“There are noises in my walls.”
I happen to love it when the creepy-crawlies go into full-tilt comedy. And Kiah Roache-Turner’s Sting does exactly that. You’ll laugh! You’ll cry! You’ll want to curl up and die! Full of wonderfully on-point practical effects and one big-ass spider, Sting is all about the fun to be had when a once-charming creature turns violent . . .
. . . with a wicked hunger for human flesh! Nom, nom, nom.
Sting works as well as it does because Roache-Turner knows the horror-comedy formula well. Having cut fangs on the Wyrmwood zombie series, everything here is cranked up - even the emotional arch - creating a work of top-notch suspense as one hell of a freaky spider turns one building into his stomping ground. Welcome to New York, right?
We spend a lot of time with Charlotte (Alyla Browne) as she befriends a cool-looking spider she names “Sting” during a severe winter storm. She’s a lonely girl and her parents - Heather (Penelope Mitchell) and stepfather Ethan (Ryan Corr) - expect a lot from her . . . and her abilities to babysit her 3-month old younger brother, who still eats paper.
But this pet spider might change everything for her. But can she keep it a secret? Can she keep it safe?
Fed on rats, Sting becomes an inspiration for Charlotte as she turns to creating comic books while being misled about her real father’s location. Umm, yeah. So not cool, Mom. All of this adds to Charlotte’s development and, because Sting is getting bigger and bigger and hungrier and hungrier, builds into an epic smackdown of creature feature hysterics vs poor parenting choices.
And thanks to the artists over at Wētā Workshop, who bring this extra-terrestrial monster to life with great skill and horror, we get to see all the flesh-eating carnage!
Co-starring Silvia Colloca, Danny Kim, Robyn Nevin, and Jermaine Fowler, the tenants of this apartment building operate as caricatures or just as food for Sting to munch on, but the cast knows the kind of movie they are acting in and it plays well, building a nice catalog of characters you will always find in a New York apartment building . . . even if they are just food for a carrion crow, I mean spider.
With lots of dark humor and a strong sense of foreboding dread, Sting lands in theaters on April 12th thanks to Well Go USA.
MPAA Rating: R.
Runtime: 91 mins
Director: Kiah Roache-Turner
Writer: Kiah Roache-Turner
Cast: Jermaine Fowler; Ryan Corr; Alyla Browne
Genre: Horror
Tagline: Your Biggest Fear Just Got Bigger.
Memorable Movie Quote: "You hungry?"
Distributor: Well Go USA
Official Site:
Release Date: April 12, 2024
DVD/Blu-ray Release Date:
Synopsis: After raising an unnervingly talented spider in secret, 12-year-old Charlotte must face the facts about her pet—and fight for her family’s survival—when the once-charming creature rapidly transforms into a giant, flesh-eating monster.
