There Came a Big Spider

This reminded me of so many things!

Eraserhead (Lynch), Enemy (Villeneuve), and Stalker (Tarkovsky).

There was a real cohesive vision here. The story has THEMES!

Excellent cinematography choices! The 4:3, film emulation, and strong composition came together in a satisfying way that enhanced the tone!

Was also super impressed by the spider puppet!

In conclusion, keep it up!

what the fuck guys

The vision needed to execute a project like this is unreal. With a team name like Shrek 2 for blu-Ray, I really thought this was going to rot my brain, but it buzzed me like a fine wine. The art direction is SO INSPIRED!! What house did you film this in?? The shots are SO GOOD!! The long awkward engagement is stunning! The tasteful nipple! the AWESOME BARREL SHOT!! I just don't understand how a team like this exists, but im SO glad they do! What a delight! Really awesome to watch in the heats! Hit me up

The quote has always been that "the teams nominated for the Incredibly Strange award won't land anywhere near the finals list". They're simply too raw and unfiltered.
But this film finally bridges that gap! (Rather it should have.) I can't believe this isn't a finalist.
It's so well crafted! I don't know if the spider looks so good due to the black and white, lighting or just a genuinely great puppet.
To execute such a strange idea so well is something this competition hasn't seen before. It's strangely competent. Or competently strange?

A "What the hell did I just watch?" movie to start the "What the hell did I just watch?" heat.

I like the claustrophobic 4:3 framing. The black and white works really well. A great performance. It's lovely to see the full cycle of a relationship, although it takes a second viewing for me to fully grasp this.

Some of the plot points go over my head on the first viewing. I don't recognise the man lying face-down half-naked in his bed. I think it's a woman in a skimpy outfit, and I think the spider has come in to kill her. Rather disturbing. Anyway, I eventually cotton onto the love story, and I understand the film better on a rewatch.

I've contemplated doing a solo entry before, and this film makes me feel more inspired to give it a go.

What? I had to triple check this wasn't on the short list cause it's insanely good. I'm pretty sure the only reason Joel and Rachel didn't select it is because they've mental blocked from their memories on account of the trauma it induced. And y'know what, fair. But great film!

Good Lord Almighty. Weird as? Yes. Good fun? Absolutely.

We echo some of what has already been said about this film bridging the gap between the truly bizarre and the quality work we expect from shortlist/finalists! It was gutting not to be able to bump this film higher up on our list — we promise we wanted to!

Sheepishly, we must admit the subject matter was a bit distracting, and took away from acknowledging the brilliant location, use of colour, 4:3 aspect ratio, and solid performance on our first viewing. On the second viewing, a lot of that fell into place and it began to climb the list — but alas, it didn’t quite hit the shortlist. Thank you very much for your email where you said you wanted to know how you can improve!

Knowing you want solid feedback on how to turn the dials up and get to finals-level storytelling, here are our points on how to make the spider sex movie better — a sentence we never thought we’d write.

The shock of the spider on top of your lead is a truly bizarre moment, with a horror-esque soundtrack to support it, followed by very sweet piano music, the table-setting sequence, and a wonderful proposal performance. This part of the film is the strongest — but we would have liked to see a bit more of what was going on here. More shots of the spider sneaking into the room and doing the deed (yes, believe it or not, we would have liked to see more of that) and also at the table, listening intently to the leads words. During the proposal, more angles of the face sweating as he stumbles over his words, close-ups of his hands — intentional choices that really make the whole scene feel lived-in. As it stands, we only had the one locked-off shot of the lead looking directly into the camera with a couple of inserts, so it seemed to lack intentionality.

Outside of this scene, everything else on rewatch didn’t quite hit the pace it needed to keep up with other stories in the comp. The sequences of him coming and going from the house without music or tonal guidance pulled us out, and we were left with too many questions about our lead. That pushed the film more into the “just accept the bizarreness of it” category rather than the “be curious about what we don’t know” category — which is what you want to gun for when building a shortlist-worthy story.

Why was he so sad about the spider dying initially? How does that tie into the loss of his wife? After they’re engaged, he wakes up on the couch smelling someone’s blanket — is that the smell of his wife, or the spider? (Another crazy thing we never thought we’d type.) And why does the spider end the relationship?

The concept is great, but for it to climb the ranks, we need more of those story beats to make sense. Funny as it is to recommend this after a film like this, as inspiration for how to do completely fucked well, we’d point you to these films:

Wheat Myself & Rye by Crab Crab Crab

Inflamed by Team Moon

We’re Dead and Gay by… wait a minute!! You guys!

Okay, genuinely — if you can combine the goofy energy and beats of something like We’re Dead and Gay and raise it up with the wonderful camera work, lighting, and intentional choices you made in There Came a Big Spider, the sky truly is your limit. We’re Dead and Gay has this charm that carries audiences along for the ride — despite not being as technically impressive as this one, its bizarre story has a lot more meat on the bones. Take heart, fellas! This means you have it in you to truly bring all your skills together and knock it out of the park in 2026. We believe in you!

THE BEST THING: The boldness of the idea.
THE NEXT THING: Give us more to play with, take us on more of a ride, and stick the landing.

Oh and one last thing - come to the heats!! We missed you and wanted to meet you, so we could climb into your brains and understand how they work! And so we could pass on our therapy bills to you! It's also a great way for you to be inspired by the competition in a fresh way and take what you learn into your future work. Come to the finals! We'd love to see you.

One of my favourite films from this heat. A very fitting Lynchian aesthetic in memory of David Lynch who sadly passed away earlier this year.