By Samuel Rillstone
Heard of Kraven the Hunter? He's a Spider-Man villain who first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man #15 in 1964. Kraven is a poacher/hunter who has enhanced animal-like senses and superhuman strength and agility thanks to ingesting a jungle herb potion. His goal is to become the greatest hunter by killing his ultimate prey, Spider-Man.
You wouldn't know any of this from watching the Kraven the Hunter film, which has just hit theatres. Directed by J.C. Chandor, the story centres around Kraven (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and his quest for vengeance against his father Nikolai (Russell Crowe) while he chases the legacy of being the greatest and most feared hunter.
This version of Kraven is an animal-loving conservationist. So, not really Kraven at all. The story is bland and boring and there is also absolutely nothing to do with Spider-Man in this film which just makes this a completely different character wrapped in a Kraven skin.
Aaron Taylor-Johnson is definitely not doing his best work here, but perhaps he's doing the best he can with the awful script he's been given. There's no substance, just lines that some producer probably think make sense and sound edgy and cool. And the line reads are different from almost shot to shot!
Russell Crowe is adequately menacing and his deep gravely voice is nice to listen to even in a Russian accent, but he doesn't get heaps of play here. Fred Hechinger as Kraven's half-brother Dimitri, aka the Chameleon, is doing at least something with a little dimension, and gets the slightest arc.
Aaron Taylor-Johnson is Kraven in Kraven the Hunter. Photo: Sony Pictures
The villain (who was revealed in the trailer but I won't spoil here) actually surprised me as quite charismatic and making some unique choices. I'm not sure if they're good, but at least they're choices! But unfortunately his end just falls into the same sub-par formula.
There's also a secondary villain character whose powers are comic-accurate but don't get explained or touched on at all. Awful.
Ariana DeBose is also in it as Calypso, who in the comics is a voodoo witch. In this film, she's a lawyer/plot device who serves to give Kraven his powers and also help him find people (which makes no sense because he's supposed to be the best hunter, but whatever).
The one positive I'll say is that Kraven has the ferocity of comic Kraven (despite not using guns). This makes for a couple of engaging fight scenes with fun choreography, if still plagued by ropey CGI.
This film tries, as all these Sony Spider-Man movies do, to set up a sequel - horribly. Reportedly Sony is moving away from these villain-not villain movies and they've got none in active development that we're aware of, so fingers crossed.
Do not see this this film. I really want to say 'go make your own opinion on this' but I can't in good conscience recommend this movie at all. Unless you have two hours you REALLY don't know what to do with, maybe?
Kraven the Hunter (R16) is in NZ cinemas now.
