Sting (2024) Dir: Kiah Roache-Turner
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Arachnophobia is one of the most common phobias in the world. As such, it surprises me that there aren't more spider based horror films out there. When I saw this Kiah Roache-Turner directed film arrive onto streaming, I was more curious than anything else. The film had pretty mediocre reviews, but that wasn't enough to deter me from at least giving it a go.
I actually liked more about the film than I expected to. It had a fair few enjoyable elements to it. The soundtrack, for example, was understated but actually quite solid. The homage to 'The Hobbit' was nice, although I did find it quite random, and almost totally irrelevant to the film. The use of practical effects for the spider was enjoyable, albeit intermittent.
The characters were fairly interesting, even the less likable ones. Admittedly, some of them were bizarre in nature, and perhaps not all that fleshed out. The choice to write in comedic characters was strange, but actually kind of worked in the film's favour, I found.
The narrative was admittedly pretty weak, especially the subplots, which were rather tepid, in truth. The comedy, as illuded to above, worked for me, but it definitely took away from the suspense. I think the most compelling part of the film was the main character's journey, the rest of the story failed to provide much of note.
Alyla Brown was actually quite a likable and capable protagonist, who was easy to root for - something horror films in particular often fail to do. I thought that her acting was pretty good, and I felt that, for the most part, she was pretty believable. I would certainly say she was the best actor in the film.
Ryan Corr and Penelope Mitchell were both a little inconsistent, but each had some positive moments throughout the film. I would've liked to have seen more of Mitchell - her character was very much an afterthought. Corr did fairly well with some discordant writing, although towards the end of the film, I found his acting a little weaker than his co-stars.
The rest of the cast were a bit of a mixed bag, if I'm honest. Of these, I was most entertained by the somewhat comedic performances of Danny Kim and Jermaine Fowler, who each provided some humorous light relief. The acting of Robyn Nevin, Noni Hazelhurst and Silvia Colloca was not so good, but could've been worse.
Overall, this actually wasn't as poor as I was anticipating, although I won't say that it was a good film. It has several issues, but equally a few positives. Either way, for an evening's easy entertainment, it did the job just fine. It's definitely one of those horror films for watching at home on a Friday night. It isn't that scary, but has enough to keep your attention.
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