Gonger Reviews: Venom

Venom (2018)

Starring: Tom Hardy, Michelle Williams, Riz Ahmed, Jenny Slate, Reid Scott and Scott Haze.

Synopsis: Let’s see... what’s this movie about? Well, uh, basically: Eddie Brock is a loo-hoo-hoozer! And Venom is a loo-hoo-hoozer! Together they’re a couple of loo-hoo-hoozers!

Acting: So it turns out Hardy can act even with his face being partially covered. He’s pretty good in this one. My only issue is how he portrayed Brock and Venom but I think that has to do with the way this thing was written. Ultimately, I bought the performance. But it is wrong so I’ll get into that in a bit. Michelle Williams has a surprisingly strong performance. I say ‘surprisingly’ because the character is written pretty hollow. It just goes to show what real talent can do under the circumstances. I really liked Ahmeds Drake but they should have saved him for the sequel villain if you ask me. Then again, it’s like, whatever! They screwed this up so I’m not so keen on checking out the next one anyway! Jenny Slate is really good too, even though she’s a little under utilized. Venom had a great cast but they’re each undersold and that’s a shame. Thats going to be 2/2 Gonger points! (That’s what we call them now: Gonger points! Most valuable currency in the solar system... and beyond...)

Editing: This flick jumps around like a House of Pain song. Jump up, jump in, please let me begin to talk about the editing. The beginning just drags. It’s like, what do you pay to see for a Venom movie? Oh I dunno, uh, a Venom perhaps? So get to it! The colour grading is pretty, though, so there’s that. In it’s defence, the run time is alright even considering the start. I don’t know. It’s alright and it sucks. 1/2 

Cinematography: Matthew Libatique is known for capturing some unique and stunning visuals... but not here. I don’t know if it’s his fault though because the vision is a little uninspiring. Kinda seems like he mailed it in. The lighting is on point, though! Except for the CGI ending which was way to dark! I actually spaced during the climax because of this and I really don’t remember how the villain was dispatched. 0.5/2

Directing: If I were a betting man (I am) I’d say Ruben Fleischer was completely asleep at the wheel for this flick (he was)! It’s so uninspired and pretty boring as a result, except for some action scenes. Now I say this but he is going to get partial credit for using the setting of San Fran for its ultimate purpose as a city: CAR CHASES! As soon as I saw that Golden Gate Bridge I knew we would get one heck of a Dirty Harry car jumping jam ram! The CGI kinda messed it up, though so... 0.5/2

Writing: Wrong. It’s just wrong. Not in a burn-it-with-fire kind of way or anything but they had some of the best source material in the comic and they managed to screw it up. Let me explain, as the Venom saga is one in which I am very well versed . You see, we can’t have Venom without Spiderman. Eddie Brock blames Spiderman for his fall as a reporter and the symbiote hates Spiderman for rejecting it. Brock and the Alien find each other and whammo! You got yer self a Venom! And a reason for everything. “But Gonger,” you say, “This is a new vision. Can’t we take some liberties?” Sure can, sister, but you still have to have purpose in the plot. So let’s forget the bastardization of the source material and talk about atmosphere. This flick plays like a buddy cop movie when it clearly wants to be a horror. Bottle it up and do an Alien (1979)-type flick where the symbiote joins with Eddie in the lab and everyone has to escape or die and we can get the Venom character development watching Eddie slowly lose his mind. Ok, so I’m not some big Hollywood writer but that seems like the movie we should have got. It’s almost like the studio executives kicked open the writers room door and said “Look here, see! We need a Venom script by lunch time and I don’t wanna have no guff from non of ya! See!” It’s just too big and the peg just needs to fit the hole. It’s just more of the same and we keep buying it. Well, not this time kids! 0/2

4/10 I’m being generous. Or I don’t wanna do math today. You be the judge.