The Spider (1958) on Netflix

Approved19581h 13mHorror Sci-Fi

Carol Flynn's father never comes home, so she and her boyfriend Mike Simpson search the caves near his crashed truck. A giant spider waits inside.

Watch on Netflix
Watch on Prime
Watch on NordVPN

Netflix3.7/5
IMDb4.7/104,125 votes
Rotten TomatoesNot available

Trailer

Watch the trailer on YouTube

Plot summary

Carol Flynn is worried when her father, Jack Flynn, fails to come home overnight, so she asks her boyfriend, Mike Simpson, to help her look for him. They find his pickup truck crashed by the highway, along with the bracelet he bought Carol for her birthday. They go into a nearby cave to search. In the dark they step off a ledge and land on a vast web, and an enormous tarantula comes for them. They get away and take their story to Sheriff Cagle, who does not believe a word of it. Their science teacher, Art Kingman, does, and he talks the sheriff into returning to the cave with a large supply of DDT.

Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Spider (1958)

Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.

SPOILER
The same dummy played both dead truck driver Jack Flynn (Merritt Stone) and Deputy Sheriff Dave (Bob Tetrick); reusing it for the second victim took only a change of clothes on the mannequin.
Special effects expert Paul Blaisdell built a life-size giant spider leg for the film, along with a desiccated, mummy-like corpse used to stand in for the spider's victims in several scenes.
Some of the cave interiors were faked with stills of Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico, while the live-action cave scenes were shot at Bronson Caves in Griffith Park near Los Angeles.
Earth vs. the Spider was American International Pictures' biggest launch at the time, opening in 400 theaters at midnight on Halloween in 1958 on a double bill with Terror from the Year 5000.