Horrors of Spider Island

(The) Horrors of Spider Island is a 1961 exploitation film.

A troupe of dancers is assembled in New York City for a special performance in Singapore. Unfortunately, their plane crashes and the survivors (the troupe plus their manager Gary and his assistant Georgia) become castaways on an island. A little exploration reveals that the island used to be the home of a scientist mining for uranium, before he was killed by spiders. One night Gary gets bitten by a spider and turns into a spider-monster, stalking his former friends and killing them.

The film was a German flick, but represented an interesting midpoint in cinema between the traditional horror film and the nudie cuties that would pop up in the early-to-mid 60's that would lead to the eventual creation of the MPAA ratings.

For the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version, please go to the episode recap page.


 * All Women Are Lustful: The ladies are stranded on an island, one of the only competent members of their group has gone missing, and the food's running out. When two average-looking men show up, you'd think the ladies would have bigger concerns than seducing them, but, well...
 * The guys do bring food and supplies with them (they were resupplying the scientist who lived on the island), but forgetting about their missing friends is harder to justify.
 * As You Know
 * Does Not Like Shoes: The women start going barefoot all the time not long after crashing on the island.
 * Does This Remind You of Anything?: A man bitten by a radioactive spider turns into some sort of..."spider-man?"
 * Digging Yourself Deeper: Joe and Anne. It starts with him saying he's glad her plane crashed (so he could meet her), and, well, if this movie were more competently written it would get worse, but the bit ends rather lamely.
 * Failed a Spot Check: Plenty of easy ways to get killed by spiders by remaining unaware of surroundings.
 * Fan Service: There's lots of scantily clad women in this movie. However, in the bathing scene, they wear light-colored body stockings. So they're nude, but they're not!
 * Halfway Plot Switch: At the plane crash. Though the title is about the Horrors of Spider Island, the first 10-15 minutes are nothing like a horror movie plot at all.
 * Hot Amazon: Babs.
 * I Love Nuclear Power: Just being vaguely near uranium deposits is enough to make spiders into giant mutants.
 * Immodest Orgasm: The moans from the sun-stricken dancers sounds... erotic. Lampshaded and deconstructed by Mike and the 'bots.
 * Kill It with Fire: They somehow deduce that spider-Gary can only be destroyed with fire, so they drive him into quicksand by brandishing torches.
 * Lego Genetics: They don't even bother to explain how or why radiation makes spiders mutate, or why their bites turn you into a werespider. Other than uranium deposits being nearby, and that's barely a Hand Wave.
 * Monster Misogyny: Kind of hard to avoid when the only two other guys come to the island in the last third of the film - and Gary is the first victim.
 * Misogyny: Overt, condescending and smug about it.
 * No Ending: Well, sort of. There's a shot of the girls leaving the island on a boat, then the film just... stops.
 * No Except Yes: "There's absolutely no reason yet to fear the worst. Until now, we only know that the plane caught fire and we've lost radio contact."
 * Official Couple: Gary was closer to Georgia than a boss and secretary normally are until Gary got spiderized.
 * Offscreen Crash: The plane crash. One moment the plane is coming down, a few ocean scenes later they're all on the raft.
 * Plot Armor: The only way that only the females and the talent agent were able to survive the flaming, nose-down, off screen plane crash - with nary a scratch.
 * Quicksand Sucks
 * Romantic Two-Girl Friendship: Two of the dancers seem to have this going on.
 * The Scourge of God: Spider-Gary's first victim is the lone stripper of the group, who previously threw herself at Gary and only managed to get slapped by an angry Georgia.
 * Sexophone: Heard whenever one of the dancers acts sexy, even when she's by herself.
 * Smart Ball: When the group finds a hammer, Gary correctly says that since it's got a long handle it's a mining hammer, probably used for mining radioactive elements like uranium.
 * One of the dancers then asks if you can eat uranium.
 * Soft Water: Because it's easy to survive a plane falling nose-first into water, uninjured.
 * You Can Leave Your Hat On: Linda strips to her unmentionables during her "audition" as a "dancer".