Sting- A Spooky Season Review
Are you afraid of spiders? Well, then Sting is for you! When you think about what a scary movie is supposed to do, then you realize you should watch things that scare you. Alien spiders? Sign me up. Thinking back to all those cheesy monster movies from back in the day where actors looked like they were acting in front of a large screen with some insect being blown up to extraordinary size, and Sting feels like how far we’ve come. I do nod my head to Eight Legged Freaks, and of course Arachnophobia, for doing similar things, but this is bloody, gory, suspenseful, and pretty damn fun. It also has audio description, which really helps you understand what is happening.
Actually, the audio description track to this is pretty perfect. There were some moments, where the spider is clearly about to do something, and a hard cut sent us somewhere else. I loved how the narrator was enjoying building the tension, only to cut to “ketchup and eggs!”. Substituting gore for breakfast, honestly, brilliant.
The problems with Sting just lie in the script, and the feeling that not everything was really well set up or the characters defined and developed. I never had a good grasp on this little apartment building, which seems to have almost no one living here, but some people just have very little to do. I always point to horror films where the audience laments a death they didn’t want to see happen, and those deaths come about through character development. Kirby ultimately got her future changed largely because the test screenings rioted over Scream 4. You should want that. Memorable characters make for heartbreaking, or infuriating deaths, but at least we care. Sting does move pretty quick, but I still prefer a good horror movie with characters I root for other than “i hope the spider doesn’t eat the baby.” this isn’t coffee table after all.
Final Grade: B
