Directed by:
Ruben FleischerCinematography:
Matthew LibatiqueComposer:
Ludwig GöranssonCast:
Tom Hardy, Michelle Williams, Riz Ahmed, Jenny Slate, Woody Harrelson, Michelle Lee, Sope Aluko, Reid Scott, Scott Haze, Mac Brandt, Jane McNeill, Wayne Pére (more)VOD (4)
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Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) becomes the host for the alien symbiote Venom. As a journalist, Eddie has been trying to take down the notorious founder of the Life Foundation, genius Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed) – and that obsession ruined his career and his relationship with his girlfriend, Anne Weying (Michelle Williams). Upon investigating one of Drake’s experiments, the alien Venom merges with Eddie’s body, and he suddenly has incredible new superpowers, as well as the chance to do just about whatever he wants. Twisted, dark, unpredictable, and fueled by rage, Venom leaves Eddie wrestling to control dangerous abilities that he also finds empowering and intoxicating. As Eddie and Venom need each other to get what they’re looking for, they become more and more intertwined — where does Eddie end and Venom begin? (Sony Pictures)
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Reviews (16)
Hardy looked like a village idiot on the poster, but the poor guy also had to act like one in the film. For the first half of the movie, Brock is just a regular asshole who gets what he deserves and only later gains Hardy’s pleasant nature, which is boosted by a symbiote. The main problem with this film is the screenplay, which is full of holes and lots of the material also got cut out! Lapses in logic, characters with strange motivations and only a few good lines. Luckily, Fleischer concentrated on Venom himself, who is really cool, even though he’s a lot different than in the comic book. Even his baffling heroic behavior doesn’t present any problem. The action is decent, though it's a bit hard to follow – everything blends into the darkness (it must be awful in 3D) – and there’s not enough of it. Michelle Williams’ acting is plain bad and the evil Indian as a twisted variation on Elon Musk doesn’t have any ground to stand on in his transformation. Harlson and his ugly hairstyle are just funny more than anything else. There are too few jokes about eating people. The post-credits scene is asking for a fist to the face. We are not amused; we are disappointed. I want to feed! BEWARE: THIS ISN’T A MARVEL MOVIE, just a character bought from Marvel (and I hope that Sony gives it back soon).
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Hardy would be funny even if he played a used roll of toilet paper. This is true even in a film that is written and composed as cumbersomely as Venom. Something is being prepared for a very long time and quite illogically, then everything is revealed and resolved very quickly. The disobedient film works thanks to Hardy's charm. But it is on pretty thin ice.
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I would like to say that in places Tom Hardy acts as poorly as Ben Affleck in Daredevil or Edward Norton in The Incredible Hulk, but that wouldn't be true. His performance is much closer to Nicolas Cage in Ghost Rider. In places it’s so bad that it's fun. I really wasn't sure if Hardy was grimacing because it's supposed to be funny, or because it's supposed to be serious (but in doing so, it's just inadvertently funny). The film is not terrible, but it is no gem either. I didn't mind at all, for example, that it didn't splash blood and heads were not flying, I much prefer it when filmmakers work with hints. The action scenes were quite solid (especially the one with the tactical unit) and the villain was also decent. Worse, however, was that everything in Venom seemed terribly hurried, and when the “grand finale" came, I almost didn't recognize it.
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Everything good about this movie is actually thanks to Tom Hardy. This Marvel movie would have ended up in the abyss of history without Tom Hardy and nobody would have ever remembered it. In this way, however, it’s a decent introduction of a new character of the Marvel universe, but it pays brutally for the naïve screenplay. While I accepted the fact that Venom is actually a distant cousin of the Goa'ulds from Stargate SG-1, I really struggled with accepting the simplicity of the screenplay, according to which the tired and disappointed Tom Hardy meets with his buddy Venom. Riz Ahmed isn’t a completely dignified adversary for Venom either; he’s rather an easy ticket into our world, which he surprisingly grew to like. Being a crazy scientist is quite a popular topic which doesn’t get old easily. What could get old are the typical tropes Marvel is already full of. Thankfully, Venom is strong because of Tom Hardy and even Venom himself understood that. And at least because of that I have a reason to look forward to the next installment.
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To begin with, I certainly acknowledge the fury of the viewers who are comic-book fans and have a tendency to whine whenever their favourite hero in a film picks their nose with the wrong hand. The PG13 rating is of course a big punch in the dick of everyone with a long relationship with Venom, and I certainly understand that a buddy comedy doesn’t fit well with horror with a cosmic parasite, but whatever. Fortunately, I was able to accept the fact that this would not be about fate, thick atmosphere and stylish kills, so I dulled my brain and had great fun. I don’t agree at all with the opinions that the beginning is slower than a week at school. On the contrary, the pace is nice, the humour is not toe-curling, Hardy is great from the start and it was nice for a change to see a pure and unpretentious comic-book flick not overwhelmed with CGI sets or dozens of characters. Surely, I could probably point out to the oversimplification of the relationships between the characters or the continuity of the twists (it’s clear that they cut out a lot), but I was all the more impressed that even on this lighter and more straightforward level, the film works just fine, clearly fleshes out the characters' motives and just doesn't bore. The interaction between Venom and Eddie is a prank that the creators deliver well and at the right moments – and a lot of the credit goes to the excellent Hardy, whom I like a bit more now, and honestly I can think of only one other actor who would entertain me so much with his lively performance in every film, Jack Nicholson he’s called (though I don’t want to compare, no way). 70%, and I’m taking down a star after some time, it’s not that well executed and unfortunately, it’s not bad enough to be worthy of a guilty 4*.
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