If you’ve been to a movie theater lately, you’ve probably noticed a lot of movies that could be described as “horror comedy” — where a horror film is combined with a comedy to make a movie that’s not scary at all, but still has a lot of humor. But, I was surprised to find this combination of elements in “Attack of the Murder Hornets”.
For two years in a row, director David Yarovesky has made a charming horror comedy that capitalizes on its ability to scare our audience with the cheap thrill of a cheap horror movie. The latest movie in the horrorific ‘Attack of the Killer Tomatoes’ series, ‘Attack of the Murder Hornets’, follows the exploits of two young detectives who are tasked with finding the murdering ‘Murder Hornets’.
In 1927 a French production company created a short film called ‘The Insect Woman’. This film was a combination of a love story and a horror film – a genre known as ‘ terror ettéré’. It was remade by a Japanese company in 1958 as ‘The Insect Woman’ and it went on to be remade a few more times, as well as being adapted into a manga and a film. In 2015, a South Korean production company created a film called ‘Attack of the Murder Hornets’, a film that blends a love story, a horror film and a comedy film.
Attack of the Murder Hornets has a storyline that is evocative of a frightening murder mystery. The insects, on the other hand, are terrifying enough without the addition of horror movie tropes.
Michael Paul Stephenson’s Attack of the Murder Hornets gives the impression of a riveting true crime series. To be clear, insects aren’t always bad. In a human sense, they lack morals and ethical standards. They don’t act in a malevolent manner. They’re not capable of murder. However, the Asian gigantic hornet was nicknamed the “murder hornet” rather than the “gentle honey bee” in the North American press for a reason. These carnivorous apex predators seem to have arrived from the Carboniferous era.
They may annihilate honeybee hives in minutes by ripping the pollinators’ torsos in two. Their venom causes severe agony in humans and, in the worst-case scenario, death. The invasion looked almost demonic when they were found last spring in Washington state. As a result, it’s only natural that Michael Paul Stephenson’s new film Attack of the Murder Hornets plays like a terrifying true-crime tale.
The show, which is now accessible on Discovery+, starts out with some spectacular carnage. Ted McFall, a friendly beekeeper from Whatcom County, Washington, describes the devastation that hornets wreaked on his honeybee hives when they attacked his bee farm: mass slaughter. When McFall speaks about the untimely deaths, she becomes worked up.
The appearance of the giant Asian hornet on his property was an existential threat to him as a professional beekeeper who sells honey and beeswax, and he couldn’t help but take the death of his bees personally. McFall joins a loose alliance of beekeepers and scientists in the Pacific Northwest in Attack of the Murder Hornets. They are on the lookout for the nests of these invading insects, attempting to eliminate them before they wreak havoc on the local ecosystem.
Another member of the team is Chris Looney, an entomologist with the Washington State Department of Agriculture who treks into the woods with a net, undaunted of the long odds. Despite the traps, the team’s breakthrough comes from a piece of high-tech equipment: roboticist Vikram Iyer believes that tracking devices designed for robotic flies could also work on the Asian giant hornet, so the team begins by collecting individual hornets and sticking trackers to their abdomens until one eventually takes them back to the nest.
Despite a series of failures, Stephenson’s subjects capture a significant number of hornets, including many juvenile queen specimens that, if they had grown up and established their nests, would have spread the problem across the area. Science may not always save the day, but it does help to avoid disaster.
Stephenson’s documentary moves at a breakneck speed, and he’s so immersed in the makeshift murder hornet detective squad that people open up to him. He captures tender moments like a local kid crying at the sight of a hornet whose wings had been fused together in an effort to connect the robot tracker by filming their pursuit from a close-up viewpoint. And it’s an exciting, energetic crowd: They’re all out in the woods, either pursuing noble scientific objectives or zealous crusader enthusiasm. (“If we don’t get rid of this murder hornet, God help us all,” McFall says.) When honeybees are endangered, the whole food chain is jeopardized, thus the story is a compelling ecological race against time with real consequences.
Attack of the Murder Hornets doesn’t need to depend on its nature-doc-as-crime-doc gimmick, with its ominous soundtrack and horror-movie images, as much because it has so much built-in drama, atmosphere, and character. The majority of the specialists questioned are careful to emphasize that the insects are not to blame for acting on their instincts. McCall, on the other hand, laments the fact that he cannot personally decapitate every hornet.
Conrad Berube, a beekeeper who destroyed the first nest found in North America, is asked to help with the job; nevertheless, because of his skill in destroying these houses, he is nicknamed the “trigger man,” donning vests embroidered with bees and being courteous of insects. Regardless, he has no malice toward the hornets he feels obliged to kill. “Look how beautiful she is,” he says when he meets a queen. “Being a part in its eradication gives me an ache.” He says that he helps to kill the animals in order to protect the environment.
Despite the fact that the video is a crime documentary, the Asian gigantic hornet is mostly shown as a terrifying creature. People are taught to fear and hate predators because they are often anthropomorphized as malevolent actors. Sharks, for example, have suffered greatly as a consequence of their terrifying reputation. The Asian gigantic hornet has already been turned into a bug-sized boogeyman in popular culture, with names like “murder hornet.” Although the subject of the documentary is intriguing, it would be more significant if it spent less time stressing how wicked and deadly the insects are. Without resorting to horror clichés, their status as an invading race poses enough of a threat.
RATING: 5/10
A review of the 2012 movie “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes”, otherwise known as “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes”, starring Aaron Ashmore, Mayko Nguyen, Orphan Black’s Tatiana Maslany, and Tom Everett Scott.. Read more about murderous hornets size comparison and let us know what you think.
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