Arachnophobia

Arachnophobia (1990)

36 mistakes

(6 votes)

Revealing mistake: When the scientists inject the mouse with poison, they put it in a jar. The, after they place it down you can see someone's hand swap the jar for one containing a dead mouse. You can even hear it. (01:17:58)

Revealing mistake: When Becky sees the spider in the shower, there are two instances when you can see the bodystocking she's wearing, covering her breasts, to preserve her modesty, most noticeable when she screams. (01:11:53)

Revealing mistake: When Jerry Manley gets bitten by the spider in the tent in South America, the others come to look at his corpse, you can see clearly see his neck pulsating, when he should be dead. (00:15:35)

Arachnophobia mistake picture

Revealing mistake: When Becky gets out of the shower naked, her father walks in on her and you can clearly see her wearing pants, reflected in the mirror, to keep her modesty. (01:10:05)

Hamster

Arachnophobia mistake picture

Revealing mistake: In the scene where Dr. Ross Jennings is trapped in the corner of the cellar, you can see that the tarantula which starts climbing up his leg has a huge black stick stuck to the back of its body, pushing it along. (01:36:05)

Factual error: Jerry Manley's corpse wouldn't have been returned to his home town as depicted. He died in a foreign country outside the U.S. from what was thought to have been a fever, his corpse would have been quarantined for possible contamination and autopsied which would have quickly determined his real cause of death from the spider.

jbrbbt

Factual error: The spider being fried by the fuse box simply can't happen. Fuses are insulated for that very reason.

Arachnophobia mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Irv and Blaire are snuggled up on the couch, watching Wheel of Fortune, watch the big bowl of buttery popcorn they have. In the first shot it is full to the brim. In the next shot it's half full. (01:18:15)

Hamster

Continuity mistake: When the General jumps out of the flames, one of his legs breaks off after he hits the ground. All eight legs are intact after he is blasted by the nail gun and crashes into his nest.

Continuity mistake: When they perform the autopsy on the three victims, Metcalf is all grey and stiff, whereas the two exhumed victims look alive and fresh.

Jacob La Cour

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Not that what you said is wrong, but it actually makes sense. Metcalf was bitten by the original, non-bred spider. The other victims were bitten by spiders that were part house spider, part deadly spider. Therefore, the effects of the bites were different. I'm quite glad that I only had to see one gray, shriveled-up body.

Actually all three were bitten by hybrids.

Other mistake: Irv and Blaire's death scene doesn't make sense. When Irv poured butter on the popcorn, he should've noticed the spider in the bowl. Also, when Blaire picked the spider up, she should've felt it. Both of them still appeared to be watching the TV after being bitten, which also didn't make sense. Why didn't they have seizures like the other victims?

Continuity mistake: Near the beginning, the clumsy guy walks backwards into a giant cobweb, so he is covered in it, but, as he leaves, there isn't a cobweb in sight on him.

kh1616

Continuity mistake: When Becky is in the shower, the position of her hair as she washes it changes, and the amount of shampoo bubbles in her hair differs also. (01:09:10)

Hamster

Audio problem: Right after the doctor falls in the basement he is talking about how no spiders are going to be there. Then he keeps repeating "Oh s***" but it looks like his lips are delayed.

Movieman123

Factual error: With Irv and Blaire, one of them picks up the handful of popcorn and presumably eats the spider. While inside the eater, the spider would bite and poison whoever it was inside. When they find both of them dead, the spider crawls out of one person. Why would it leave one body and actually take the trouble to go inside the other rather than just bite them on the skin like the others? It's not like it would crawl out and back into the bowl to be eaten by the other person.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: We actually don't see either Irv or Blaire "eat" the spider at all. We just see Blaire take a handful of popcorn with the spider inside. Next we see both dead bodies, and then a spider crawls out of Irv's nostril. So the spider could have bitten both people on their skin in short order and then crawled into Irv's body, for whatever reason, after he was already dead. Or, there could be two completely different spiders that killed the pair at around the same time. As the action happens off-screen, it can't be a factual error, we simply don't know exactly what happened.

BaconIsMyBFF

The whole scene doesn't make sense. The fact that Irv pours the butter on the popcorn with the spider in the bowl, Blaire doesn't feel the spider in her hand when she picks it up with the popcorn, and they are still sitting in the same position watching Wheel of Fortune after being bitten. Only Irv's Coca-Cola can is lying on the floor with some popcorn pieces. The popcorn bowl is still on Blaire's lap, showing they did not have seizures to the spider's venom like the other victims. It also doesn't make sense that the spider doesn't bite Irv when he carries the bowl from the kitchen to the living room.

The mistake entry as written states that the spider is eaten by one person and then eaten by another, with both people dying afterwards. Since we do not actually see that happening, this doesn't count as a Factual Error. The fact that the victims do not seem to have violently seized prior to death should be submitted as a separate entry.

BaconIsMyBFF

Factual error: Towards the end Ross pours wine on the egg sac to light it. Wine doesn't contain enough alcohol to ignite.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: He uses cognac and not wine, which is why it burns.

Audio problem: When Bunny says "Yo Dr Death" when riding off in the car with Shelley, her lips don't move. (00:58:05)

Migster

Continuity mistake: When Jerry Manley is shown in the coffin his head is on the right side. When they show the shot inside the hole before inserting the poles, his head is on the left.

robsuttonjr

Visible crew/equipment: When the dog and the cat run out through the dog flap, you can see the puppeteer moving behind the flap handling the spider. (00:18:55)

Mortug

Other mistake: The wood coffin that Jerry Manley is placed in has no bottom. Right after showing him in the coffin they seal the top, insert handles and somehow carry him off.

robsuttonjr

More quotes from Arachnophobia

Trivia: Near the start of the film, when Atherton is examining the spider after returning from the valley, several butterflies are seen pinned up in front of him. Several of these are not South American butterflies - the top left one (blue with long tails) is Papilio Ulysses, a species of tropical Australia, and the big green-and-black one near the bottom right is Ornithoptera priamus or O. euphorion. Whether this qualifies as a mistake, I don't know - Atherton is supposed to be an expert, so they may not be the most geographically accurate 'colourful' butterflies to use.

More trivia for Arachnophobia

Question: Which spider attacked the doctor in the barn, killing him? Was it the general, the queen, or just one of the offspring?

Answer: It definitely wasn't one of the offspring, as you can see when it jumped out at him that it was a very large spider, likely the general since they mentioned the queen would be guarding the egg sac in the wine cellar to defend it from other spiders.

Phaneron

Answer: I think he's referring to the Brazilian doctor they brought in to help. If that's the case, it was the main spider that hitched a ride with the body.

lartaker1975

Answer: One of the offspring. There was a brief shot of the little one crawling into the doctor's slipper.

Wrong doctor.

lionhead

The question is actually referring to the entomologist played by Julian Sands, not the town medical doctor that Jeff Daniels moves in to replace.

Phaneron

More questions & answers from Arachnophobia

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