To Demonstrate How Spiders Fly

{{Short description|1909 film by F. Percy Smith}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2025}}

{{Use British English|date=June 2016}}

{{Infobox film

| name = To Demonstrate How Spiders Fly

| image = ToDemonstrateHowSpidersFly.jpg

| caption = Screenshot from the film

| director = F. Percy Smith

| producer =

| writer =

| narrator =

| starring =

| cinematography =

| editing =

| studio = Kineto

| distributor = Charles Urban Trading Company

| released = {{film date|df=yes|1909||}}

| runtime = 58 secs

| country = United Kingdom

| language = Silent

| budget =

}}

To Demonstrate How Spiders Fly is a 1909 British animated short silent documentary film, directed by F. Percy Smith, featuring a close-up of an animated model spider throwing its silken thread to take to the air. The film features "the first of several animated creatures to appear in Smith's films", and according to Jenny Hammerton of BFI Screenonline was made in the belief, "that he could cure people of their fear of spiders by showing them blown up images of their eight legged foes on the cinema screen."{{cite web |title=To Demonstrate How Spiders Fly (1909) |first=Jenny |last=Hammerton |url=http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/594353/index.html |work=BFI Screenonline |date= |access-date=2011-04-24 }}{{cite web |title=To Demonstrate How Spiders Fly (1909) |first=Alex |last=Davidson |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKPbxcK58aI |work=BFIfilms YouTube channel |date= 8 April 2010|access-date=2011-04-24 }}