Overview
‘the punisher’ was awesome. not in an iconic masterpiece sort of way, but in a popcorn michael bay sort of way. ok, not as good as michael bay, but it was fun and surprisingly funny at times, with some great explosions and fight scenes.
Cast
plus thomas jane is so hot (as brandon and i discussed, as a young christopher lambert look-alike, he could play connor mcleod in a highlander prequel/flashback). he fits the character at least physically and does a good job of being anguished and whatnot. john travolta is so…john travolta. crazy, weird, you know. one of my favorite character actors, will patton, is in it, as is ben foster who i’ve liked since seeing him in ‘liberty heights.’
there are some wonderfully cheesy lines, most notably:
Candelaria: Vaya con Dios, Castle. Go with God.
Frank Castle: God’s going to sit this one out.
see? AWESOME. which is actually what i exclaimed in the theatre when i heard that line (it was the davis, i felt that i HAD to exclaim something). also:
Howard Saint: You killed my son!
[muffled explosion]
Frank Castle: Both of them.
LOL! AWESOME!!! also, i mean you just don’t see a compound bow used much today. how cool is that? plus frank is nursed back to health by a WITCH DOCTOR and there is a great fight sequence choreographed to la donna e mobile while his neighbors dance next door. PLUS frank uses a paper cutter to kill a bad guy, all faculty-style. sweet.
Tech
typically grainy, contrasty, gunmetal-blue and black cinematography, pretty much de rigeur for action flicks these days. but still, looks cool. great fight scenes and pyrotechnics.
Website
‘the punisher’ website is the best movie website i have ever seen – it gives you a lot of backstory about frank castle (helpful to me since i’ve never read the comic books) in the form of redirects to fake websites, photos, FBI and marine corps dossiers, videos, audio clips, etc. way cool.
In summary…
‘the punisher’ is a great and quite dark action film with some weird tone shifts and sort of thin characters, but is a lot of fun. i hope fans of the comic book liked it.