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Monday, December 11, 2017

Horrors Of Spider Island (1960)

Starring Temple Foster, Helga Franck, Alexander D'Arcy, Helga Neuner, Rainer Brandt
Directed by Jaime Nolan
(actor & director credits courtesy IMDB.com)

A dance troupe survives a plane crash and make their way to a nearby island, only to find it's home to a deadly mutated spider that infects their manager and turns him into a monster.

This German film from director Fritz Bottger, credited as Nolan, has its limitations, but also some creative photography, a jazzy music score that I enjoyed, and a decent creature makeup.  The exhibitionism of the dancing girls, which includes plenty of bare skin although nothing R-rated, culminates in some exploitative scenes involving catfights and a nude swimming sequence.  This still seems rather tame compared to more recent efforts, and there is at least some effort by the screenwriters to flesh out a few of the girls' characters, rather than just put their bodies on display.  I found it interesting how Bottger and his crew framed several closeups against black backgrounds to get by budget constraints, a practice which does add a certain amount of shock value to certain sequences within the film.  It's not a great movie, but I found it entertaining.

2 comments:

  1. I have a lot of fun watching this movie. The level of actual intentional craftmanship isn't very high, but it makes me smile, it makes me laugh, and that's enough to make me want to watch it again and again!

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  2. Thanks Derek- I've enjoyed this one on multiple viewings as well. It makes me smile too :)

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