Phoneutria nigriventer: The Brazilian Wandering Spider.
Two get-rich-quick guys, Buddy (Tom Atkins) and Fred (Howard Hesseman) are flying back from Ecuador to California. On board is a shipment of coffee beans, three smuggled passengers and a bunch of deadly tarantulas.
During the flight they run into a thunderstorm. The vibrations of the plane irritate the tarantulas. The sacks of coffee beans open and the beans and spiders spill all over the cargo area. The three smuggled passengers are bitten to death.
While flying over California the plane develops mechanical problems. Buddy and Fred need to make an emergency landing. While attempting to land, the spiders have now worked their way through to the cockpit and attack the pilots. The plane crashes near an orange grove next to the small town of Finleyville California.
Everybody from town comes out to see the plane crash. Fuel begins to leak from the plane so the fire chief, Bert Springer (Claude Akins), tries to divert it away from the plane. While attempting to hook up the plane to the tow truck, to move it out of the way, one idiot on a motor cycle crashes into the fuel ditch and a spark sets it on fire. This sends the tarantulas scurrying to the near-by orange grove.
The pilots and the illegal aliens on board are taken to Doctor Hodgin’s (Pat Hingle), office. At least the ones that are still alive. The ones that are dead are taken to the morgue. One by one the citizens of Finleyville are beginning to succumb to the same strange symptoms as the pilots. The doctor finally figures out that bite marks on the bodies are from spiders. Some one in town finds one of the spiders. Joe Harmon (Charles Frank) brings it to a specialist he knows. The specialist tells him that the tarantulas are actually banana spiders, AKA Brazilian wandering spiders. They are the most deadly spider known to man.
“Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo” was released in 1977 and was directed by Stuart Hagmann. It is a made for TV movie from CBS. The banana spider is very venomous and the neurotoxin from it is extremely painful, however, it is mostly only lethal in children. Granted the poison is not as deadly as noted in the movie but, since when did the science ever really matter in a horror movie.
The movie is typical for a 70’s made for TV horror movie. Someone does something either for money or just plain stupidity that causes something really bad to happen. There are the likable good guys, greedy bad guys, some mayhem, very little blood or gore and an ending where everyone that’s left alive walks off into the sunset. Oh, I almost forgot, there is usually one pivotal moment toward the end of the movie where something happens that puts everyone in danger, but the power comes back on, or the sun comes up, or some other natural thing occurs that makes everything all better. Remember it’s TV so it needs to be family friendly.
This one, like many of them done for the big three networks, is done well. The first half is better than the second half. Still it’s a nice slice of nostalgia. The acting is good. The 70’s didn’t have a lot of special effects so kudos to the tarantula wranglers.