Arácnidos

The best spider horror film in the history of cinema. On the other hand, you can count the number of horror stories about spiders on one hand :-)

Well acted, funny, well shot and keeps you in suspense from start to finish.

It also has an accurate social commentary on groups of people "pushed" to the outskirts of large cities, who, like the spiders in the film, often have to fight for survival.

It's a dream directorial debut that looks like a good million-dollar horror hit. It is worth following the development of this director's career.

I recommend it to everyone who is not afraid of spiders.

Calling all fans of claustrophobic horror and creepy crawlies! "Infested" delivers a potent double shot, merging the frantic energy of "REC" with the sheer terror of "Arachnophobia."

This film throws you headfirst into a decaying apartment building overrun with monstrous spiders. Like "REC," the action unfolds in an apartment building, keeping the tension high. You feel trapped alongside the desperate residents as they navigate the building's labyrinthine corridors, each corner potentially harboring a venomous nightmare.

But unlike "REC," the terror in "Infested" comes with eight hairy legs and a taste for human flesh. The film takes a page from "Arachnophobia," reveling in the sheer ick factor of its spider infestation. The close-ups on these monstrous arachnids are guaranteed to make your skin crawl, and the creative ways they attack add a layer of gruesome fun to the experience.

Where "Infested" truly shines is in its ability to balance scares with surprising character development. We care about the residents trapped in the building, making us genuinely invested in their fight for survival.

"Infested" is the perfect recipe for a frightfully good time. Just make sure you haven't eaten recently, and prepare to swat imaginary spiders out of the air long after the credits roll.

What tangled webs they weave when the survivors cannot leave.

Infested is the latest of European Apartment/Isolation Horror with the likes of 2007's Rec from Spain and 2022's Lockdown Tower with the latter closer to this kind of rundown building and both from France. While I liked the other two more, this still works. At least the first half, anyways.

A neglected apartment tower's resident critter expert brings home a poisonous spider only to lose it almost immediately and just as swiftly, that thing multiplies tenfold+. Soon, all the residents will face off with the new eight-legged occupants and hopefully some will survive.

As usual in these When-Animals-Attack films, the characters do some DUMB things. Like over and over.

Wasn't there a first-floor window to crawl out of? Front door to simply open? Egad, every dumb mistake you could make happened here. Granted, I'd probably panic, too or simply have a heart-attack with my arachnophobia in a dark building full of spiders.

My biggest issue was there were no time jumps to make this even remotely realistic. And to me, the more realistic, the more terrifying it is. Here, the one spider lays its egg sack and pretty much, within minutes the whole tower is covered with them. Plus, they grow to almost human size with each new batch.

Now that said, it didn't stop me from jumping so many times out of my seat and audibly swearing, I had to constantly pause the movie to recover. So, yeah, they did their job on my fears. And if you also suffer from the same fright of these abominations, you'll probably get some great scares out of this as well.

You'll just have to get through some tough/long scenes of character set up in the first half-hour. Despite these feeling like real people who really live in the same tight quarters, it was almost brutal to get through so much exposition to get to what we pressed play for: a Spider Invasion.

It's not bad, and for the grand majority of the spider-scenes, they did look like real spiders (well, except for the 3-foot kinds.) Just try not to imagine them on your own skin.

***

Final Thoughts: It pains me to give this a mediocre review. I did the same for 2022's Fall - which explored my greatest fear: Heights. (Spiders are my #2.) That one just suffered through cliches and really bad characters I didn't care about. This film's problem was the speed they multiplied and size they grew. Also, since when are spiders social bloodsuckers?

Good setup. Made me think of the beginning of "Braindead" (Dead-Alive) from Peter Jackson. It also has some great, odd, close-up camera shots which were great.

What follows in Infested, however, is a avalanche of constant group yelling scenes of a bunch of people who make really bad decisions. Again!

Why do movie writers keep creating stupid characters just to give them a tool to hurdle over major plot holes? Stop doing that! Create characters which the viewer can relate to and create a better story.

I feel though, that this is a promising director, due to the special shots and atmosphere he created. I hope he will do a better job with the next "Evil Dead" movie.

This is what a horror movie about spiders should be like. For the first hour or so everything works, it feels well put together, and the soundtrack only compliments this.

The spiders are well done, and there is some genuinely frightening jump scares.

It entire production takes place in a apartment block in Paris. It feels isolated, dark, grim, and poverty stricken. At times, it felt like the same isolation one would get watching the the first Alien movie.

However, whilst the movie is well made, the third act is difficult to take seriously. Sometimes less is more in this context. People in an apartment block fighting for their very lives was interesting, until it became silly and cartoonist.

That being said, the first hour is the best bit of horror you're likely to see this year.