Tarantula - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Tarantula

Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score: ​

​

Movie
Scream Factory is back again at dipping into Universal’s older catalog of horror titles. This time with another atomic fueled horror story from 1955 known as Tarantula (the 1950s were ripe with horror stories about the mutagenic properties of radiation, as the atomic bomb was still fresh in the minds of people and the fears of the resulting radiation fueled imaginations through the early 60s even). Not everyone today appreciates 1950s horror, as it is a VERY unique sub genre, but it’s a personal favorite of mine. The kitsch and cheesiness of 50s horror is unmistakably energetic, and filled with a sort of hopeful optimism and “you can do it!” mentalities that just isn’t IN horror movies of today. Back then horror movies were meant to creep you out and let your imagination run wild, but it wasn’t like the 70s and 80s and 90s horror movies that were more intent on disturbing you and having the film be as hopeless as possible (although don’t get me wrong. Those generations are my favorite horror decades for a reason). As such, the 1950s films tend to play out with a more sci-fi/horror vibe to them than what we traditionally call “horror” today.

Going back to the 50s we get to meet Dr. Matt Hastings (John Agar, who starred in The Mole People which we reviewed from Scream Factory a few months back), a medical doctor in small town Arizona who is called in to perform and identification on a mutilated body. The body turns out to be a scientist living just outside of town, but what makes the scenario so shocking is that he has a mutagenic disease that has completely disfigured him. A disease that usually takes years and years to manifest, but has cropped up almost over night. His partner, Dr. Gerald Deemer (Leo G. Carroll) swears that it cropped up in just 4 days, but Dr. Hastings is more than a bit skeptical.

However, Dr. Deemer has been harboring a secret that Dr. Hastings is picking up on. The scientists have been performing experiments on animals that has grown them dozens of time their normal sizes through the use of a synthetic compound that they’re creating. One that uses atomic energy (of course) to bind the agent to the subject, and which seems to be having some catastrophic results in the aging process. As Matt delves deeper and deeper into the mystery he may find out that Dr. Deemer’s silence is broken too late, as one of his biggest lab experiments, a tarantula some 100x it’s natural size, has inadvertently escape and continued it’s growth while in the wild. Now a flesh eating monster is on the loose, and soon the whole countryside will be engulfed it’s ravenous search for food.

As I stated above, the 1950s was rife with horror movies that delved into the “horrors” of what radiation and atomic isotopes could do in our society. But while it may seem like your traditional bomb nuclear fallout type of “big bug monster movie” that was typical of the era, but upon looking closer you’ll notice it’s more of a mad scientist type of movie under the surface. Deemer is pulling the classic Frankenstein’s monster type of manipulation of nature, and humanity pays the price. However, Tarantula not only stand outs in terms of the source of the radioactive material, it also stands out by being a wittier and better written horror film than many of it’s brethren. John Agar is fantastic as the charming Dr. Hastings, and the dialog he’s given is leagues better than the usual cringe worthy writing that was typical of the genre.

The film also happens to be a good bit more “gory” than your typical 50s horror film. By gory I don’t mean blood and guts everywhere, but the amount of deaths on screen is pretty impressive if you’ve watched any of the other big bug movies of the time period. Usually it’s just a few people who scream up at the monster, but the tarantula happens to have some intense build up to it’s kills, and there’s some pretty nasty death scenes for the time. It’s a neat mixture of suspense, sci-fi, and monster movie horror, and it makes Tarantula one of the better movies of it’s ilk.




Rating:

Not Rated by the MPAA




Video:

Scream Factory has gone back and done a fresh 2K scan of the negatives and done some touch up work along the way. Luckily the print seems to have been in excellent condition, as the resulting Blu-ray is fantastic. There’s a few flecks on the print used, as well as a few lines for the superimposing of the tarantula to make it appear big, but other than those two small things the image is pristine. Grain levels are nice and well defined, yet never obtrusive or overly “swarming”. Contrast is solid, and the fine details for the black and white imagery stand out as being razor sharp. The only time I saw clarity drop was when the monster was superimposed over someone as it came in for a kill, as you notice some softness around the edges (such as when the monster is tearing apart the Deemer house).







Audio:

The 2.0 Mono track in DTS-HD MA is clean and precise, but fairly limited due to the sound design and some baked in flaws. The ambiance for the track is excellent, giving us a heavy horn based score that gives us the appropriate “dun dun dun!!!!!” as the monster approaches. Dialog is clean and fairly clear, but you do notice some harshness to the vocals. There’s also some background hiss and a little distortion from time to time. Nothing wild, but it’s not as clean as I would have liked, but that’s fairly typical of a film that’s this old.






Extras:

• BRAND NEW 2K REMASTER OF THE FILM
• NEW audio commentary with film historians Tom Weaver, Dr. Robert J. Kiss and David Schecter
• Theatrical Trailer
• Still Gallery

Final Score:
​

Tarantula is a welcome addition to Scream Factory’s ever expanding diving into Universal and Sony’s classic horror collections. The 1950s movies are few and far between, but this is one of their better acquisitions in quite some time. Tarantula is a fun little bit of 1950s history, and one of the smarter written ones as well. The new 2K remastering/restoration is exquisite to behold and really breathes new life into the film. Sadly the extras are a bit spares, but it is typical of most 1950s horror movies, as there wasn’t a lot of effort to really document stuff that went on with them back then. If you’re a fan of big nasty bug horror movies from yesteryear, then this is definitely worth picking up. Recommended



Technical Specifications:

Starring: John Agar, Mara Corday, Leo G. Carroll, Edwin Rand, Raymond Bailey, Nestor Paiva, Ross Elliott, Hank Patterson, Bert Holland, Steve Darrell
Directed by: Jack Arnold
Written by: Robert M. Fresco, Martin Berkeley
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono
Subtitles: English SDH
Studio: Scream Factory
Rated: NR
Runtime: 80 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: May 30th, 2019

Image

• Michael Scott
• May 11, 2017

Recommendation: Recommended

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. I remember seeing this back in the day. Will catch it again.

 

[Asere]

Thank you for the review. I should get my wife and son to watch this to see how they react. They have arachnophobia lol.

 

[tripplej]

lol, keep them away from "kingdom of the spiders" as well.