Venom: Let There Be Carnage * (2021, Tom Hardy, Woody Harrelson, Michelle Williams, Naomie Harris, Reid Scott, Stephen Graham, Peggy Lu) – Movie Review

The 2021 Anglo-American Marvel Comics superhero film Venom: Let There Be Carnage is the very unwelcome sequel to the 2018 Venom. It is nasty, British and short, and aggressively violent, making it no fun at all, and just plain boring. A bunch of talented middle-aged actors desperately try to give the dead-on-arrival script the kiss of life, and the handsome-looking production is a riot of CGI and motion-capture technology, with an imaginative comic-book look. But it is all to no avail.

Tom Hardy stars as lethal vigilante Eddie Brock, who understandably struggles as the host of the alien symbiote Venom, while Woody Harrelson plays serial killer Cletus Kasady, who escapes from a failed execution in prison after becoming the host of the symbiote Carnage, a spawn of Venom. Brock has taken a leaf out of The Silence of the Lambs book by interviewing serial killer Cletus in prison. First the two spar, and later the two battle it out, leading to a prolonged (violent) CG end fight in a church where Cletus is planning to wed Frances Barrison (Naomie Harris).

The whole problem is the underdeveloped, muddled, derivative screenplay by Kelly Marcel, based on her story written with Tom Hardy. It’s not really a story at all, just a premise and a temporary ending, infuriatingly inconclusive and (oh, no!) setting up a third episode and a link to Spider-Man. The screenplay lacks wit, invention and ingenuity. It is just a peg to hang Tom Hardy’s rather dreary Eddie Brock character on, with his daft alter ego issues, and as a showcase for the mountain of work it offers the brilliant CG artists. There lies the film’s sole invention and cleverness.

The actors do their best with what is offered, which is so very little. Hardy plays it like it is a proper acting gig, Shakespeare or something. Harrelson is in a different film, giving his usual crazed redneck performance another workout. Harris and Michelle Williams as Brock’s ex-fiancée Anne Weying are lost and wasted. Stephen Graham is miscast as detective Patrick Mulligan. The best performance comes from Peggy Lu, reprising her role as convenience store owner Mrs Chen from the first film.

Andy Serkis was hired as director partly because of his experience working with CGI and motion-capture technology. It was shot at Leavesden Studios in England from November 2019 to February 2020, with additional filming in San Francisco in February.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Movie Review

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