cult film freak: JUNE KENNEY STARRING IN BERT I. GORDON'S 'EARTH VS THE SPIDER'

Title: EARTH VS THE SPIDER Year: 1958 Rating: ***

Bert I. Gordon excelled in camp cinema where small things turn huge, from rats to ants and before that was EARTH VS THE SPIDER, which is actually a TARANTULA, obviously inspired by the 1955 Jack Arnold classic that took place in a very rural location where the superimposed Aaraneae creeps around mostly at nighttime, adding to the suspense...

Herein it's mostly a daytime crawler... starting out in a catacomb-filled cavern resembling another planet... initially discovered by young high school couple Eugene Perrson and Gordon's regular ingenue June Kenney, an A-looking starlet known for B-movie programmers...

June Kenney in EARTH VS THE SPIDER

With a backstory involving her father mysteriously killed driving home, it's a semi-involving investigative thriller that builds along nicely... until being handed-off to dull scientist Ed Kemmer teamed with reluctant sheriff Gene Roth...

And while the creature looks neat, starting out seemingly dead in a museum before coming to life and stomping across town, THE SPIDER is far more effective as a teenagers-vs-monster vehicle that THE BLOB ignited the very same year.