Arachnid (film)

The film opens with a translucent alien spaceship investigating over the sea somewhere in the South Pacific. At the same time, a test stealth plane piloted by Joli Mercer comes across the spacecraft and starts chasing it. After the plane begins to malfunction, Joli lands on a nearby island and comes across an alien life form which a giant spider kills. Then the spider kills Joli.

Months later, Loren Mercer (Joli's sister) left the Navy as a pilot and started traveling all over the South Pacific to find Joli. Then she is required to be the pilot of a medical expedition organized by Dr. Samuel Leon with his assistant Susana Gabriel, after having received a native from an island who recently died from an unknown virus transmitted by a bite. The expedition is also led by Lev Valentine, accompanied by his friends, Bear and Reyes. The rest of the team consists of arachnologist Henry Capri and three natives from the island. Once they reach the island, the plane begins to malfunction, and they are forced to land on the beach.

The next morning, the expedition goes into the jungle to get to the native village, but some strange ticks burrow into Reyes. Upon reaching the village, they find that everything is deserted. Henry Capri, who has been investigating some arachnids from the jungle, finds out that several have mutated. Suddenly, the ticks start to come out of Reyes's body: two are vomited, one comes out of his chest, and one comes out of his right eye. Bear decides to shoot Reyes in the head and then the ticks.

That night, Loren decides to investigate on her own when the group is suddenly attacked by a giant centipede that has mutated, killing one of the natives after a bite. Loren then finds some of her brother's clothes and confesses to Valentine that she is still looking for her brother, which is why she left the Navy. After studying a piece of the centipede, Capri concludes there has been an inter-species mutation. With two expedition members dead, Valentine decides they all will leave the island the next morning, although Loren and Capri do not agree to leave.

The next day, Valentine tells Loren he will help her find Joli, but first she has to get everyone off the island. Samuel finds out Capri is not in the village. Bear is sent to the mountains with one of the natives to find a signal to call for help by radio. As they walk down a river, a small spider throws acid in the native's face, killing him. Capri ends up in an area covered with spider webs, where he finds the giant centipede dying. Then the giant spider shows up and attacks him. The rest of the group (Mercer, Valentine, Samuel, Susana, and the other native, Toe Boy) keep looking for Capri until they find the remains of a body stuck with a spider web in a tree, which turns out to be Joli's. Loren buries his remains and vows to kill whoever did this to him. Later they find Capri, who is covered in spider web and got bitten by the spider so that his insides can feed its eggs. He explains there is a giant spider in the island and it is impossible that it has evolved on Earth, so they deduce it is an alien. Capri asks to be killed and Susana does it so he stops suffering. The giant spider reaches them and a scared Samuel flees while the others shoot the spider but they end up running. While doing so, Susana is trapped in spider webs, but Loren and Valentine help her by breaking the webs with Capri's liquid nitrogen. At the same time, a tired Samuel is caught by the spider who kills him by melting his face with its acid.

The three enter a military bunker when they realize that Toe Boy has disappeared. With little ammunition, the spider attacks them through one of the bunker windows. Valentine throws himself on the spider and attacks it with a machete, but the spider cuts him off with one of its fangs. Loren manages to shoot one of the spider's eyes, making the spider leave. Later that night, while Loren reads Capri's book on arachnids, the spider manages to sneak through the bunker's roof and the three have to lock themselves in a small room. Thinking the spider left, Susana suffering claustrophobia, opens the door and is trapped by the spider and kills her with its stinger. The spider tries to enter the room, but Loren and Valentine are able to tear off one of the legs by closing the door. Then they escape through a trapdoor that gives access to underground tunnels. As they go outside, they both fall asleep and Loren has a nightmare in which his brother turns into the giant spider. Next morning, Bear and Toe Boy reach them and after recounting what happened, they decide to go to the spider's nest to kill it.

On the way, Valentine decides to stay behind as he is affected by the spider venom from the previous confrontation. Loren, Bear, and Toe Boy arrive at the nest, which is filled with the remains of natives from the village. The spider is found changing its skin and breeding in a silk cocoon over a spider egg sac. Loren plans to knock the spider down and have Bear shoot it to death, but it awakens early and kills Bear. Loren distracts the spider until Toe Boy throws a vial of black widow poison to her and she pours it over the spider, hurting it. The spider chases Loren but upon stumbling, the spider traps her in spider web. When the spider is about to kill her, Valentine appears shooting at it while Toe Boy throws numerous darts. While the spider tries to flee, Loren, who is still attached to it because of the spider web, manages to pull the spider web thread causing the spider to fall off the ceiling on a stalagmite, killing it.

As Mercer, Valentine, and Toe Boy leave the nest to the outside, another giant spider watches them from an overhead cliff.

• Alex Reid as Loren Mercer
• Chris Potter as Lev Valentine
• Rocqueford Allen as Bear
• Robert Vicencio as Toe Boy
• José Sancho as Dr. Samuel Leon
• Neus Asensi as Susana Gabriel
• Ravil Isyanov as Henry Capri
• Luis Lorenzo Crespo as Reyes
• Jesús Cabrero as Joli Mercer/Lightfoot
• Héctor Chiquín as Native 1
• Conejo Wilson as Native 2
• Fausto Gualsaqui as Native 3

Arachnid was the first role of Alex Reid's acting career. José Sancho agreed to participate in the movie since he had never worked a film with so many special effects. Neus Asensi was excited about working on the film as it was her first role in a film shot entirely in English, also because this type of movies are not normally made in Spain.

It is the second film under the Fantastic Factory label and the second film to be released by the label in 2001 after Faust: Love of the Damned got released in Spain in January. The film was shot in between Barcelona and Mexico during May and July 2000.

Brian Yuzna contacted Robert Kurtzman and Tobe Hooper to direct the film but Julio Fernández, one of the producers and creators of Fantastic Factory, suggested Jack Sholder after watching The Hidden. The main spider design and other creatures practical effects were created by Steve Johnson and his team, XFX.

In an interview for the film's documentary, "Behind the Curtain Part II" (2012), director Jack Sholder, confessed that he disliked the movie:

I basically did it for the money and it was a stupid script . . . I got to live in Barcelona for six months and, you know, they paid me well. Everything was good except I had to go to work everyday and shoot a dumb script. I haven't seen that one since, you know, I made it. And some people say 'Oh well, it's actually better than you think', but I basically tell people to avoid that one".[1]

Arachnid received mostly negative reviews. Actor Richard Dreyfuss claimed to have seen it at a local theater, saying in one of his blogs "It was better than expected, by far." Popcorn Pictures.com gave the film a negative score of three out of ten, writing,"Arachnid is a cheap and lacklustre giant spider flick, ultimately indistinguishable from the next spider flick and where the only bite is the amount it’ll gorge from your wallet."[3] eFilmCritic.com awarded the film two out of five stars, calling it "A step up in quality", but also criticized the film's unappealing characters, and poor creature effects.[4] Buzz McClain from Allmovie gave the film a more positive review. In his review of the film, McClain noted that in spite of the film's numerous flaws, "There's a certain brainless charm to it all that will amuse those looking for nothing more than a few cool maulings and no amount of intellectual challenge."[5]

• Arachnid (2001) at AllMovie
• Arachnid (2001) at IMDb
• Arachnid (2001) at Rotten Tomatoes