Sting
Sting
A perfect bite-sized chunk film length of ninety one minutes can’t do justice to Sting, another horror-action genre movie that follows a giant spider terrorizing a group of New Yorkers in Brooklyn. It unquestionably seems to go nether here nor there, but for the length of the film, barely scratching the surface was an awful lot because so the monster attacks and most of the animal attack scenes are all overwhelmed with bizarre levels of editing.
While this clearly is a B-movie and there expectations and limitations, an additional bonus of 15 to 20 minutes as we would have guessed initially wouldn’t have bothered this drama, probably because it’s supposed to look more like a Spielberg movie in angle. Kiah Roache Turner has not directed many films like this, although most audiences around the world have no problems enjoying the typecast that comes along with it.
Plenty of films from that period directed by Spielberg define and structure couples in a family with children in the center of the conflict, just like Sting. Ethan’s nemesis is that he is a strong superman from Brooklyn with a giant spider and a delinquent landlord ( Robyn Nevin) both controlling his world. As much as this could be perceived as a flaw, it nurtures the character to be a rising comic artist at the same time.
In her comics, Ethan draws his inspiration from Charlotte (Alyla Brown), one of the characters from Heather’s (Penelope Mitchell) supporting partner in the story. She is an irritating child of Ethan – a working stiff who is also a provider, though it’s hard for him to hold both roles at the same time. Problems like them on their own aren’t significant – but in bulk, they quickly become a cause for concern: pests in Gunter’s building, the growing alienation between Ethan and Charlotte, etc.
No adults were around to share the burden of this tragedy with him, not even Frank (Jermaine Fowler) the disgruntled exterminator with smart aleck perspective. Introduce Charlotte, arguably the most relatable character in ~Sting~ and quite possibly the one most riddled with dramatic/situational lynchpins of all.
One does not have to appreciate the character Charlotte to watch for the scenes in which she first catches and then is seen pursuing the web-beetle whom she refers to as sting, who comes in a small asteroid to earth. Meanwhile the sting in all this only gets larger throughout the movie, remaining a source of no more than a vague threat.
The character Charlotte could as well have engaged herself in hunting an irradiated field mouse or a man-eating toilet ‘gator’ only to develop feelings of frustration and disgust at the same time. It is strange that even after such a remarkable period of Charlotte and co altering their modes of transport to air vent tunnels that Sting being a spider explains nothing. One would believe that with a storyline of frustrated father and unappreciated daughter, there’s something about spiderwebs & family life to embellish it further. In this case, you are wrong.
“Sting” does not offer much insight into the relationship between Charlotte and Ethan, other than the cliché wish for them to be together again. Wētā does the most possible of making Charlotte’s spider look good as a giant black widow, but even that design of the monster seems unfit for the situation.
It’s just a black spider with a thin red stripe that goes right through in which position it is standing? Seriously? I mean, simply portraying a threat which is good in the neighborhood is not an out of the world achievement for a monster flick. It is still interesting only to a certain point when the characters are also archetypes, and the monster-centric scenes are far too brief and not even well-shot enough to which, either build tension or disgust.
The spider’s web, fluids, and gore effects mostly succeed in landing anyway because they require little set-up or development as such. But everything else that falls under the domain of Spielberg feels shallow and wispy. Even the schtickiest elements of the movie seem rather sketchy. Like for instance, why isn’t there more or better material about Gunter’s sister Helga (Noni Hazelhurst), who has the dubious honor of being the most stereotypical character in the book and the first person to notice Charlotte’s pet?
The same applies to Frank, an unfortunate supporting character performed with effort by a rather talented actor. There is no question that these people are supposed to be sympathetic but plenty of scenes and even one-liners and plot points, allow themselves to be so slapdash, that it is hard to comprehend the importance of even trying to achieve Spielberg-ian thoroughness. Otherwise, why wouldn’t the audience, think about far better films about monsters?
It is not a negative that the likes of Spielberg and his heirs are imitated but in such a case, one ought to be in possession of enough patience to have actually learnt their craft. Eldar’s “Sting” often times seems like a film made by fans with a lot of enthusiasm but little to no attention to detail. Not all gags work—“Why didn’t you get a f***ing dog?”—do not ever wear the kind of build-up that would warrant their place in the logic of the action in the film. And so these fight scenes typically begin and end with very little in the way of weight and enthusiasm and so fail to make an impact.
The documentary has some shortcomings’ – Eric climbs the climbing-belt staircase of a vending machine as if it was an air shaft. A viewer can understand why Dad catches his breath. However, there is no evidence of the struggle. We don’t get to spend enough time settling in/ into dreadful anticipation or growing any attachment to Eric and his family so the faster scenes feel too slow and the slower ones too fast. It appears that a number of concepts were implemented in “Sting” but none of these were integrated well.
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- Genre: History, Sci-fic, Thriller
- Country: Australia, United States
- Director: Kiah Roache-Turner
- Cast: Noni Hazlehurst, Jermaine Fowler, Alyla Browne
