The private investigator Mark Higbie (Tony Franciosa) is drinking in a bar with his friend Frank, who is waiting for his fiancée Leigh Lockridge (Donna Mills), and the bartender Carlo Lenzi (Michael DeLano). Out of the blue, a young woman asks Frank to help her to go to her car, but something happens and Frank screams, and his friends find his severed body. Soon Leigh goes to Mark's office and hires him to find what happened to her fiancé since Lt. Gully Conti (Vic Morrow) believes she is involved in the murder. Her last husband vanished in a ship during a voyage with her and her twin sister Laura (Patty Duke). Mark visits Gully in the precinct and learns that the suspect is a woman named Valerie Steffan. His further investigation shows that there were three previous cases similar to Frank's one, and all the bodies had their fluids sucked out of them. Mark's assistant and secretary Flaps (Roz Kelly) researches the Lockridge family and learns that their parents died in a plane crash and an old Indian found the sisters, but one of them almost died bitten by spiders. Further, in accordance with ancient legends, women affected by a curse turn into giant spiders during the full moon and under stress, killing their victims. Mark proceeds his investigations and starts to believe that the legend might be true. Now he wants to know whether Leigh or Laura was the child bitten by spiders. And who is Valerie Steffan?
"Curse of the Black Widow" is an American TV Movie from 1977 with a kind of tribute the sci-fi films from the 50's. The story is not bad, with many details and twists, and certainly attracts the fans of these old movies. There are some silly and confusing things that could have been improved, as follows: (a) The last name of the family is "Lockridge", but the film credits and IMDb write "Lockwood" instead. (b) The successive fade-out for the insertion of TV commercial is annoying and could have been lesser with better edition. (c) Is Olga the Lockridge sisters' nanny, or the mother of Mrs. Lockridge's husband since she is called grandmother by Jenny. (d) Why Jenny calls Laura and Leigh "aunt"? The special effects are poor, but acceptable for a low-budget TV movie. My vote is six.
Title (Brazil): "A Maldição da Viúva Negra" ("The Curse of the Black Widow")
"Curse of the Black Widow" is an American TV Movie from 1977 with a kind of tribute the sci-fi films from the 50's. The story is not bad, with many details and twists, and certainly attracts the fans of these old movies. There are some silly and confusing things that could have been improved, as follows: (a) The last name of the family is "Lockridge", but the film credits and IMDb write "Lockwood" instead. (b) The successive fade-out for the insertion of TV commercial is annoying and could have been lesser with better edition. (c) Is Olga the Lockridge sisters' nanny, or the mother of Mrs. Lockridge's husband since she is called grandmother by Jenny. (d) Why Jenny calls Laura and Leigh "aunt"? The special effects are poor, but acceptable for a low-budget TV movie. My vote is six.
Title (Brazil): "A Maldição da Viúva Negra" ("The Curse of the Black Widow")