By David Dent
We’re in Brooklyn, New York (actually Australia, where the movie was filmed) during an unprecedentedly vicious winter storm, during which a very small comet comes to earth, disgorging a tiny spider.
Said arachnid is scooped up by 12 year old Charlotte (Alyla Browne), who lives in an apartment block with her mum Heather (Penelope Mitchell) and comic illustrator step dad Ethan (Ryan Corr). Charlotte occupies her time secretly travelling the air conditioning ducts of the building through which act we meet her neighbours, including Heather’s Alzheimer’s suffering mum Helga (Noni Hazlehurst).
Charlotte feeds the spider, which she names ‘Sting’, with cockroaches; it grows at a tremendous rate. Although she keeps it out of sight, Sting’s cover is blown when Charlotte confides in her quirky rookie biologist neighbour Erik (Danny Kim) who lets the arachnid out of the bag, causing an ever-growing Sting to run rampant through the apartment block, its appetite progressing to human flesh.
The first two thirds of Sting is largely taken up with Charlotte’s family’s home life, her complex relationship with her stepdad, and the growing tension of a family struggling to make ends meet; Ethan lives rent free in the apartment as the block’s handyman, while Heather struggles to kick start her career, while balancing the needs of her family. The apartment neighbours provide some gentle character comedy, as does a rather over the top bug exterminator Frank (Jermaine Fowler) and there’s some nice time shift-y narrative to keep things interesting.
But what we’re here for is a giant, flesh-eating spider, and when Sting runs rampant…well it’s all over a bit quickly, although the CGI remains convincing throughout. I think the issue with Sting is that it wants to be all things to all people; Kiah Roache-Turner understands the need to develop characters you care about, but there’s probably too much character here and not enough mutant spider action.
Bloody Flicks 