SpidersSpidersSpide rsSpidersSpiders - Kingdom of the Spiders Discussion

[–] RishOut 21 years ago

I too noticed the wholesale destruction of spiders in the making of this film. It certainly made things feel more real (more real than Shatner's awful toupee, anyway), but distracted me a few times. Poor beasties.

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[–] Grrrim 21 years ago

Don't you diss the Shatman!

That's his own hair, every strand.

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[–] warnerclassic 20 years ago

Yeah loads of those spiders got killed. When the police man is first driving through the town and the people are banging on his windows check out his rear left tire in the first shot of him driving down the road, he squashes a spider big time!
The film is a classic, and I would like to put a web-site together of it some day

Warner Classic

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[–] warnerclassic 20 years ago

In an interview with Kingdom of the Spiders writer Jeffery Sneller he says in answer to this question.

Did you use effects spiders or did you have a spider wrangler?

“You know, in those days effects weren’t nearly as developed as they are today. It was done through the old process of generation of film after film, and creating those visual effects; it was done the old-fashioned way. So we actually imported I think 5,000 live tarantulas from Honduras, Guatemala, all over the world. Today of course we could have worked with maybe 50 and generated the rest through computer-generated animation, and had as good, if not better, results. It would have been more controllable than having 5,000 spiders crawling all over the country! So we relied on live tarantulas in that one, as well as background models to fill in space in the background. That’s the way that one was done.”

Interesting, though he didn't say how many of the things they killed, probably hundreds

Warner Classic

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[–] 20 years ago

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[–] warnerclassic 20 years ago

Just typed in Shatner, Spiders, kingdom and interview. I love this film so much I'm going to put a web-site together that at least gives it the credit it deserves. Any interesting Kingdom of the Spiders articles anyone has, please letme know in a private message

Warner Classic

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[–] 20 years ago

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[–] phil_mcaleenan 20 years ago

sweet jesus....

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[–] nakedcitizens1 20 years ago

i dont think it was a big deal back in the 70's. people didnt really look at that till the late 80's i think.

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

"As much as I'm against killing a living thing, it's hard to feel sympathy for a spider. "

Why!? You would have a hard time killing a mole or a gopher because it's so cuuuuute right? Regardless of the fact that it tears up your yard and rips open your trash bags at night.

What do spiders do? They kill flies and other household pests. What did they ever do to you?

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

Spiders are extremely important animals, and they have every right to live that you do ***hole. Tarantulas are docile, and usually not aggressive, simply going about their lives, living in fear 90% of the time from people who pollute the natural world and step on bugs because they fear them for no reason.

Why do you hate spiders? A spider is not even 1/1000 of your size, and even the biggest tarantula is no more than 10 or so inches long, still small enough for you to simply kick it out of your way, or douse it in bug spray. Tarantulas are only ugly if you don't understand them. You think a spider sitting there on your wall is deviously plotting ways to kill you. The spider doesn't even know you're there. All it can feel is vibrations from you walking around, which is terrifying it beyond the capacity of movement or rational thought. Spiders will never go out of their way to hurt a human being, or anything of such a considerably larger size than itself.

Stupid? Only a stupid person would say such a thing. Tarantulas are fiercely resourceful and versatile. They are achitectural and scientists have found tarantula habitats in the wild that simply baffle with their precision and practicality. Tarantulas hunt and trap prey with a vicious intelligence, and actually go as far as to refuse dead food as it provides no sport or chance for the spider to be a predator. Spiders are by no means "Stupid or ugly." That's just a usual attitude displayed by your average dumb desensitized American because movies like this have convinced you that they're all out to break into your house and bite you while you sleep.

Oh, and by the way, unless you have a severe allergic reaction, there is no spider on earth which can kill you with its venom. Tarantulas are far more afraid of you, and they have every reason to be. You are destructive and ignorant. Tarantulas are calm, intelligent and respectful of their environment and they have a right to live just like any other animal.

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[–] hclark-5 19 years ago

I think you're a spider.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] RayRay1127 19 years ago

There are some people who are just afraid of certain animals. I personally am TERRIFIED of spiders. Logically, I know they have much more to fear from me and that they are simple usefull creatures who do not actively seek to harm, but as a child, I was bitten by a big hairy brown recluse and the image has stayed with me into adulthood. I do not harm them if they do not come near me. I give them a wide berth. When one gets into my house, I have my room mate catch it and release it outside. It's just the fact that when I see one up close or when one surprises me, blind panic takes over, and whatever happens cannot be helped. Everyone has a phobia. You may like spiders and that's fine, but just be open to the fact that not EVERYONE does.

Ray

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

Just so you're aware, there are indoor spiders, and outdoor spiders. Catching a spider that is indoors and releasing it outdoors is far worse than just stomping on it.

It is a widely accepted myth that catching a spider in your house and releasing it into the wild is some kind of favor to the spider. You're essentially letting it go into a world filled with things that would love to have it for dinner. If it's inside, it wants to be inside to live a quiet solitary life and eat flies. If you insist on tossing it outside to a slow agonizing death, you might as well just step on them.

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[–] RayRay1127 19 years ago

Just so YOU are aware, the only spiders that seem to get into my house are common garden spiders. Yellow and black with a fairly large abdomen and short-ish legs. The reason they get in is the fact that there is a large palm tree right outside my window. I know the difference between indoor and outdoor spiders. Just cause I'm arachnophobic doesn't mean I haven't read up and educated myself. Geeze.

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[–] chiznat7-1 19 years ago

What about the Brown Recluse? That can kill you even if you're not allergic and do not receive the proper medical attention. They are far worse than Black Widows.

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

Not really.

A brown recluse bite can have medical significance if not treated, as their venom contains a potent necrotoxin that basically eats away flesh.

Fortunately, Brown Recluses live up to their names. They are recluses. They do not sit in dark corners waiting to bite you. Like most spiders, they have no desire to have contact with humans, and will flee from you always.

As with all spider bites, the effects of the bite on a full grown adult are minimal to say the least. Most spiders don't even inject venom, and instead administer what is known to collectors as a "Dry bite." While a Brown Recluse bite may be potentially dangerous to a small child, in an adult, it is simply a case of driving casually to the hospital and receiving an antivenin.

Also, keep in mind that doctors are not arachnologists, and it has been estimated by arachnologists that as much as 85% of "spider bite" cases have been misdiagnosed simply because it is easy to blame a spider.

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[–] chiznat7-1 19 years ago

Interesting.

One of my former co-workers was bit by a brown recluse in the middle of the night and had to be hospitalized for a whole week. The wound was very large, due to the fact that it spread, or the necrotoxin that eats flesh, as you pointed out.

She's around 18-19 years of age.

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[–] RobbD 19 years ago

Im a 32 year old married man with two kids. I can change the oil in my car, in the wife's minivan, I know how to work power tools and will foresake an entire day for football...

....put me in a room with a teeny, tiny spider, and I will jump up on the table screaming like a 5 year old girl for my wife to come in and kill that "bloodsucking crewature".

yes, I hate spiders that much myself.

I have nightmares about them...not kidding.

yuck.

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[–] StormSworder 19 years ago

According to the British Tarantula Association, there are more male arachnophobics than female ones. I'm male and I myself used to be terrified of even tiny spiders. I think finding out more about them helped make me realize they're not the kinds of monsters most of us are brought up to believe they are.

Re the tarantulas in Kingdom of Spiders, I read in a recent interview in a magazine that apparently when they started making the film they were killing the tarantulas. But after a while this was considered pretty horrible or messy or whatever. The tarantula which climbs on William Shatner apparently had its fangs cut off before-hand. It presumably died later, as without the ability to inject venom to dissolve its prey, it would have starved to death.

Re tarantulas in general, I've never come across one I'd describe as genuinely aggressive. They are very reluctant to bite, and there has never been a recorded case of someone dying from a tarantula bite. Most public knowledge concerning large hairy spiders comes from horror films.

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

I'm sure the fangs were left in. You cannot simply "remove" a tarantula's fangs as the mechanical damage alone would kill it long before any scenes would be able to be shot. It's far more likely that the Tarantula simply crawled on Willian Shatner and just didn't bite him, as Tarantulas are very seldom likely to bite, especially those (Brachypelma Smithi and Grammostola Rosea) universally used in movies.

Most people would have the same views as you and I if they simply took the time to educate themselves.

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[–] StormSworder 19 years ago

You're right. A very good posting. I've never known a tarantula I'd call 'aggressive'. Even if they feel threatened they tend to run away, hide in their burrow or (in the case of some new world species) flick hairs from their abdomens. The hairs are quite irritating but I don't think they can cause any real harm. Or if they're cornered they might rear up and display their fangs. I've only been given a few little nips which never even broke the skin and went away after a few seconds (and one of them was an accident, when the spider was trying to grab a locust).

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

Nice to see somebody with some education instead of baseless fears. Although, I've been told that getting those hairs in your eyes could mess you up pretty bad. Though anybody who does that probably deserves it.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] sharky-17 19 years ago

"Oh, and by the way, unless you have a severe allergic reaction, there is no spider on earth which can kill you with its venom. "

The Sydney Funnelweb Spider can certainly kill with its venom alone, luckily there has been an antivenin since about 1980.

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

Right, and a lion can also kill you with its teeth, and a bear could take off your head with one swipe of its claws. What the relevant issue here is, spiders are not aggresive towards human beings, and if you get bitten by a spider, you probably deserve it.

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[–] jbaker1-2 18 years ago

Not entirely true. While most spiders, even the few dangerous ones, are shy and inoffensive, some are highly aggressive. Both the Sydney Funnelweb and the South American Banana Spider (a type of huntsman spider that, unlike most of its relatives, is potentially deadly) have been known to attack humans with little or no provocation.

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[–] trentj101 19 years ago

Calm down bpt! You do your post a disservice because of the level of hostility in it. You come across as a borderline fanatic, take a chill pill, or a whole bottle of them before you go into siezure. Shiiiish

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[–] 18 years ago

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[–] jbaker1-2 18 years ago

"Sigh* -- another science geek."

You know, there's something deeply, fundamentally wrong with a society in which curiosity and a desire for knowledge are considered worthy of derision.

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[–] 18 years ago

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[–] Cartwheeling 18 years ago

"Nice to see somebody with some education instead of baseless fears."

You do realise that every person who has a phobia does not necessarily have it because they are afraid of being bitten and dying from its venom, right? To some, they are just creepy as hell.

Seriously, you sound really freakish. Killing spiders is immoral to you, shouldn't f u c k i n g a spider be immoral as well? Because that's what I suspect that you are doing.

Rodney Dangerfield biography reviewed!http://axelfoleypresentsstandup.spaces.msn.com/

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

You're a retard. I'm not going to go back through the whole production of explaining to you again. Go back and read the threads to find out why everything you say is wrong. And I'd rather be a science geek than an ignorant tool.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

I value human life, just not all of it. There's plenty of people who don't deserve the gift of life. People start wars, murder, rape, steal, corrupt... what do animals do? Animals are pure of heart, and kill only to survive. Alot of people could only hope to be as noble as most animals.

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[–] yentle64 19 years ago

Fair enough, but there are pleanty of animals who commit seemingly random acts of savagery and violence. Sounds like you've been watching too many RSPCA documentaries to me.

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

Animals cannot comprehend the ideas of intolerance, revenge, or random violence. The smartest animals thus far in the world, being pigs, dolphins, and some varieties of monkees cannot even comprehend ideas such as this. An animals kills out of three whims.

Hunger

Feeling Threatened

Defending its young

Humans kill because they like it. They make a conscious decision to kill something because it fits into their agenda. Soldiers do it because the President tells them to. Serial Killers do it because they get off on the attention. I'm sick of people complaining and leading witch hunts because a Grizzly Bear kills a hunter. For f u c k's sake, you were TRYING TO KILL the Bear. What exempts the hunter from DESERVING TO GET HIS FACE RIPPED OFF?

It has nothing to do with watching RSPCA documentaries. It has to do with respecting animals, and not being a f u c k i n g moron. What you see (or the media coerces you into seeing) as "random savagery and violence" is just what I would expect an uneducated person to see. If that's what you see, than you see it one-sidedly.

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[–] nuclearyak 19 years ago

>"Animals cannot comprehend the ideas of intolerance, revenge, or random violence"

Erm, I'm sorry, but that's complete crap. There are many documented cases of murder within primate communities.

>"[Humans] make a conscious decision to kill something because it fits into their agenda"

As do the majority of mammals. Lions, for example, regularly kill each other in order to accend social hierarchys.

I'm all for animal welfare, but the majority of your post was bat-s h i t crazy.

(edited for spelling)

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[–] bpt2004 19 years ago

>>Erm, I'm sorry, but that's complete crap. There are many documented cases of murder within primate communities.

Once again, you're confusing cannibalism or the need to eat or being threatened with the emotions that make a human being kill. Wrong. Try again.

>>As do the majority of mammals. Lions, for example, regularly kill each other in order to accend social hierarchys.

Nothing gets by you. Unfortunately the conversation was about animals attacking humans, not each other.

>>I'm all for animal welfare, but the majority of your post was bat-s h i t crazy.

I think you're all for animal welfare as long as it doesn't inconvenience you, just like most people. And I'm not too sure how crazy bat s h i t is, maybe you can enlighten me on that with the same class you made your last post with.

FTW

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] starstattootoo 19 years ago

Animals kill each other for reasons besides food. In fact, infanticide is widespread, even among mammals and birds that nurture their young.

If a male hippopotamus becomes the new alpha male of a herd, he will slaughter any hippo calf that is not his - slaughter as in rip it to pieces in front of its mother. Shocked scientists have speculated that this type of infanticide is a way for an animal to ensure the survival of its own genes.

When food is scarce, rabbit mothers, like many other animals, will eat their entire litters, not for food but because they cannot support them.

Most mammals and birds that have multiple births will have at least one member of the litter or brood deliberately starved or killed. Birds will push their siblings out of the nest. Livestock runts are stomped to death, or lose the constant battle for access to a teat. Mothers will sometimes throw the runt out or deliberately push it away.

The chimpanzees of Gombe were documented by none other than Jane Goodall as being cold-blooded murderers, killing each other because of apparent rivalries. Some chimps killed the infants of chimps they were fighting with. Revenge and malice are not uniquely human.

And I have watched my own cat kill mice and small birds for entertainment. The creatures were left uneaten. In fact, most housecats who hunt will leave dead animals on the doorsteps of their owners - so here is widespread evidence of animals killing other animals as a gesture of affection, the slaughter of rodents for their value as gifts.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] Saintted 19 years ago

Nonsense. Monkeys dismember members of other groups of monkeys simply for trespassing in their territory. They then lay out the trespasser's gory body parts as warning to others. They might then stage right into the other group's territory and slaughter as many as they can.

You're displaying a Utopian bias.

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[–] Saintted 19 years ago

>"I value human life, just not all of it. There's plenty of people who don't >deserve the gift of life. People start wars, murder, rape, steal, corrupt... >what do animals do? Animals are pure of heart, and kill only to survive. Alot >of people could only hope to be as noble as most animals. "

Who the hell are you to decide who should live or die? You've shown yourself guilty of the most vile corruption - bloodlust. Carry out your sentence, righteous one.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] bluedaisyboo 16 years ago

Good grief!! I know there were plenty of people who hated spiders (myself included) as well as plenty that liked them, but I didn't realize they'd all get so pissed at each other!! The OP didn't say anything more than a simple question really and now everyone is biting heads off? Newsflash people! We all have opinions!Some people want to protect the spiders, go ahead! I see a spider? I (actually the person I find to do it more me because I'm not going near it) will crush the thing! My opinion, its a bug. Just like ants and bees and hornets and other things people don't want. Lets fill the house of one of these self-righteous creature savers with ants and hornet nests and see how long until they call the exterminator? If you want to save the creepy-crawlies, good for you, just keep them away from me and we can all be great!

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[–] Zombafyed 15 years ago

It's interesting replying to a thread started 5 years ago.

Anyway, I just finished watching KotS for the first time in...man...about 15 to 16 years. I used to like it as a kid. I was under 10 during this time, and had a fixation with spiders. I actually have had several tarantulas throughout my life, mostly when I was young. I had a mexican-brown, a couple rosehairs, and a pink-toe.

They are really nothing to be feared. They are beautiful and fascinating critters. I don't really have the interest I did when I was younger, but I can still appreciate them.

Back to the point, like I said, I just got done watching the flick, and myself noticed how many spiders were getting whacked (and stomped). The first one I really noticed was when the crew are locked up in the bar/motel/whatever. Some idiot opened the front door, and a bunch got in. They sprayed them with the fire extinguisher, and started stomping on them. I had to rewind again to confirm, but yeah, that old prick stomps one to mush. Really cruel how no regard was given for these creatures lives. After that, I saw the onslaught of murder, especially that cop driving the car. He must have killed 4-5 with every foot his car moved.

And I'm sure that when they were done filming, they didn't send all the spiders back to honduras. I'm sure they had a nice bonfire with them, sick *beep* It doesn't make me as sick as Cannibal Holocaust's animal exploitation, but it pisses me off. ESPECIALLY after the bad acting (hey I like the movie, but the cheesy acting is a lot less tolerable after realizing that some creatures lost their lives for it). And what was with Mr. Rapist Shatner anyway? The girl's in town for 2 days, and he's already pressured her to dinner twice. Then he abducts her on the side of the road, and leaves his truck out in the wilderness.

What a douche. And just so everyone knows,...yes, I am a spider.

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