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  • March 16, 2013

    Big_Ass_Spider_credit_SXSW is winding down now and there’s only two films left for me to screen, the Zac Efron led At Any Price and The East featuring Brit Marling, Ellen Page, and Alexander Skarsgard. So before those final reviews are posted, I thought I should share my snippet review of the three 3 star films I had the opportunity to see: Some Girl(s), Reality Show and my #1 most anticipated film of the festival, Big Ass Spider.

    Some Girl(s) (***) A fascinating chamber piece written by Neil LaBute that examines how past relationships and feelings can still linger. A man tracks down 4 of his ex-girlfriends and tries to make amends with them to alternately fascinating and horrifying results. Adam Brody fits LaBute’s man child shtick to a T, giving a raw but at the same time composed performance, managing to make an unlikable protagonist into a can’t take your eyes away from character. Zoe Kazan and Kristen Bell steal the show near the end of the film.

    Reality Show (***) When your movie starts off with quotes from Job and Kim Kardashian, the rest of the film had better live up to that kind of prompting. Luckily for audiences Reality Show more than holds its end of the bargain by offering a warped hyper-realistic satire of reality shows. Reveling in its blatant dislike for those forms of entertainment, the sheer audacity of this film that keeps amping up the volume also detracts from it’s critique. It’s a case of a film going too big when it didn’t need to, being too self-indulgent to get out of its own way. However, that does make this film any less powerful or fun to watch.

    Big Ass Spider (***) A delgihtfully ridiculous and silly film with a great sense of self, Big Ass Spider channels the monster movies of old and the visual effects of now. It’s amazing that this film is so good given the appearance, but Mike Mendez really knocks it out of the park with this film, imbuing a great sense of adventure and just enough winking at the camera to make it not as serious. The movie is incredibly funny and yet still scary enough to suffice as a horror film.

    About Terence Johnson


    When he's not enduring Shade Samurai training from Victoria Grayson, you can find Terence spends his time being an avid watcher of television, Criterion film collector, Twitter addict, and awards season obsessive. Opinionated but open minded, ratchet but with class, Terence holds down the fort as the producer of the Power Hour podcast and will soon be taking over Historical Circuit, bringing you the best films and hidden gems from the lovely history of cinema. As the only person with a degree in a STEM field (B.S. in Civil Engineering), he's holding it down for the nerds who love film. You can follow him on Twitter at @LeNoirAuteur.

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    2 Comments

    1. Being chronologically if not mentally elderly, I can’t see a reference such as “Big Ass Spider” without thinking TARANTULA!!! which I actually saw in a theater. Of all the atomic/sciencegonewild films of the 50s it was actually one of the better ones, and yes in a more innocent age we actually cringed at the first sight of the BIG ASS APIDER

      http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048696/

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    2. SPIDER not Apider

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