DVD Features:
Available Subtitles: Spanish
Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Cast auditions
Voodoo Nightmare: The Making of Venom
Storyboard-to-film comparison
DVD Review:
When I first saw the trailer to “Venom” I thought it looked very promising. A zombie like killer running around the swamps of Louisiana killing teens. Sounded pretty good and looked pretty good. It seemed like another monster legend was about to be born, just like Jason and Freddy. However that didn’t happen and in a way I’m kind of surprised. I figured that this film which released back in September of 2005, would of at least had a shot at doing well in the box office, however it failed to do so, and even on DVD I don’t think it’s expected to make much of a splash, as my local video chain here on Long Island only had two copies of the film available to rent.
So the question is, is “Venom” a good movie? Well yes and No. Now I read a lot of bad reviews for this film and can’t see how some people called it one of the worst films of 2005, I mean it’s no gem, trust me on that, but it’s so bad that you’ll shut it off. The film does start out very slow and the story does drag on for a bit. I mean it’s pretty obvious who’s going to live and die. We have teenage kids drinking and so on. The story basically sets it’s own characters up for death. While watching the beginning of this flick it just felt like “Another teen horror film”. And it’s no wonder it did because Kevin Williamson the writer of “Scream” produced this flick and it was directed by Jim Gillespie whom also directed “I Know What You Did Last Summer”. So you get yet another film that stresses the teenage characters more than it does their killer.
In a nutshell this film starts off with this voodoo lady who has these snakes in a box, about twenty minutes into the film she gets into a car accident, and her car hangs off a bridge. Two local teens and the local “slow” gas station mechanic try to save her, however the local gas man named Ray gets trapped in the car with the voodoo lady and falls into the river to his death, however the snakes in the box jump out and bite into and invade Ray’s body, thus turning him into a zombie like killer. Sounds pretty cool right? Well to be honest the story gets better towards the end, there are some pretty original killings and some good special effects however they seem to keep with a theme of one kill after the other, and that’s where we got less story and an over abundance of action scenes that consisted of way to much running and killing.
My opinions of the script is that I found it to be just like every other teen film, I mean yes “Venom” does have a different story, one that I found to be entertaining but the overall feeling I got from the script was not one that felt original, although I did get a little bit of that throw back feeling to the 80’s horror flicks. More or less it felt like I was watching an evil swamp thing picture.
The acting was alright, it was pretty much on cue and was up to par with the kind of acting you expect in horror films. I didn’t think the performances were anywhere near being bad, I felt that the actor once their characters were put in a stressful situation did a great job at letting us feel what their characters were feeling. One scene comes to mind when one of the ladies of the film makes the mistake of crawling under a car which is up on a lift, just to have it come down on her legs and trap her under the car. The helplessness she trusted herself into would result in a more painful death, and the actress playing that part really made the feel of the scene seem very painful.
The effects in this film are pretty good, as I stated above there are plenty of original kills in this film, as well as some we’ve seen before. But the make-up effects combined with the CGI was not all that bad. I think the only thing that looked very fake were the CGI snakes, which is another reason to add to the list of why this film was just an alright horror flick.
Overall, “Venom” is neither a good nor bad horror flick. Despite what other reviewers have said, compared to most of the direct to video horror flicks you can rent, and compared to some of the films that are released in theaters, Venom is an alright horror flick. Nothing more and nothing less. I’d say rent the DVD if all the other good horror films are checked out of your video store. It’s an alright way to kill an hour and a half of your time.
-Horror Bob
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
