Writer-director Kiah Roache-Turner’s arachnid horror Sting will hit cinemas May 2 via Studiocanal.
Set in New York, the film centres on Alyla Browne’s Charlotte, a rebellious 12-year-old girl obsessed with comic books. Despite her stepfather Ethan’s (Ryan Corr) best efforts to connect with her through their comic book co-creation Fang Girl, Charlotte feels isolated. Her mother and Ethan are distracted by their new baby and are struggling to cope, leaving Charlotte to bond with a strange spider after it falls from the encased in an egg. Keeping it as a secret pet, she names it Sting.
As Charlotte’s fascination with Sting increases, so does its size. Growing at a monstrous rate, Sting’s appetite for blood becomes insatiable. Neighbours’ pets start to go missing, and then the neighbours themselves. Soon Charlotte’s family and the eccentric characters of the building realise that they are all trapped, hunted by a ravenous supersized arachnid with a taste for human flesh… and Charlotte is the only one who knows how to stop it.
The cast also includes Penelope Mitchell, Robyn Nevin, Noni Hazlehurst and Jermaine Fowler.
Sting is produced by Pictures in Paradise’s Chris Brown, and See Pictures’ Jamie Hilton and Michael Pontin.
The film received major production investment from Screen Australia and was co-financed by Align, with additional finance by Create NSW, Cumulus VFX, and Spectrum Entertainment. Weta Workshop, led by creative director Richard Taylor, created the physical puppet effects for the project out of their workshop in New Zealand.