The Legend of Spider Forest

In an opening scene in black and white with a blue tint to it, a young man and woman skinnydip together, and then go into the woods for a little sex. A large shadow of a spider looms, and the man is attacked. The woman has a birthmark or tattoo of a spider on her. There's seemingly some full-frontal nudity in a longshot, and there is toplessness despite the PG rating! Later there's some sadistic beatings and whippings. The Legend of Spider Forest almost makes this sound like it's for kids: nope!

I watched this on a double-sided DVD as Spider's Venom (the other title is Virgin Terror). Unfortunately full-screen, and I had to actually zoom the picture out a bit since it went beyond the edges of the screen. Probably taken from a videotape rather than a film print, given a weird glitch about thirty-five minutes in. Additionally, the sound quality is awful - whoever did the transfer wasn't checking the levels and it's particularly bad when the music swells and some notes just become loud hums and there's pops and crackles. So "Miracle Pictures a Division of PMC Corp. - Delaware," thanks for releasing this, but what a terrible job you did!

After the opening scene, the picture turns to color. Paul, a photographer/artist drives into a small German village and he manages to take a photo of the woman with the spider marking that he calls a scar. However, his pictures are stolen. He's met with a mixture of friendliness and hostility at the local pub. The mill owner shares a bottle of wine with him, and tries to interest him in his daughter. He does in fact wind up in bed with her shortly later, where they have a vigorous session, though it isn't graphic at all.

Paul wants to find out who the young woman is, and the townspeople want him to leave. He knows that there had been some paintings, including a Bosch, that had disappeared during WWII from the church. He finds one by a fresh body in the forest, but they too disappear.

The villagers do speak some German that isn't subtitled (putting us in Paul's shoes, I guess). The girl with the spider mark also sings some song in German as well.

Eventually, the mystery is solved along with a bizarre bit of transvestism that adds nothing. Cue the big fire, so common in Gothic horror movies of the 60s and 70s. Not bad, but a better release is clearly needed for a real idea of the quality of the movie.

"The Legend of Spider Forest", which is a way cooler title than the alternate and highly derivative "Venom", is a film that always intrigued me, and has been standing on my must-see list since forever. Like too often the case with films for which you have high (too high?) expectations, it turned out to be a minor disappointment. The first half hour, or so, is definitely promising. The opening sequences - dream or reality? - are atmospheric, and the setting is perfect. Clichéd as it might be, I love these sleepy little towns full of secrets. In this case, it's a German village right next to an immense forest where the ghost of a young girl with a spider-shaped scar may or may not dwell around. But then, director Peter Sykes makes one of the biggest mistakes you can make in a horror movie. He tries to uphold the mystery for so long, so desperately, and reveals so little clues about what is happening, that you eventually stop caring. A couple of suspenseful moments, one including the protagonist tied up while a spider crawls towards his face, and the fiery finale are probably the only things I will remember from this film.

SPIDER FOREST looks like it had some intriguing ideas in place prior to filming, but the final product is a crabbed and often hard-to-follow farrago with a light smattering of atmospheric moments.

A lovely young lady dwells within a European forest where super-venomous spiders roam, although she is, it seems, impervious to their deadly bite...her male lovers, however, aren't so lucky.

When a young artist takes lodging in the aforementioned locale, he becomes smitten with the mysterious spider-girl, pursues her, and becomes inadvertently embroiled in a covert Nazi experiment to create a highly lethal neuro-toxin.

Far too much going on, and quite sloppily presented. Whatever potential may have been in play here is sadly lost to mishandling of the material, mostly in relation to editing/continuity problems and a knotted-up tangle of a screenplay. Pity.

4/10

The palpably flawed, but nonetheless entertaining 'Venom' remains a deliciously odd, avidly arachnophobe triggering Brit-horror curiosity. Partly shot in what handsomely appears to be the eerily bucolic Bavarian mountains, 'Venom' tells the bizarrely esoteric tale of the deadly mysterious man eating 'Spider Woman! This memorably malign mistress of multi-legged misanthropy is excitingly played with vulpine verisimilitude by the delectable starlet, Nada Arneric! An increasing number of libidinous young men have been inexplicably expiring whilst traversing the horror haunted forest. Are their obscure sudden deaths solely due to the dastardly machinations of the nubile nymph, Arneric? Or are there far more preternaturally sinister forces at work? 'Venom' even throws in a ubiquitously loony, medically deviated German scientist for some additionally lurid interest! Peter Sykes's mythologically muddled mishmash of hallucinatory 1970s Brit-horror kookiness brings a terrifyingly vivid meaning to the phrase 'better dead than web'!

Before Tom Hardy comes along and ruins one of the most popular Marvel characters (Venom) we had another movie by the same title but no supervilliany is to be found here.

Venom otherwise known as Spider Venom otherwise known as The Legend of Spider Forest is a curious little tale that I suppose would be horror, but just barely.

It tells an absolute mess of a story that revolves around a painter visiting a small town, a mysterious girl who lives in the forest who the locals call the spider queen and a Nazi conspiracy to weaponize spider venom.

It all sounds fairly interesting but the delivery is awful, worse than I could actually put into words. Sure the cast are competent enough, but they can't save a movie with the writing quality of a Sharknado (2013) film.

Venom is one of those titles I get the impression IMDB do not have the full brief on. It claims this is UK made and filmed exclusively in England but the movie comes across dubbed, has some foreign cast and some of the scenery is certainly not British.

I really wanted to like this but by about the half way point came to the conclusion that simply wasn't going to happen (And I wasn't wrong).

It looks the part, it's well acted and the concept is there but the writing is so appallingly bad it leaves the movie DOA.

The Good:

Neda Arneric

Some very interesting ideas

The Bad:

Plot is an unfettered mess

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Men simply shouldn't wear scarves of any description