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EIGHT LEGGED FREAKS (Warner Bros) Head Count: Tag-line: The excellent 'Let the squashing begin!'. Death Toll: Hard to tell amidst all the city invasion mayhem, but well over 20. Cutting Remarks: This Slasherama reviewer is terrified of spiders, so this seemed to be a strangely attractive ordeal - facing your fear and all that. While Eight Legged Freaks undeniably provoked a great deal of 'Aaaaahhh!'s and 'Shit!'s during its running time, it's not quite the trouser-dampening marathon that it might have been.          For one thing, there's the tone. We're very much in cuddly Spielberg territory here, where people do die, but you're somehow shielded from the full horror of it all by a sense of swashbuckling adventure and the jaunty musical score. The CGI effects are fantastic, as a horde of toxic waste-afflicting spiders (Ahhhh, toxic waste - the screenwriter's eternal scapegoat!) run rampage around a town, but the overall effect is of having seen a fun picture, as opposed to a horrifying one.          David Arquette is a fine comic foil in the Scream movies, but doesn't cut it so well as the supposedly tough hero. Doug E Doug is only occasionally amusing as Harlan, the paranoid X-Files worshipping local DJ - his 'anal probe' gag appropriately disappears up its own ass very swiftly. Still, there's a lot to enjoy here, and some surprisingly nasty moments among the jolly frolics. Most Memorable Demise: The unidentified, webbed-up character in the queen spider's lair, who she casually stabs to death with one of her legs. Disturbing. Look Out For: Those jumping spiders. It's a scary idea, but in practice, they look a shade foolish. Killer Quote: "I see dead people!" - a parrot owned by Joshua, a spider farmer played by Tom 'Manhunter' Noonan. DVD Details: Surprisingly for Warners, there's a fair bit here. Of most interest is Larger Than Life, a short movie made by New Zealand director Ellory Elkayem before ... Freaks, which turns out to have surprisingly good effects for a no-budgeter. Then there's an audio commentary featuring Arquette and co-star Rick Overton, along with Elkayem and producer Dean 'Independence Day' Devlin. There are also eight extra spider scenes, some rather dull deleted scenes, the theatrical trailer and selected filmographies. DVD-ROM features include "our high-voltage spider-killing challenge". Presented in widescreen, with Dolby Digital 5.1 sound. Release Date: Out now! [Check it out at Amazon US] [Check it out at Amazon UK] [Reviews Menu] [Home] © Copyright Slasherama 2002-present