Logan Sork Film Reviews
Venom
Venom is among one of the most popular Spider-man villains of all time. He has appeared before in Sam Raimi’s film Spiderman 3, but many people saw it as a watered-down version of the character. When it was announced that he’d be receiving his own solo film, many people were excited, I was skeptical however. How can you make a movie based on a villain whose origin is tied to the hero who won’t be featured in said film? Apparently, it’s to make the movie over the top, make insanely weird choices and put the film in an almost so bad it’s good territory. Watching this movie has been one of the most fun experiences I’ve had in a long time. Though the film itself isn’t all that good, the performances, effects, dialogue and bi-polar tone helps to elevate what should be a bad movie to the level of guilty pleasure.
Venom is directed by Rueben Fleisher and star Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock, a journalist who’s more concerned with rooting out evil than playing by the rules. Brock is investigating Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), head of the life foundation, whose experimenting with symbiotic organisms trying to improve humanity. His investigation results in his fiancé Anne (Michelle Williams) leaving him and losing his job. Seeking revenge, he breaks into Drake’s lab where he is exposed to the symbiote Venom, who speaks to Brock through their connection. They must work together in order to stop Drake from taking over the world with his new symbiotes.
What helps Venom be an entertaining film instead of a bad one is the performances. Tom Hardy’s dual performance as both Brock and the voice of Venom is the best element of the film. He really does manage to pull off being two completely different characters rather than the same person, all done with the change of his voice. The level of commitment to the roles is something that all the actors excel in. Both Michelle Williams and Riz Ahmed are given horrible dialogue and character traits, but they own every second of it.
The film’s tone and comedy are so bizarre it’s kind of amazing. The film goes from being extremely serious and attempting to be thought provoking to a scene that’s straight out a gross out comedy to a body horror type with the symbiotes. The fluctuating tone shouldn’t work but somehow it just does for this movie in particular, it’s almost remarkable. The comedy is also something I neve expected to come out of this film. I don’t really read the comic concerning this character, but I never in a million years thought that a movie based on Venom would be so hilarious. Again, it’s so bizarre it’s kind of amazing. However, those who want their tones to remain consistent in film should probably avoid this film at all costs. The visual effects are surprisingly good for a film like this, with the titular character coming to life beautifully on the big screen.
Despite the film’s absurdness making up for the more slacking elements of the film, there are still some major problems with this movie. The film has an extremely slow opening act. For almost 30 minutes of the film’s run time I was bored out of my mind, good thing the rest of the film was so absurd because this would’ve been painful to watch. The film’s editing is also very lazy, cutting to multiple angles that were unnecessary in certain scenes. There was also a focus on the villain symbiote as it travelled from Malaysia to San Francisco, a sub plot that detracted from the interactions between Brock and Venom, the highlight of the entire film. The action scenes were also serviceable at best. There was really nothing that set them apart from other action superhero films.
This film is bad and there’s no getting around it. Its tone is confusing, the comedy is weird, the technical elements are mixed at best, there’s just no getting around that this movie is bad… but it’s the good bad. The kind of bad where you laugh with the movie, not at it. It’s a relic from the 90’s that found its way to today. It knows to have fun with itself and provides an experience that is absolutely bonkers from start to finish, resulting in a bad movie, that is oh so fun to watch.
6.5/10