SPIDER BABY

A fun romp. This movie feels like it is wedged between old school horror, and more recent exploitation films. Stylistically, it feels 50s, yet subject matter is more 70s exploitation. I liked it, but I will watch a lot of garbage. Give it a try. Young Sid Haig as a bonus.

Picture a ramshackle house (like the one the "Waltons" lived in) and then imagine it populated by two sisters and a brother who progress ok until their early teens, then they start to regress - with varying degrees of maniacal behaviour. Is this dangerous? Well we need only ask poor old Mantan Moreland who never faced such dangers with "Charlie Chan" as he does in the opening scenes trying to deliver a letter to the house and... well... it's the last delivery he will ever make! Their only controlling influence is their chauffeur "Bruno" (Lon Chaney Jr.) but even he has his hands full when some grasping cousins - and their lawyer - decide to come visit and claim their inheritance. Given the state of the place, I'd have run a mile but they cling on and are soon beginning to regret their perseverance! It's fun, this. It makes no effort to assess or explain the mental illness that prevails amongst the offspring - aside from suggesting that it could be quite plausible for their mother, father and dog to all have been the same being! The acting itself is pretty average, the writing delivers little by way of subtlety or mystery and we are left with a series of slightly repetitive spoof-horror scenarios that wear thin after a while. It's not with humour - intended or otherwise - and it moves along quite well for 80 minutes but sadly not a film I think I'd ever bother to watch again.

“It’s a madhouse, a madhouse!”

This was shot at the end of summer, 1964, but not released until over three years later due to the producers going bankrupt. Its full title is “Spider Baby or, The Maddest Story Ever Told,” which is reminiscent of other oddball, overlong titles in the ’60s, such as "The Incredibly Strange Creatures ...Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?"

This isn’t as entertaining and it’s strapped by B&W photography but, like that one, it’s really quirky, hammy horror, rather than a comedy. Both came in the 'B' tradition of "The Brain That Wouldn't Die,” mixed with the slasher bits of "Psycho." Rob Zombie was obviously influenced by it for his “House of 1000 Corpses.”

While Lon Chaney Jr in his old age and a young Sid Haig are notable, the real highlight is the female cast. Guys tend to gush over petite brunette Jill Banner as Virginia, who happened to be 17 during shooting and would turn 18 a couple of months later. She unfortunately died prematurely in 1982 at the age of 35 due to a vehicular accident involving a drunk truck driver on an off-ramp of Ventura Freeway.

Interestingly, she was working for Marlon Brando at the time, developing scripts and what have you. While she certainly has her appeal, her character is so dim-witted and psycho, she’s a turn-off (for me, anyway). I prefer Carol Ohmart as Emily, who has a few stunning scenes à la “Horror Hotel,” aka “The City of the Dead.”

It runs 1 hour, 21 minutes, and was shot at Smith Estate in Highland Park and other parts of Los Angeles, such as Chatsworth and Mandeville Canyon, with studio work done in Glendale.

GRADE: B-