Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		4.5

Spider Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov October 7, 2017

Vasili Mass' "Spider" a.k.a. "Zirneklis" (1991) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Mondo Macabro. The supplemental features on the disc include exclusive new video interview with director Vasili Mass; newly discovered footage from the Latvian State Archive; and trailers. In Russian, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

The innocent girl

I would be lying to you if I told you that I knew exactly what Latvian director Vasili Mass had in mind when he began working on Spider. My initial impression was that the film mimics the style and narrative structure of Andrzej Zulawski’s Possession, but having just finished viewing it for a second time I am actually beginning to believe that it might have been partially inspired by Mikhail Bulgakov’s famous novel The Master and Margarita. It is difficult to know for sure, but at least the fact that it was completed during the early 1990s, which was the final phase of the perestroika in the now-defunct Soviet Union, pretty much guarantees that it was meant to be deconstructed like Possession.

The film follows closely a young and very beautiful girl named Vita who is asked by a priest to model for a supposedly famous artist who plans to paint a new portrait of the Virgin Mary. The context in which the request is made is crucial to the story -- and ultimately the logical deconstruction of it -- because the entire segment implies that the innocent and pure ones, like Vita, are also too naïve and too blind to recognize an imminent danger. (I will explain what this means later on). Intrigued by the priest’s description of the artist's work, and more importantly feeling safe because of his enthusiasm for the artist, Vita immediately agrees to visit the studio where the portrait will be painted. Soon after, the girl enters the studio and her reality is essentially replaced by something else that reminds of a very fluid dream. Exactly why and how this happens will probably make or break the film for a lot of people because it is here that Mass abruptly shifts the narrative in an entirely new direction and leaves the audience with Vita to make sense of the dream.

So, what happens next?

It turns out that the artist is really more of a brilliant maker with a very dark heart who has the ability to assume the identities of different objects and creatures, though the one that he typically uses is that of a naughty spider. He can also play with people’s minds in ways that allow him to reshape their identities and ultimately the way they live their lives. When Vita realizes that she will have to do a lot more than just model for him she attempts to run away and ends up on a remote island with distant relatives, but the artist, transformed into a spider, begins haunting her. Then as her dreams become more sexually intense, Vita actually begins to enjoy how her world and that of the artist routinely overlap.

Now, what does all of the above mean? One way to make sense of the film is to think of the relationship between Vita and the artist as a prism that allows the audience to see the strange contrasts of Soviet realism and specifically how it corrupted the minds and hearts of ordinary people. In Bulgakov’s novel the main story has a similar function, but it is developed in a very different context. So, the scary spider essentially represents the evil that would find ways to distort the lives of completely innocent and apolitical people like Vita. The simpler but also less effective read is to look at the entire thing as the intense sexual awakening of a girl who eventually becomes prisoner of her own mind’s bizarre fantasies.

It is easy to tell that Mass worked with a modest budget, but the film’s visual style is brilliant. The lush colors, thick shadows and unusual light reflections frequently make it look like a neo-surrealist portrait that has come alive.

Spider Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Vasili Mass' Spider arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Mondo Macabro.

The release is sourced from a very beautiful 4K master. I don't know when or where it was prepared, but if I had to guess I would say that it is a recent one. Regardless, Spider is exactly the type of film that needs a high-quality presentation because it has a very unique stylistic appearance with a wide range of gentle nuances that an ancient master almost certainly would not have retained. Thankfully, depth and fluidity are fantastic, and on a big screen even the trickier visuals look wonderful (you can see an example in screencapture #7). Elsewhere delineation and clarity are also outstanding, with the close-ups of Vita looking particularly good (see screencaptures #1, 5, and 12). Colors are wonderfully saturated and with beautiful nuances, some with more pronounced organic hues, and some with lighter surrealist overtones. There are no traces of problematic degraining or sharpening adjustments. Image stability is excellent. Lastly, I noticed a couple of tiny blemishes, but there are no large cuts, debris, damage marks, stains, or torn frames to report. Fantastic master. (Note: This is a Region-Free Blu-ray release. Therefore, you will be able to play it on your player regardless of your geographical location).

Spider Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only on standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: Russian LPCM 2.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature.

Spider was not shot with a huge budget, but its creators were quite smart and did some pretty original things to enhance its surrealist atmosphere. To be honest, I was actually quite surprised how active its sound design is. Some of the sequences with the spider and the artist are great. The dialog is clean, crisp, stable, and very easy to follow. There are no audio dropouts or distortions to report.

Spider Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Interview with Director Vasili Mass - in this new video interview, director Vasili Mass explains how he entered the Soviet film industry, his initial work as a production designer, and discusses the original script for Spider, the intent to produce a film with multiple identities that would work as a serious drama and a socio-cultural parody, some of the difficulties of shooting a film with horror and erotic elements during the Cold War era (as both were seen as promoting Western cultural values), the art and special effects that were (with some very interesting comments about the deign of the giant spider), the casting process, the film's music score and editing, the film's reception in Riga and Moscow, etc. In Russian, with optional English subtitles. (33 min).

• On Set TV Report - presented here is a clip that was discovered by Inese Strupule in the Latvian State Archive. It is a newsreel report filmed on location in Dekrim Studios during the shooting of Spider and shows fascinating glimpses of cast and crew going about their work. The film ends quite suddenly -- this is the way it was on the original newsreel. In Latvian, with optional English subtitles. (4 min).

• Trailers - a large collection of trailers for other Mondo Macabro releases.

Spider Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

During the Cold War era government censorship undoubtedly prevented a lot of very ambitious and talented directors in the Soviet Bloc from realizing their dreams, but the truth is that it also inspired many to be creative in some very special ways. Vasili Mass' Spider is a perfect example of a bold and very original film that exists only because it essentially tried to outsmart the people that were going to determine its fate. Unsurprisingly, it has multiple identities, though stylistically it fits somewhere between Sergei Parajanov's The Color of Pomegranates and Andrzej Zulawski's Possession. Mondo Macabro's release of Spider is sourced from a gorgeous 4K master and has a terrific new video interview with dierctor Mass. It was a pleasure to discover this film and I will make sure that it ends up on my Top 10 list at the end of the year. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.