Sting review: "Alien’s influence resonates in this playful creature feature"

Following Adam Sandler’s midlife-crisis meeting with a comforting off-world spider in Spaceman, here’s the discomforting youth variant. Like E.T. gone wrong, director Kiah Roache-Turner’s underdeveloped but briskly suspenseful, suggestive arachno-shocker sees a kid with family issues find solace in alien company. Only this spidery E.T. will gobble you up before it phones home…

A clever opening sees a chunk of meteorite crash through the window of a New York apartment block, land in a doll’s house and crack open to release spidey. Prone to scuttling through air ducts, pre-teen Charlotte (a likable Alyla Browne) finds it, feeds it and names it Sting, after Bilbo’s dagger. But this critter grows fast – and soon uses the air ducts itself to hunt (human) food.

Alien’s influence resonates, wittily so when the shadowy environs tease hidden spiders – a lampshade and electric cables offer nifty fake-outs. A Ripley/xenomorph-ish congruity is also implied between girl/spider, though as the impressively WETA-spawned Sting’s victims mount, Charlotte realizes this home ain’t big enough for the both of them.

Sam Raimi echoes also haunt Roache-Turner’s dark wit and fluent camerawork, which makes immersive use of the contained settings. Often, though, Sting can seem limited rather than lean: the spider’s growth spurts, gooey kills and voice-mimic skills could have been more inventively nurtured, especially during the underplayed climax. Yet there’s another sting in the tale. As Charlotte channels Ash/Ripley for the close, facing down all that adolescence throws at her, her coming-of-age arc takes up at least some of the slack. 

Sting is released in UK cinemas on May 31 and is in US theaters now. 

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