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# Jack Arnold’s Spiders in the Films “Tarantula” and “The Incredible Shrinking Man”
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/chto-strashnee-gigantskii-pauk-ugrozhaiushchii-tselomu-gorodu-ili-obychnyi-pauk-atakuiushchii-umenshennogo-do-razmerov-naperstka-cheloveku/
- Published: 2021-06-11T10:23:43.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-02T19:06:19.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Cinema, Humour

Which is scarier: a giant spider threatening an entire city, or an ordinary spider attacking a man shrunk to the size of a thimble? The proper person to ask would be the director Jack Arnold (1916-1992), who, after all, had to conjure up both of these afflictions. It must be said that he handled arachnophobia in first-class style. First in *Tarantula* of 1955, where a spider grown enormous through experiments menaced mankind with its leg; then in *The Incredible Shrinking Man* of 1957, in which a hero diminished by a radioactive mist does battle with a monstrous spider in his own cellar.

![](https://theparnassian.com/content/images/2026/09/photo_4410@11-06-2021_13-23-43.jpg)