Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Peter Travers seems to have really liked this, but I’ve heard a lot of hardcore PUNISHER fans who don’t seem to think this is a movie for them. They’re unhappy with the particular version of Frank Castle that Jonathan Hensleigh chose to portray in his film. Me, I’ve got very little baggage from the comics, and I liked the film a heck of a lot when I saw it a month or so ago. Let’s see what our first scooper thought:
Hey, Harry
I just got home from an advance screening of Marvel's latest comic-movie, "The PUNISHER" (courtesy of some free passes from "Strange Adventures comic shop in Halifax) . I enjoyed myself, but I think the hard-core PUNISHER fans will have some mixed feelings.
"Was it a good movie?" Yes... The story was there, the acting was there, the pacing was there. Even though there might have been a few plot holes or head scratchers (like, months after the death of Frank Castles family, the crime scene still contains Frank's father's gun collection is a display case), it was still a great movie.
"Was it true to the character?" Yes... and No... If you were to explain to the layman about what the character was about, it' pretty much there. That is, "Frank Castle's family was murdered and gets even by using a lot of guns and explosions while wearing a skull on his chest". In this movie, he wasn't in Vietnam, he isn't totally crazy, and he is/was an FBI agent. Basically, if the main character's name wasn't "Frank Castle", this would have been a great Van Damme movie.
"How were the supporting characters?" Awesome... every character had his/her place. No character was left unturned. From the simplest "yes-man" to the top of the food chain, the supporting characters really help make the movie. In fact, I will be VERY disappointed if the actor who played "Spacker Dave" doesn't get a best supporting actor nomination. You know how we say "Nicholson was born to play the Joker" or "DeVito was born to play the Penguin"? Well, forget it. The actor who played Dave just nailed it. He was born to play Dave. The actor looks, acts, and I bet even smells like Dave. Garth Ennis would be very proud.
"How were the Violent and Bloody parts?" Not bad... Not great either. Some parts were extremely good like the Russian showing up and all hell breaks loose. The torture scene was **snicker** good (I won't give it away). However, you'll notice that the ONLY person who seems to bleed in this movie is the Punisher. Towards the end it gets a little more bloody, but let's just say that when this movie appears on TV, there won't be much editing required. After being totally spoiled (or soiled) by Tarentino's Kill Bill Vol. 1, Punisher seems very weak.
"Would you recommend this movie?" Sure... why not? I enjoyed myself. Even though it wasn't as good as Spider-Man or X-men (even those movies strayed from their source material) it was way, WAY better than "Daredevil" or "HULK" (did those movies refer to any source material?")
As I said, it might disappoint hard-core Punisher fans, but it is a good movie overall (3 out of 5 stars)
Murray C.
And another take on it from someone far less in tune with what the filmmakers were doing...
Hi Harry
You’ve posted a couple things from me before. I would write more often but it’s usually enough just to handle my own weekly workload, and some of your spies consistently beat me by a day or two. Anyway I went to a press screening of the Punisher last Friday, or at least that’s what was they called it in the opening credits. What I saw was more like “the adventures of Frank Castle and his wacky neighbors” mixed up with a watered down tropical spin on Death Wish.
I will admit that The Punisher has never been my personal favorite, but I did read both titles fairly regularly in the late eighties/early nineties, and I think I understand what works about the character. I wish I could say the same for director Jonathon Hensleigh, who so badly bungles the very bedrock notions, it gave me a new found appreciation of Ang Lee, and made me thank the movie gods that Hensleigh never got his hacky mitts on the jolly green giant. I can’t really talk about what went wrong without dropping some major spoilers so be advised, they’ll be coming fast and furious.
We start off with Thomas Jane in a bad blond wig, posing as a Euro trash arms dealer in an FBI sting set up to nab some members of the Howard Saint crime family. For reasons that are never clear the bust goes bad and Saint’s youngest son gets gunned down by the feds, leaving a grieving Saint searching for a scapegoat, and with a couple bribes he manages to get the name of an undercover federal agent without the help of Robert Novak. Meanwhile the entire Castle family has gathered in Puerto Rico for a family vacation before Frank moves his wife and son to the relative safety of London. While daddy Roy Schieder is showing off his gun collection to Jane a truck load of goons shows up and starts blasting the bejeezus out of the kinfolk. Frank gets off a few shots but can’t save anyone, and we’re talking twenty or thirty yuppie corpses littering up the veranda. The baddies finally corner Frank on a dock, and instead of putting a bullet in his head, they decide to blow up the dock, giving him a chance to survive and be rescued by a kindly rasta fisherman. A bearded and limping Castle then returns to the unattended crime scene and retrieves his Dad’s guns which of course have been left laying around by the incompetent Puerto Rican cops. The fisherman then tells Frank to “go with god” to which he pithily replies “God’s going to sit this one out” So far so good I suppose. Eventually our boy drags his ass back to Tampa [yes, Tampa! ] where he moves into a warehouse loft full of quirky slackers, paints his GTO black and starts downing bottles of Wild Turkey by the case. Next they lift a pretty funny scene right out of the John Romita JR drawn issue of “War journal” that came with the Marvel legends figure, where a lackey gets tied up and pretend tortured with blowtorch and a Popsicle. After that we are treated to some seemingly endless slapstick shenanigans with Joan [ marvel go to girl Rebecca Stamos] and Mr. Bumpo [funnyman and noted fatso John Pinette] and Spacker Dave[Six feet under's Ben Foster]. Then comes perhaps the single stupidest scene in this history of a comic book movies, where Frank walks right up to the cops the feds and the press, and in front of everyone announces his plan to turn Saint and his boys into hamburger helper. This bit is unforgivably brainless, as is the complete absence of any member of the Tampa police force or F.B.I or even the fire department for the remainder of the fucking movie. This one scene tainted everything else for me, being completely and heinously out of character. The Punisher is in the line of The Lone Ranger and the Spirit, guys who gain their power through resurrection, who can act out side the system because they are as good as dead, guys who scare criminals by becoming myths and rumors. This Punisher has his goddamn face all over the nightly news. He then raids Saint’s downtown office building in costume and tosses several million dollars into the street for the pedestrians to fight over. A nice touch for Robin Hood populism, but probably not something a wrathful spirit of vengeance would fuck around with. Meanwhile John Travolta tries hard to look disinterested and ends up sleepwalking through, which I suppose is better than his over the top non kosher bombast like in shit like Swordfish. There’s a lot of time devoted to the internecine squabbling of the crime family, and Frank develops an elaborate scam [involving a fake fire hydrant, don’t ask] to get them fighting amongst each other, instead of just blowing their damn heads off.
When not drinking and brooding Castle fends off the occasional hit man, including one yutz who actually serenades him with a country/folk song. The fight with Kevin Nash has a cool retro brutality to it, and Nash takes more convincing bumps in two minutes than in the last two years of his WCW contract. Enjoyable yes, but it seemed more like something that would happen to Martin Riggs or John McClane, not as snake eating black ops shit kicker like Castle, who would have gouged out the big asshole’s eyeballs and been done with it. Basically the Punisher as we know him doesn’t show up until the last reel when he really starts dishing out the pain, before that he spends most of the picture conflicted and sad, and aside from the jet black Fonzie haircut pretty much unrecognizable. Taken on it’s own this film is an entertaining, if flawed and deeply logic impaired revenge yarn, but for the fan boys it’s not their Punisher, despite the attempted nods to Garth Ennis. A decade ago this would have been good enough for a movie from “the house of ideas“ but now the bar has been raised too high.
Throw me a steel banana, cause I’m Mechakong.
And one last one...
Hey guys,
If you choose to run this review, call me "Cohete"
Who of you out there are looking forward to seeing [b]The Punisher[/b]? Judging from the hands raised it looks like there's a handful of you... but all of you appear doubtful on whether or not this film can deliver the goods.
Let me just tell you, having seen it this evening, this film is truly unforgettable. ...Unforgettably BAD. My word, I went in expecting a drama with a lot of comic book action. What I got was a comedy...and not purposely so! In the film's defense, the group I saw this with was a comedic bunch so it was almost like mystery science theater (it was a private screening so don't worry... we didn't screw up someone else's experience). The events that occur in this film are so rediculously stupid you can't take this movie seriously. And I'm not saying you can enjoy it like Kill Bill or anything... it is OBSURD. Not even Arnold Schwarzenegger can make this film work, and to be perfectly honest, I REALLY did want this film to work. If I tell you how Frank Castle comes across his skull t-shirt in the film, you'll probably nod in agreement "yah, that's pretty stupid."
So what's my background with The Punisher you ask? Well, I never really read any of the comics but I believe I know enough about the character from reading Spider-Man and collecting Marvel cards as a kid. With that said, I went in to witness the story of Frank Castle with an open mind. Whatever changes were made to the comic, I really wouldn't be able to tell. I went in to enjoy a movie, and boy did I ever. I swear we were snickering and laughing early into the movie. I can tell that we were all TRYING to hold it in for the life of us, but once someone broke the silence, it was over.
I'm going to save you from any spoiler info but there really isn't anything to spoil. But I'm sure you all are wondering about John Travolta's character of Howard Saints. If you hated Travolta before, you're going to hate him still, and perhaps even more so. Yup, this is another lousy performance that makes him that much creepier. I gotta say though, Travolta's last scene in the movie has got to be one of the funniest things ever. I don't want to give it away, but it's worth seeing again just for that alone.
Onto the rest: Thomas Jane is actually decent as the lead but his character and the entire film, for that matter lacks focus. Well it actually doesn't lack focus, just everything else. We follow the events unfold from scene to scene without any real emotion. It just happens. The film is pretty much on auto-pilot the entire two hours, which makes it that much easier to crack jokes during the movie.
Many people have asked me the question: how violent is it? Pretty disgustingly violent. It's not so much the blood but the acts depicted are so incredibly brutal that it's far more painful to watch than Passion of the Christ! I'm not talking about a long torture sequence here but rather about horrible and rediculous ways to kill another being, one right after another. There are other hideous acts of violence but I won't spoil them here.
Wrapping things up, is The Punisher worth your time? Only if it's "bad movie night" with a bunch of your drinking buddies. Otherwise, this movie is a horrible piece of garbage. I definitely felt like I was punished for sitting in on this one. So the question now is this: who should be punished for making this crappy movie in the first place? And what about a sequel you ask? The end is perfectly set up for one...
Go see Kill Bill vol 2 instead.
Grade: 4/10 :thumbdown:
Thanks, guys. Just one more week till everyone gets to check it out for themselves...
"Moriarty" out.
