Venom (Ruben Fleischer, 2018)

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Ribs
Joined: Fri Jun 13, 2014 1:14 pm

Re: Comic Books on Film

#1 Post by Ribs » Thu Mar 16, 2017 7:25 pm

Sony will release Venom in October 2018, jumping on a date vacated by Aquaman which moved back to jump on a date vacated by Avatar 2

The story here as most people are weirdly taking it away seems to be "oh my god so sudden!" as though Deadpool wasn't commissioned almost entirely off the success of Kingsman the previous February, and Logan was almost entirely developed following Deadpool's success.

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captveg
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#2 Post by captveg » Thu Mar 16, 2017 7:53 pm

Sony jumping on the vacated 10/5/18 date with Venom begs more the question about just what it is more than anything else. I figured it was another year off further than that. But a good date is a good date, so hope it's a well done film.

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dx23
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#3 Post by dx23 » Thu Mar 16, 2017 11:11 pm

Well, Venom is a different thing though. Kingsman, Deadpool and Logan are their own thing and basically don't need the help of another main character to exist. For those unknown to Venom's backstory, he's a character whose origin is intrinsically tied up with Spider-Man. People expected Marvel to have a say on Spider-Man and all the related characters, since Spidey, played now by Tom Holland, is part of the large scale Marvel Cinematic Universe. I don't see how Tom Holland will be able to take part on being part of a Venom film when he has like 3 other projects including Avengers: Infinity War.

A Venom movie from Sony so soon could be a big mistake due to them not using Spider-Man, or even worse, doing their own origin/backstory instead of using the source material and creating something more along the lines of Halle Berry's Catwoman instead of the product people are familiar with. Seeing how Sony fucked up Spider-Man 3, 2 Ghost Rider films, I don't have too much faith in them coming out with a good Venom film.

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Ribs
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#4 Post by Ribs » Fri Mar 17, 2017 12:01 am

I think it's fairly clear that this will be its own thing, with Venom probably in space or something doing some gritty, likely R-rated adventures to emulate the X-Men success. Venom in the comics is obviously tied directly to Spider-Man but there's a way to do that in a way that doesn't directly tie him to Spider-Man when adapting it; if Sony's goal is to build their own cinematic universe of tertiary Spider-Man properties that they have full control/profit on, they'll do what they can to keep it distant whilst capitalizing on what they can without giving Marvel a chunk of the change.

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dx23
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#5 Post by dx23 » Fri Mar 17, 2017 10:08 am

I feel like Marvel may be behind this after all. Marvel just announced a big Venom event in the comic books for 2017 and the return of Eddie Brock (the character's original host) is being heavily rumored. The way this can go for Sony is by having a movie based on Venom vs Carnage.

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domino harvey
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#6 Post by domino harvey » Wed Sep 27, 2017 8:19 pm

Michelle Williams (!) to co-star in Venom -- well, we all saw that coming

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Luke M
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#7 Post by Luke M » Tue Apr 24, 2018 10:06 pm


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Big Ben
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#8 Post by Big Ben » Tue Apr 24, 2018 10:14 pm

My familiarity with Venom comes from the media I consumed as a boy and I'm unsure how they're going to work that sardonic humor into a film like this. I certainly expect it to be goofy in spots but I'm quite confident that won't carry the film. I'm under the impression that this is also going to be R-rated (The information when it was announced was murky as hell.) so I'm wondering now if they're going to piggyback on Deadpool just a bit and try to be darkly humorous while Venom is eating people.

How many films is Tom Hardy up to now where his face and or voice is obscured/distorted?

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Luke M
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#9 Post by Luke M » Tue Apr 24, 2018 10:30 pm

Venom/Eddie Brock story is dependent on Spider-Man so it seems they have their work cut out for them in rewriting his origin from scratch.

Deadpool was funny from the first trailer I’m not sure this one shares the same ambition.

Maybe Hardy has a thing for masks?

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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#10 Post by McCrutchy » Tue Oct 02, 2018 2:00 am


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Never Cursed
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#11 Post by Never Cursed » Wed Oct 03, 2018 1:16 am

Venom has been received pretty harshly by critics and is on track to be the worst-reviewed superhero movie since Suicide Squad, which it is only two points above on Rotten Tomatoes.

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domino harvey
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Venom (Ruben Fleischer, 2018)

#12 Post by domino harvey » Wed Oct 03, 2018 1:59 am

Probably worth mentioning that the bad reviews are viciously bad, describing the audience laughing nonstop at unintentionally funny moments and more than one critic saying it will be the next Wicker Man remake. Apparently Hardy also makes out with the symbiote at one point WTF? Maybe this, not Life Itself, is this year's Book of Henry

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tenia
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#13 Post by tenia » Wed Oct 03, 2018 4:21 am

The last time I remember about a such a debacle for a super hero related movie was... Suicide Squad. And we all know the quality level of this one...
Here is a movie that spent months being marketed as a grim R-rated Tom Hardy starring super hero movie, which is now being schizophrenically marketed as a family PG-13 movie that even Tom Hardy bashes for the scenes deleted from it and get reframed by a co-actor straight on a promo interview.
At least, it setup the expectations right.

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Dr Amicus
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#14 Post by Dr Amicus » Wed Oct 03, 2018 4:31 am

It may be a PG-13 in the States, but it's ended up as a 15 in the UK. I'm really surprised Sony didn't cut it to make it a 12 (the default for just about every superhero film over here - even the extended Batman Vs Superman remained a 12, unlike the R it had in the States)

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Lost Highway
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#15 Post by Lost Highway » Wed Oct 03, 2018 5:53 am

It’s all a conspiracy cooked up by Lady Gaga fans:

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/20 ... born-venom

McCrutchy
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#16 Post by McCrutchy » Wed Oct 03, 2018 10:18 am

Dr Amicus wrote:
Wed Oct 03, 2018 4:31 am
It may be a PG-13 in the States, but it's ended up as a 15 in the UK. I'm really surprised Sony didn't cut it to make it a 12 (the default for just about every superhero film over here - even the extended Batman Vs Superman remained a 12, unlike the R it had in the States)
The BBFC classification came in very late, so my guess is that Sony was trying to get a 12, but the board pushed back on the body horror elements regarding Venom and other symbiotes that they describe in the classification Insight. Without having seen the film, I suspect those elements are crucial to understanding the narrative, and that removing them would result in not just a few seconds of cuts, but possibly several minutes, so Sony UK were probably forced to release the film uncut at 15 or end up with a 12A film that is more confusing and considerably shorter than the US version.

This is a key difference between the BBFC and the MPAA. The latter has a high tolerance for bloodless horror, while the former is more restrictive, and seemingly concerned with psychological impact. That's why a majority of recent PG-13 horror films are 15s in the UK--they might not show much blood, but if they have a darker tone with lots of threat, they're going to be restricted in the UK (and usually, Ireland, too).

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tenia
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#17 Post by tenia » Wed Oct 03, 2018 10:28 am

It might indeed be that for all the movie's unwilling humor, the BBFC estimated its overall tone made it too sustainably tense for a 12 classification.

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Dr Amicus
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#18 Post by Dr Amicus » Wed Oct 03, 2018 10:41 am

Sounds highly likely to me - it's like the original Texas Chain Saw which was banned for years, the BBFC looked at cutting it but the issue was a matter of tone more than moments of extreme violence / gore.

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Never Cursed
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#19 Post by Never Cursed » Tue Oct 09, 2018 5:56 pm

Venom is pretty awful and sits up there with Mile 22 as one of the worst action movies I've seen in some time. The biggest problem is the script, which is unsure whether to treat the idea of the symbiote comedically or not. The premise of a hungry, superpower-bestowing alien parasite stuck in someone's body is ripe material for either a moody Jekyll-and-Hyde-style horror movie or something more lighthearted involving the symbiote's relationship with its host, but this movie is less interested in characterizing Venom and more interested in using him as an excuse for ugly and messily shot action scenes. Accordingly, the movie settles for a weird mixture of the two previously mentioned approaches, one where Venom rips people apart and eats brains while cracking wise about the "snacks" (internal organs) he's having.

This wouldn't be as much of a problem if the action sequences weren't all somehow flawed. Most of them involve some variation on "dudes with guns try to kill Venom," an idea that is fundamentally uninteresting since Venom is bulletproof and nearly indestructible. This leads to long and boring sequences, like a smoke-filled fight in the lobby of a skyscraper, where dozens of goons get murdered and consumed by a giant monster without any effort or sense of danger on the monster's part, and thus without any tension on the part of the viewer.
SpoilerShow
And then there's the final fight, a showdown between Hardy's and Riz Ahmed's symbiotes. I held out hope that at least this part would be engaging, since the two symbiotes are clear threats to each other. But, since it takes place at night between a black giant ooze monster and a dark grey giant ooze monster, the fight is almost unwatchably incoherent because the two are indistinguishable from one another in low lighting. There's one closeup where each grabs the other and the two struggle for a bit before one of them throws the other around, and I couldn't tell you if I tried which was winning and which was losing because of how dark the frame was and how similar the two CGI abominations looked.
Hardy's dual performance is the only real bright spot, and even that doesn't amount to much, given how terribly his character acts to those around him. Believe the hype, folks - this is an ugly and unexciting franchise-starter that squanders its ideas of interest in the service of poorly-executed action.

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tenia
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#20 Post by tenia » Wed Oct 10, 2018 2:00 am

Yet it started at $80M because, I guess, people just go to see super heroes related movies and dont even remotely care if it's good or not.

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Morbii
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#21 Post by Morbii » Wed Oct 10, 2018 9:13 am

I have a pretty high tolerance for Hollywood films like Venom, but it’s starting to sound like I might actually skip it.

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senseabove
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#22 Post by senseabove » Wed Oct 10, 2018 3:14 pm

Not that this sort of movie really needs any to go to bat for it, but on the flip side, while it is objectively a terrible movie pretty much across the board, from dialogue to editing to continuity to character motivation—even with the bar pretty low for Marvel movies—it was the most genuine fun I've had at one of these in a very long time. Hardy's just so odd it's fun to watch.

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thirtyframesasecond
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#23 Post by thirtyframesasecond » Wed Oct 10, 2018 4:30 pm

Hardy's a weird one. Besides Bronson and the Nolan films he doesn't have much of a filmography, yet he's a big name. I saw a trailer for that romcom he did with Witherspoon and Pine; they're both spies, stringing her along. I assume that will be his one and only effort in that genre.

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tenia
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#24 Post by tenia » Thu Oct 11, 2018 3:58 am

If I'm not mistaken, he's famous also for Warrior, Lawless, Fury Road and The Revenant, and I seem to remember Locke wasn't too badly received as well. It certainly isn't a massively successful filmo, but it seems to be enough to make a recongizable face for the audience.

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reaky
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Re: Marvel Comics on Film

#25 Post by reaky » Thu Oct 11, 2018 5:27 am

I’d say his signature role is in the TV series Taboo, which he stalks through like a timebomb. He’s often touted as a future Bond, and I know a good number of women who fancy the pants off him.

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