Zirneklis (1991)

Zirneklis (1991)
aka: The Spider
Director: Vasili Mass
Writer: Vladimir Kaijaks
Cast: Romualds Ancans, Aurelija Anuzhite, Saulius Balandis
A young girl agrees to sit as virgin mary for a painter. Soon after that she starts experiencing nightmares in which painter turns into a giant spider and tries to rape her. Is this just her imagination or is there something else to it?

Zirneklis/Spider starts with a quote from everyone's favourite head shrink Sigmund Freud "Subconscious sexual urges are fast bonded to the sense of fright" It's basiclly a psychosexual drama following Vita, a natural beauty who's been asked to model as the virgin Mary by her college's Priest, on the say so of a local artist. The artist tries to dominate Vita only she declines his advances. Later that night while sleeping she gets attacked by a giant spider that bites her, it then transforms into the artist who she manages to fend off. Needing to take a break after the ordeal Vita retreats to a more rural area, she quickly starts to become romantically involved with a young man. Only the artist surfaces again this time in a more monstrous form. This leads to a good vs evil battle between the artist and the priest which is played out over Vita's sexual awakening.

Very artistic and perverse Russian fable, the young red haired actress playing Vita was very attractive, but for me at least Zirneklis/Spider failed to rise to the occasion. Visually it had many things going for it some of the dream sequences are very well made. Special mention to the classic paintings which came alive, sadly though most these scenes are too darkly filmed and needed much better camera work. It's a shame as given more resources Zirneklis/Spider could have turned out to be a damned fine Jean Cocteau styled fantasy.

(6 out of 10)