Venom (2005 film) (4 Stars)

Usually I only watch films that I expect to like. That's why the majority of my ratings gravitate towards the top end of my scale. It might be the case that a film I expect to like badly disappoints me and only gets one or two stars, but that is (thankfully) not often the case. Today was one of the rare exceptions where I watched a film that I didn't expect to like. I didn't want to buy it, but I was forced into it. I wanted to buy "The Hole" on Blu-ray, but it was only available on Blu-ray in a double feature package with "Venom".

In Germany it's common to bundle together films on Blu-ray in double or triple feature packages, usually for the price of a single film. There are often stickers on them saying something like "Start your Blu-ray collection with these great films". I can guarantee you that films included in packages like these aren't "great", they're films that nobody wants to buy. I'm not talking about trilogies that are released in box sets, such as the Sam Raimi Spider-Man Trilogy or the Matrix Trilogy. That's fully justified. I'm talking about bundling films together which have little or nothing to do with one another. I'm talking about box sets with titles like "Three Comedy Films", "Three Classic Westerns" or "Three Horror Films".

Or "Miramax Double Feature".

That's what I bought 18 months ago, shortly after arriving in Germany. This Miramax Double Feature – a very generic title in itself – contained "The Hole" and "Venom". I normally ignore the double or triple feature Blu-rays, but it cost less than a Euro and I'd long wanted to see "The Hole", so I bought it. The two films have nothing in common apart from both being distributed by Miramax. No common actors, one film is British and the other is American. They're both horror films, that's it.

I have six bookshelves for my Blu-rays and DVDs. One is in my bedroom. It contains the films I intend to watch soon (the top shelf) and the films that I've recently watched (the next two shelves). The other five bookshelves are in the cellar, neatly sorted alphabetically so that I can quickly find any film I want to watch. When the bookshelf in my bedroom gets too full I take the films downstairs into the main storage area.

Yesterday I was in the cellar, about to slot my Miramax Double Feature Blu-ray into place – filed under H, of course – when I was reminded of "Venom". "I might as well give it a chance", I thought. So I brought it back upstairs and watched it today.

The film started slowly and I was only half paying attention. Then it picked up as the killings started, and I was amazed. I paused the film to see who had directed it. Jim Gillespie. He's the man who made "I know what you did last summer", one of my favourite films, so I knew I had to take it seriously.

The film is about voodoo rituals in Louisiana. From generation to generation a priestess has been using snakes to help men pass into the afterlife. Shortly before death she uses two snakes to suck the evil out of a man, which is called "milking the evil", after which he can enter the afterlife without sin.

(Curiously, this ritual is only performed on men. Is it because men are more evil than women, or is it because men are easier to milk?)

The snakes are evidently immortal, and are stored in a suitcase. The priestess is travelling in a car and has a fatal accident. The man who tried to rescue her opens the suitcase, and he's attacked by the snakes. Their venom contains hundreds of years of evil, milked from countless men. The man, Ray Sawyer, dies immediately, but the evil stored in the venom brings him back to life. He goes on a mostly random killing spree, but his main target is CeCe, the priestess's granddaughter who is destined to become the next priestess.

While not up to the level of "I know what you did last summer", this is a thrilling slasher movie. I'll probably watch it again, paying more attention to the opening scenes.

	Order from Amazon.com
	Order from Amazon.co.uk
	Order from Amazon.de