Venom

Venom is getting a lot of hate so far, because critics on RottenTomatoes gave it an average rating of only 4.3, but on IMDB it's a rather satisfactory 7.0, so again it looks like the audience is mostly satisfied, only the critics are grumbling, but they always do when it's not a sophisticated drama, musical or cheap indie. Personally I wasn't expecting much, but Ruben Fleischer, director of Zombieland and Gangster Squad, has once again pleasantly surprised me. It's a shame it’s not R-rated, but it still looks pretty gritty and dark even without the blood. The opening half hour is slightly slower, but once Tom Hardy meets Venom (the scene in the lab is atmospherically horrific), the film becomes an action adrenaline ride to the end that doesn't let off the gas. Tom Hardy's performance is different than ever before and he's surprisingly very funny, and those who like the guy will like him even more after this. Venom's voice is also great and his looks are perfect. The action is great, even though it often takes place in the dark, it's still suspenseful, gritty enough and with decent cinematography. So my only criticisms are the mediocre villain and the rather underwhelming finale, but I had a great time and that's what comic-book movies are all about. Woody Harrelson as Carnage is going to be awesome. The theater was packed, I hope the film succeeds financially. 75% (10/04/2018)

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. (10/24/2019)

One of Marvel's most interesting characters finally made it to the silver screen, but it deserved a better story, a little better execution, and overall better care. Such an entertaining, strong and hard-nosed antihero could have been handled much better than waiting a third of the film, getting to know him a third and then lurking in front of a green screen for a while. Hardy does a decent job in the role of a weird journalist, but his digital counterpart is considerably worse. Boring. 20 minutes in, and you know how it's going to end, and of course there's going to be a final battle, because you usually can't do without that in comic book adaptations these days. So predictable. (01/07/2019)

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. (10/06/2018)

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). (10/10/2018)