A Not-So-Venomous Review

A review of Venom by Tejas Raghuram

Venom is a comic-book film directed by Ruben Fleischer, starring Tom Hardy as Venom. The story follows Eddie Brock who is an investigative reporter at a TV network. He becomes infected with an alien symbiote while investigating the questionable dealings of a large and evil corporation.

Michelle Williams plays his love interest Anne Weying, and Riz Ahmed plays the villainous billionaire Carlton Drake. Venom is a fun action movie that delivers exactly what it wants to: a fun, breakneck-paced and action-filled ride. While it does not have an extremely compelling story, that isn’t the purpose of the film. What it does have is thrilling action sequences, excellent humor, and a fantastic performance from its main star Tom Hardy. All of these things considered, I had to give this film a relatively positive review.

However, my perception of the film was not positive at the start. Despite the films incredibly fast pace, the entire first half is quite dull. This is not to say that nothing happens, but what does happen is not all that interesting. In the first act, we are introduced to one of the many symbiotes (creatures like Venom himself) that appear in the movie. Aside from a few short flashbacks, the movie just ignores these symbiotes until right before the ending.

In addition, the movie does not do a good enough job of fleshing out any of its characters as well as I would have liked throughout the film. However, there is one exception to that, and that is our protagonist Eddie Brock. His introduction is actually pretty interesting, as the movie does a good job of informing the audience of who he is and what his life is like.

Tom Hardy’s Eddie Brock is one of the best parts of the film. Going into the movie, I was most interested to see Tom Hardy as the head-chomping, gut-spilling Venom.

When I first heard that a there would be a standalone Venom film coming out soon, my first thought was “No Spider-Man? No way!” But upon hearing that Tom Hardy was cast as the lead, my interest in the film rose dramatically. After watching the film, I can definitely say that he delivered one of his best performances in his acting career.  The dynamic between his Eddie Brock and the Venom symbiote was easily the best part of the film for me.

Hardy really sells the fact that there is a thing talking to him inside his head, and it really made the movie fun to watch. The two of them have some really funny exchanges throughout the film, and it gives the film a lot of really comedic moments. It just seems like Hardy had a lot of fun in the role, and this makes his performance in the film a joy to watch.

Even though Venom sports a talented cast, the film is really Tom Hardy’s movie, as none of the other cast members are anywhere near as good as him. Michelle Williams is fine as his love interest, a woman named Annie Weying. Aside from having a terrible wig, she is interesting enough, and Williams does a good job with what she is given.

William, sadly, just does not really get that much to do, as she spends most of the film running around after Brock and the Venom symbiote.  She also suffers a bit from the Lois Lane syndrome: the ability for her to instantaneously appear wherever the plot requires her to be. That being said, she does have two great moments, with one being in the final fight of the movie when she saves Venom and the other being the surprise debut of She-Venom, when the Venom symbiote takes her over.

Riz Ahmed, on the other hand, is a boring, bland and most definitely miscast villain for Venom and Eddie to go up against. Ahmed’s character Carlton Drake mirrors Jeff Bridges’s Obadiah Stane in Iron Man, as he is the head of a massive corporation that is involved in illicit offscreen projects. Similar to Obadiah Stane, by the end of the film, Carlton Drake has a similar suit and the exact same powers as the protagonist.

Drake’s motivations are never fully fleshed out, and once the symbiote named “Riot” takes control of him, he just becomes a typical evil alien bent on world domination. While Ahmed does a good job in the role, he is not given very much to work with. Script constraints aside, he also doesn’t look like the type of person who would play the head of a multi-billion-dollar corporation.

Aside from the limited performance of most of the cast, Venom’s character is never unlocked in terms of the overall gore the film could have had. A major part of Venom’s character is that he likes to eat people, and this movie does not do very much of that. A major criticism many have levelled against Venom is that the action sequences are not gory enough. The film does show Venom eating people, but it just cuts away at the last second to show someone else’s reaction to it rather than actually showing Venom ingesting the person.

Many have attributed the problem to the film’s PG-13 rating. However, I did not find this to be much of a problem at all. Most of the action was thoroughly entertaining, with the standout scene being the chase through the streets of San Francisco leading to the fight with the SWAT team at Eddie’s TV network building. It was well shot and directed, and was really easy to follow.

Again, another part of what made the action so entertaining was the dynamic between Brock and the symbiote, which was just really fun. This is a very good thing, as almost the entire second half of the film is pure action. Thankfully, most of that action is well directed and very fun to watch. The one exception to this, though, is the final fight between the Venom symbiote and the Riot symbiote. Venom suffers from the same thing that most modern superhero movies do, and that is the third act CGI fest. Wonder Woman suffered from it, Black Panther suffered from it, and now Venom suffers from it as well.

The fight between the two symbiotes is extremely hard to follow and has little to no sense of geography. During the fight, they magically transport from one location to the other, with little or no explanation as to how they did so. If executed a little better, this fight could have been something really enticing to watch, and a great way to explore the power set of both symbiotes. However, it ended up just being a boxing match between two characters with extremely similar power sets.

Venom, although predictable and CGI-infested, is carried by Tom hardy’s commendable performance as Venom. If you are on the fence about whether to watch this one or not, you should. It is a fun, family-friendly superhero film, with little story and lots of great action and comedy. While the villain is pretty cut and dry and the third act is really CGI heavy, the excellent chase through San Francisco and the interplay between Eddie and the Venom symbiote really do make up for all of the movie’s faults.