Curse of the Black Widow is a 1977 American made-for-television horror film directed by Dan Curtis and starring Tony Franciosa, Donna Mills, Patty Duke, Vic Morrow and June Allyson.

For the past four years, Los Angeles has been terrorized by a series of mysterious murders, in which several men have been found dead with huge puncture wounds in their chests.

Mark does some digging and finds out that Lieutenant Gully Conti, who is leading the investigation, knows who the culprit is, but is covering up details.

Mark eventually gets in touch with a former bartender who saw one of the murders, who tells him that at least one man was killed by a man-sized black widow spider.

Checking further, he finds out that Leigh and Laura's father died in a plane crash several years ago, and one of the girls was nearly bitten to death by spiders.

Mark finds out that the plane landed in an old vineyard owned by the Lockwoods, and meets an aging Native American who found the girls.

The Native American says that according to an old legend, some women are affected by an ancient curse passed through the female line.

During the full moon, these women turn into giant spiders in times of stress, kill their victims, encase them in webbing and feed on them.

These women have a red hourglass-shaped birthmark on their abdomens, similar to those found on black widow spiders.

She has long suffered from multiple personality disorder; Valerie is the expression of her feelings of inadequacy compared to Leigh.

Videohound's Golden Movie Retriever's Jim Craddock rated the film a mixed score of two out of four bones.

Deal then went on to note that, while the film was reasonably entertaining, its "meandering story" and 'forced sense of legitimacy' proved detrimental to its overall success.

[7] Fraser A. Sherman felt that the film was reasonably well-made and favorably compared it to director Curtis' previous work, The Night Stalker, while also criticizing some of Curse's over-the-top and unanswered plot elements.