Anyone afraid of snakes and creepy crawlies should probably look away now. In the vein of Arachnophobia and Eight Legged Freaks and their ilk comes yet another horror film featuring a nasty and lethal spider. Sting is the work of writer/director Kiah Roache-Turner, who specialises in low budget horror films like 2014’s Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead.
The film is set largely inside a decrepit apartment block in Brooklyn during four days in a freezing winter. Charlotte (played by Ayla Browne, who we recently saw as the younger Furiosa in George Miller’s action film Furiosa) is a curious and bright 12-year-old with a healthy imagination which she pours into the creation of her graphic comic books. She lives in an apartment with her mother Heather (Penelope Mitchell, from Hellboy) and her stepfather Ethan (Ryan Corr, from Holding The Man). Ethan is also the handyman for the apartment block, but he encourages Charlotte with her comic drawings. In an upstairs apartment lives Charlotte’s great aunt Helga (Noni Hazlehurst) who suffers from dementia, and her sister Gunter (Robyn Nevin). When the film opens Helga is concerned about the noises she hears from within the walls of the building and calls an exterminator. When Frank (Jermaine Fowler) arrives he discovers something bizarre and nasty lurking in the walls.
The film then jumps back to four days earlier to reveal the arrival of a strange glowing egg that seems to have come from outer space. It crashes through a window into a spare room in Helga’s apartment, which is full of bric-a-brac and memorabilia. A small spider emerges from the egg and takes refuge inside a doll’s house. Charlotte, who loves to crawl through the air conditioning ducts of the building an pop into other apartments, discovers the cute little spider and puts in a jar. She names it Sting after Bilbo’s sword in her favourite book The Hobbit. She feeds it cockroaches and other insects. But the more the spider eats the bigger it grows.
Ethan becomes concerned with the spider and takes it upstairs to Erik (Danny Kim), a shy biology student who lives alone. Erik is intrigued by the spider, puts it in a tank and studies it. Soon though Sting escapes from the tank and begins attacking the residents and their pets. The spider attacks the residents and wraps them in a web, storing them for food. It is up to Charlotte to find a way to destroy the spider.
Despite being set in Brooklyn, the film was actually shot on a sound stage at the ABC studios in Sydney. There are some great special effects courtesy of Weta workshops and Richard Taylor that bring the spider to life. Sting is a low budget film but it delivers with the effects and impressive production design. The setting is claustrophobic, and the grim moody lighting contributes to the uneasy atmosphere. Brad Shiels’ camera is constantly roving and prowling around the corridors and apartments in the building, and even through the air condition ducts through which Charlotte and the spider crawl with ease.
Roache-Turner’s script also contains some emotional moments as the film explores the family dynamic at play. He also delivers a couple of effective jump scares.
The residents of the apartment block are a little eccentric, and the small but effective cast brings them to life. Browne brings a feisty quality to her performance as Charlotte. Fowler brings some welcome touches of humour to the material with his role as the hapless exterminator. Hazelhurst is not given much to do here.
Greg King
Other reviews you might enjoy:
- Spider-Man: No Way Home
- Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – movie review
- Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse – movie review
Greg King has had a life long love of films. He has been reviewing popular films for over 15 years. Since 1994, he has been the film reviewer for BEAT magazine. His reviews have also appeared in the Herald Sun newspaper, S-Press, Stage Whispers, and a number of other magazines, newspapers and web sites. Greg contributes to The Blurb on film
