Movie Review: The Punisher
Another Marvel film? Yes. Another superhero? Not exactly. He’s just a guy, no superpowers whatsoever, but isn’t that the same for all the best action heroes.
Driven by the anger and pain of having his entire family massacred at the hands of a criminal gang. Frank Castle’s life is now devoted to ending those of all the murderers/rapists/gangsters he can shake an M16 at.
If you’re already familiar with the comics, which I’m not really, you may expect the dude in the blue skin-tight suit who made his first appearance in “Amazing Spider-Man” issue 129, but it’s not him. What you get is a more realistic man with dark but every-day clothes and extensive U.S. Marine [Sea Air Land, Underwater Demolition Team and Long Range Patrol] and F.B.I. training as his ‘powers’.
So instead of webs & laser eyes, his weapons are an arsenal of guns, blades, explosives, industrial tools etc. Which isn’t a problem for action junkies like myself. His standard weapons of choice include the good old M16 [.223 caliber], a Sterling Mark 69mm, 34-round clip fed, semi-automatic rifle converted to automatic fire, a 14-round, 9mm Browning Llama automatic pistol, a Government issue .45 caliber automatic frame re-chambered for 9mm ammunition with a replaceable barrel to convert it to .223 caliber ammunition, and a 4-shot derringer in .223 caliber. All this conveniently allows him to only need to keep two ammunition types on him, he has a big kick-ass bow and arrow thing too. When it comes to killing he’s a bit of an artist, in the climax of the film he turns an entire car park into his skull insignia by blowing up cars ‘Big Art Attack’ style.
The t-shirt is the one thing that makes him like other comic book heroes, it’s his ‘costume’ and I liked it so much, I bought one for myself. In my opinion it looks cool and is indeed pretty “intense”. My own theory for why he wears it is that his reason are probably similar to that of Mel Gibson’s character in “The Patriot” for melting down his murdered son’s toy soldiers to make bullets to kill the man that did it. The shirt was a gift given to Frank by his son soon before he was brutally slaughtered along with his mother, so wearing it when he guns down various goons probably gives him more of a feeling that he’s avenging his boy.
To me, a film with that kind of material to base it’s plot on is something to get excited about, but there were things that could have been improved on. Most of the characters were not deep enough and it failed to deliver as much action and violence as I would have preferred. Even though women and children get peppered with bullets in one part of it, you see little blood. Then again, there is no film that meets my perfect action and violence level requirements. They could also have done the fight scenes and gun battles a bit more stylishly, like John Woo would have.
It’s not revenge, it’s punishment!
8/10