Venom: The Last Dance
The journalist Eddie Brock and the wise-cracking fiend are united a third time for another helping of CGI and destruction.
Two for the price of one: Tom Hardy
Image courtesy of Sony Pictures.
If nothing else, the CGI is impressive – even if it still looks like CGI. Which leaves the human component, this time embodied by a hippie family in a camper van headed for Area 51 in Nevada – the ‘secret’ headquarters of the United States Air Force and its attendant experiments with UFO phenomena. Rhys Ifans plays the bearded, vegan paterfamilias who cares for the diet and future of his young son and daughter, yet is willing to risk their welfare by poking his nose into the operations of the US airbase. The family’s campfire song is Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’ (“Ground Control to Major Tom/Your circuit’s dead, there's something wrong…”), a heart-warming moment, prompting Venom to gush, “I love a singalong!”. The good news for the hippie clan is that Venom recognises their decency and expresses no interest in eating them. Because Venom needs to eat people in order to fuel his spectacular pyrotechnics and feats of derring-do.
For those unfamiliar with the antics of Venom, he is an extraterrestrial who sounds like James Earl Jones on three packs a day and has possessed the body of the investigative journalist Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy). They are a vaudeville double-act in one, a Jekyll and Hyde who are learning to co-exist in one body, if not the same temperament. Together, they harbour an intergalactic codex, or portal, with the capacity to unleash the chains of the preternaturally evil Knull (Andy Serkis), the “slicer of worlds” and potential slayer of cosmic harmony. The codex also acts as a tracker device so that Knull’s hideous and hideously destructive foot soldiers, the Xenophages, can find Eddie and Venom and steal the codex. Meanwhile, thanks to the miracles of facial recognition, Eddie is also being trailed by the cops and the US army, the latter headed by the trigger-happy Rex Strickland (Chiwetel Ejiofor). It’s complicated – and looking increasing dangerous for Eddie, who just wants to get to New York to clear his name.
Under the direction of Kelly Marcel, Venom: The Last Dance – the third chapter in the franchise – cannot be faulted for a lack of pace, or for a dark streak of sick humour. The Xenophages could hardly be more disgusting or uglier creatures, prompting the thought of how interesting it might have been if the alien threat had been less obviously grotesque. But, as we’ve known all along, all alien life is repugnant to our human eyes. Thus, The Last Dance succumbs to a number of familiar tropes, its endless display of death and destruction becoming as wearisome as it did the first two times around. One should be grateful, though, for the employment of the thousands of CGI animators and “visualization artists”, along with the opportunity for so many English actors. The five main protagonists are all portrayed by British players utilising American accents, proving yet another welcome payday for Hollywood’s busiest recruit, the dialect coach Elizabeth Himelstein (who recently toiled away on Kinds of Kindness, Heart of Stone, The Apprentice and the upcoming Snow White, Saturday Night, On Swift Horses and Unstoppable). And with a stellar soundtrack that includes David Bowie, Queen, Abba, Maroon 5, Post Malone and Cat Stevens, it's reassuring to know that the $120 million budget didn’t entirely go on the special effects.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Tom Hardy, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Juno Temple, Rhys Ifans, Stephen Graham, Peggy Lu, Clark Backo, Alanna Ubach, Cristo Fernández, Jared Abrahamson, Hala Finley, Dash McCloud, Andy Serkis, Reid Scott.
Dir Kelly Marcel, Pro Avi Arad, Matt Tolmach, Amy Pascal, Kelly Marcel, Tom Hardy and Hutch Parker, Screenplay Kelly Marcel, from a story by Tom Hardy and Kelly Marcel, Ph Fabian Wagner, Pro Des Chris Lowe, Ed Mark Sanger, Music Dan Deacon, Costumes Daniel Orlandi, Sound Ando Johnson, Matt Hall and Tim Walston, Dialect coach Elizabeth Himelstein.
Columbia Pictures/Marvel Entertainment/Arad Productions/Matt Tolmach Productions/Pascal Pictures/TSG Entertainment/Hutch Parker Entertainment/Hardy Son & Baker-Sony Pictures.
108 mins. USA. 2024. UK and US Rel: 25 October 2024. Cert. 15.
