Yet again, Sony Pictures shows movie goers and super hero lovers that they do not have a handle on nearly anything related to Spider-Man.
Directed by Oscar nominated J.C. Chandor, Kraven the Hunter is a mess of a movie that still somehow manages to be silly fun despite the writers not showing any knowledge of how this comic character and iconic Spider-Man villain works.
**WARNING: SOME SPOILERS ARE AHEAD
The movie opens with a captured Kraven (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) infiltrating a Russian prison to kill a gang boss which then leads to a frantic jail escape. That opening sequence showed some promise for the film as the action is kinetic and brutal. It then falls apart upon flashing back to his origin.
We learn that while on a hunting trip with his family, Kraven is attacked by a wild lion and is almost near death. In a scene prior to that, a young Calypso learns of a magic potion that her grandmother gives her that can bestow powers upon one that needs it. Then, bang! The movie unbelievably reaches for the ‘magical negro’ trope when somehow right after her grandmother gives her this potion, Calypso administers this potion the Kraven who she didn’t even know at that point in the film, saving him and giving him super powers.
Back in the modern day, we find that the adult Calypso (Ariana DeBose) is now a high-powered lawyer and that Kraven has become a hunter of bad people and he is here for vengeance. You have heard this one before right?
This film had a few good spots here and there, but it was just a mess of bad directing, missed plot opportunities and bad acting. The casting of Taylor-Johnson I think was a miss. While Johnson did a lot to get cut for this role, he still facially lacked the intensity and ferocity to really pull off this role. He just looked too polished and not what a rugged man of the jungle should look like. Another thing that has baffled me is with all of the previous times Kraven has appeared in other media formats, he has a Russian accent. Its absence here in this movie is one of the most egregious errors in my opinion, about casting Johnson in this role. His casual American accent (and corny dialogue “My name is Kraven, with a K and I am a hunter.”) just takes away one of the things that makes this character Kraven. Conversely, Russell Crowe cast as Nikolai, the family patriarch, hams it up, pseudo accent and all; he was really enjoyable in his role.
Some of the other performances were hit or miss as well. Ariana DeBose, while she wore some of the baddest and hottest black dresses, had some of the most wooden dialogue in this movie. Her acting and chemistry with Taylor-Johnson was evaporative to say the least, but again that speaks to the above-mentioned bad trope that put them together in the first place. Fred Hechinger, who is also in the recently released Gladiator II, turned in a good job as Kraven’s brother Dmitri. Two other stand-out performers included Christoper Abbott as the Foreigner, a hired assassin as well as Alessandro Nivola as Aleksei Systesevich who then becomes the Rhino.
Speaking of the Rhino, this brings me to yet another issue which was the CGI. It was laughably bad and I mean circa 2008 bad. They did no favors to the animals but most of all to the final transformation of Aleksei into the Rhino. To get an idea, think back to Vinnie Jones’ portrayal of the Juggernaut. In both cases, they were massive but not imposing and I was really disappointed.
Beyond that, the action was intense and visceral thus the R rating. The biggest problem is that it felt like no one working on this movie really had a good idea of what really made Kraven tick. Does anyone at Sony Pictures not have a direct connection to Marvel comics to get better guidance? Sure, they had the basics down such as his honor but they missed really portraying him with his bravado and how he learned how to hunt his prey by self-making items he needed for his hunts. By the end of the movie, Kraven was pretty much a mashup of Rambo and Batman, but in the woods. Similar to Venom, Sony Pictures wasted another foil to Spider-Man by trying to do a stand alone movie with a character best known as a villain and attempting to turn him into some kind of anti-hero. This proves once again that Sony Pictures failed on giving fans what they want to see: Spider-Man facing off against his foes.
If you can look past some of the bad acting and failed plot points, this movie can be a silly loss of two hours. I found myself chuckling because just when the movie got serious, it did something silly. However, if you want a more cohesive story that features both Venom and Kraven, get a Playstation 5 and the Spider-Man 2 game. Otherwise, wait until there are better, cheaper alternatives to watching this movie.
FINAL GRADE: C-
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