Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021 | USA | 90 minutes | Andy Serkis)
At its best when it’s at its most absurd, Venom: Let There Be Carnage makes the most of the Tom Hardy and Venom romance when it doesn’t get bogged down in superhero tedium. You just wish it would let them fully commit and make out already. Instead, it is a film in tension with itself as it wants to let loose and go crazy yet still keeps itself regrettably reined in.
The fact that there is another Venom movie after the first one is something to unironically celebrate. The first was so bizarre and strange that it was hard to not just be won over by how bonkers it all was. Most notably, Hardy as Eddie Brock gave a committed and appropriately over the top performance. It picks up where the first film ended after Brock had taken down the bio-engineering corporation Life Foundation that was unethically testing the symbiotes on human subjects and trying to bring them all back to take over the planet. Brock still is dealing with the consequences of that after he had many wild episodes. While there is nothing quite like Hardy’s brilliant scene that ended with him jumping in a lobster tank in this one, he still shows he is more than game for the more raucous aspects of playing a man bonded with a violent, abrasive symbiote.
The story itself is regrettably tiresome and one that often detracts from the central relationship between Brock and Venom.
When the movie picks up, Brock is back in a rough spot after the fallout from the accusations he made in the first movie damaged his standing as a journalist. Brief aside: his portrayal as a journalist here almost feels like a joke in of itself because of how far off base it is from what the actual work requires. Anyways, his luck turns around when he gets the serial killer Cletus Kasady (a wonderfully weird Woody Harrelson) to sit down for an exclusive interview. In the process, he is able to piece together where the locations of various bodies Kasady buried are hidden to get the big scoop.
This launches him back into the limelight, signified by how he’s now riding around town on a new bright red Ducati and that Kasady has been condemned to death. Big boy motorcycle man will still have to worry about a looming threat from the serial killer, who got his own symbiote by biting Brock on the hand and consuming his alien-infected blood. He will also have to deal with relationship problems with both Venom and his ex-wife Anne, played by Michelle Williams, who showed up far longer than I expected. As these crises blow up in his face, the question becomes whether Brock will be able to stop Kasady from wreaking havoc and reconnect with those he loves.
If this sounds gloriously silly, it definitely is. The schtick between Brock and Venom could never be called the most clever of humor, though it just is so ridiculously unique to see such a talented actor going for scenes that border on surrealist slapstick. The surrealism mainly comes from the fact that you almost can’t believe what you’re seeing. Points for creativity in having Hardy, who gets a story credit, spend a significant amount of time arguing with Venom over his refusal to eat chickens because he considers them friends. They bicker like a married couple and if there was anyone involved in the making of this film with real courage, they would make the entire story only about that.
Even though that relationship can’t make the movie “good” in the conventional sense, at least it is memorable for how completely off the wall it gets. There are just so many scenes that are hard to believe that they’re really going for it, including a moment where I thought Venom would begin rapping, that you only wish they would really let loose. The rest of the actual film, however, is far more typical. The bonkers nature running through the film is unfortunately calculated to be in balance with a more straightforward and restrained story that really begins to drag.
Those who really enjoyed the more wacky aspects of the prior film and are looking forward to more of them here may be somewhat disappointed. There are still a lot of good bits, though they still end up feeling like just that: small pieces of a less engaging whole. The rest of the film gets stuck in the increasingly generic formula of the superhero genre. From the need to create an antagonist that is a mirror of the protagonist to the CGI mess of a battle at the end, it all just is far less interesting than the silly sequences. The film does make the smart decision to ensure you can better tell apart Venom and Carnage, one is black while the other is red, though it still is just a mess of a finale.
If you are willing to overlook those aspects and get through the slop, then the rest of the film is a treat.
As the film plods toward a finale, it feels like it suddenly wants you to take it quite seriously by giving Kasady a tragic backstory with Frances Barrison/Shriek, played by Naomie Harris who seems to have a good time. This, too, just ends up being wrapped up so tidily and without any narrative significance that it feels like an afterthought. The film does seem to have a degree of awareness about this: at one point Venom says “fuck this guy” when a woefully sappy emotional line is said out of no where. Still, the storyline just feels out of place and far too serious for what it was going for.
The film just won’t fully commit to embracing the more absurd potential of its source material and lean into being an unrestrained campy journey. Give us a couples’ road trip with Brock and Venom. Have them get up to wacky adventures just the two of them. The unfortunate reality is no amount of schtick can shake off the Marvel malaise.
Without a willingness to fully go for all that more goofy stuff, Venom: Let There Be Carnage only toes the line when it should have completely jumped over it. The conclusion ends up feeling like it could have been lifted from any other generic superhero movie. That is a shame, as it is an enigma that best deserves the chance to open its wings and soar. This film comes close, though it never quite reaches the zenith that we all could have hoped for.
Venom: Let There Be Carnage is in theaters on October 1.