty Hey, I didn't want to go nuts and give this movie 10 stars, but for sheer entertainment value, I really could not help but give it 8 stars. No, it's not GONE WITH THE WIND, nor even a top contender in the sci-fi film category, but it's a REALLY well-made B-picture. The acting is quite good, the special effects easily match those of some of the bigger studios' sci-fi films of the era, and Albert Glasser's musical score is a bombastic sci-fi B-film classic. For those of you who like sci-fi B-pictures from the 1950s, this is a GREAT one.Film fans will notice, that although this is an American International Picture, some of the outdoor town scenes were filmed on several parts of the Universal backlot, including the steps of the clock tower building on Universal's "Courthouse Square" outdoor set, which of course was a major focal point in 1983's BACK TO THE FUTURE.

ofpsmith It's fun to make fun of how stupid this movie is but there are a lot of other movies where that's more fun. Earth vs. The Spider has your general monster movie set up. Monster attacks on person, one person declared missing, police and witness investigate death, monster attacks again, town fights monster in big showdown. That's pretty much the movie for you. The acting is funny, the story is the usual formula, and the spider effects are obviously superimposed. The film is a good target for MST3K when they riffed it and most people could probably find lot's of things to make fun of. But that's really about it. There's nothing more to say.

Paul Andrews Earth vs. the Spider is set in the small US town of River Falls where high school teenager Carol Flynn (June Kenney)is worried that her father hasn't returned home having been out all night, along with her boyfriend Mike Simpson (Eugene Persson) she searches for her father. Eventually they find his crashed truck sitting at the bottom of a hill, they decide to explore a nearby cave to see if he crawled in there for shelter but are horrified to discover a huge Spider living there. Making a run for it Mike & Carol make it back to town & tell Sheriff Cagle (Gene Roth) who doesn't believe them but is convinced by high school science teacher Professor Kingman (Ed Kemmer) to investigate their story, at the caves they find the giant Spider & gas it with DDT. Thinking that it is dead the giant Spider is put on display at the high school but returns to life & rampages through the town...Originally filmed under the simpler title The Spider before the it was changed by production company AIP, produced & directed by Bert I. Gordon (affectionatly called Mr. BIG by some his fans) this giant insect film was probably inspired by the success of Universal's monster flick Tarantula (1955) made a few years earlier & is a fun little rip-off. The script mixes the giant monster mayhem with a teen aspect as the main cast are teens, the high school plays a big part & there's even a rather daft looking rock'n'roll scene which has dated very badly. The film only lasts 72 minutes which means it's mercifully brisk & to the point, the action starts straight away & never really lets up until the end with the film divided into scenes set in the caves & scenes set in the town. A bit of shoddy writing & some really dumb moments stop Earth vs. the Spider being anything more than silly, good natured fun as the school caretaker just stands there as the giant Spider approaches him yet he's standing against a door that all the teens had just run through, why the hell doesn't he just open the door & run? Then there's the woman who gets her dress stuck in a car door so she can 't run, instead of opening the door & freeing her dress she tries to tear the dress where it's caught, why not just open the damn door woman? The fact that Carol wants to go back to the cave to find that stupid broach is also hard to relate to & understand the logic behind. Overall though despite a few badly written scenes Earth vs. the Spider is enjoyable 50's monster fare that should please fans of the genre & pass an hour or so harmlessly enough for everyone else, I liked it despite some unintentional laughs.The giant Spider effects vary, there's the giant hairy model leg, there's the shots of a real Spider walking around model sets & there's the shots of a real Spider projected against real people & places. While the Spider does change size between the various effects shots at times (one moment the Spider can easily fit inside a school gym yet the next it's bigger than a two storey house!) none of the effects work is terrible considering the age of the film, I have certainly seen a lot worse. Another huge error in logic is that when Mike & Carol fall into the Spider's web they don't stick to it & seem more than capable of just climbing up it & to safety, aren't Spider's webs meant to be sticky? There's not much scare value here & no real build-up of tension or suspense, the giant Spider is seen within the first ten minutes or so & the only real horror are a few shrivelled bodies & skeletons.There's a really funny schoolboy error in the opening credits as just after the Earth vs. the Spider credit Starring is spelt Starring with three R's! Filmed in the back-lot at Universal studios & the much used Bronson Canyon. The acting isn't great, it's a bit wooden as you would expect from a film of this type from this era & all the high school kids look far too old, I would have though most of them were about thirty at the time of filming.Earth vs. the Spider has it's faults sure but at just over an hour it moves along a brisk pace, is never boring & quite fun. Director Gordon got some self promotion into the film as a cinema is showing his The Amazing Colossal man (1957) & Attack of the Puppet People (1958) is vaguely mentioned. Remade as Earth vs. the Spider (2001) but this time it features a scientist mutating into a Spider monster.