True Punishment: Watching this movie!

I was dragged to see this as retribution for making Archaeopteryx see “The Alamo”. Yes, I actually saw The Alamo…and forced people to endure it with me, and yes, I know I deserved every second of pain I was in watching “The Punisher”. It was this or “Beloved” and I wasn’t in the mood to watch Oprah. In every sense of the word, this guy was the punisher. He ran around “punishing” wrongdoers, and he most certainly “punished” me by forcing me to sit through 124 minutes of crap. I had no intention of going to see this movie after having seen the Dolph Lundgren original- I’m no Marvel Comics fan, nor did I really care to see somebody try to be another Dolph (c’mon, no one compares…).

Dolph´s most dramatic role.

So I offer you my synopsis. I know you all were waiting on this.

1. Frank Castle kills the son of a major mob dude. Mob dude= Saint. Yeah, that’s his last name.
2. Saint’s craaaAazy wife decides to have Castle’s entire family killed at (how convenient!) a family reunion.
3. Castle gets mauled.
4. Castle is picked up by random crazy guy and nursed back to health.
5. Castle goes wild!
6. Castle is moody.
7. Castle kills someone.
8. Castle is moody some more.
9. Castle takes out the enemy in a total of 1:32 seconds.
10. Castle decides to kill wrongdoers everywhere for no apparent reason.

Bad man Travolta, in one of his many action sequences.

Now, to elaborate on parts that just made me giggle. Frank’s wife and child were literally mowed down by a big 4×4 vehicle, but when the close up came of the Quasi-Dolph cradling them in his arms, they looked pretty darn good. No tire marks…no ripped clothing…it just kinda looked like they were running down the pier and flopped over.

The mad russian, Basicly the only action sequence this film had.

Flolph (as the Dolph-wannabe will now be called), on the other hand, endured a much worse fate than his wife and child. In fact, Flolph could have been run over like them and probably still survived to hop up, take a round of bullets in the face and try it all over again. He went through more than an army of people could have endured and STILL was alive. No limping, no bruising…hell, his hair even looked good after he recovered. I can only hope that one day, after I’ve been beaten, shot, cut, shot again, broken and blown up, I still look that great afterwards.

Next. This movie was beyond disjointed. One second, he’s mulling around the slums, drinking Wild Turkey and fondling his gun- the next, he’s got random dude #1 strung up from his ceiling, being tortured with a popsicle. Flolph made me confused. I betcha Dolph would have never done that to me. Dolph would have stomped through the streets, dragged random dude #1 out of his hiding place and hauled him to his slums apartment by the balls. Then I would have known what had happened.

One of the “wacky and zany” sidekicks.

Then they had to bring in the wacky, zany sidekicks. We’ve got Chef Boyardee, Punky Brewster and Flo the Waitress. Bah, those weren’t their names, but just imagine them as sidekicks. Flolph was there to brood in their general vicinity, save Flo from her scary boyfriend and occasionally eat their food and cause them general pain. They tried to work in a whole “family” story to it, but I think the director just gave up on that idea and decided that letting Flolph go off and kill random wrongdoers was a better plan of action.

This makes you think he goes to take people out Rambo-style…
He doesn’t, in fact I think he only uses it once.

Finally- the boss scene. Everyone knows, comic book readers and game players alike that the Boss Scene is the most important scene in the movie. Some directors drag it out for daaaaaaays, making them go through obstacle courses, cooking competions, and rings of fire to finally finish. This director decided to make it short and sweet- Flolph goes in, Flolph sets bombs, Flolph shoots some people, Flolph drags Saint around behind his coolmobile, all while random vehicles in the carlot blow up. Guess what these burning vehicles make from the aerial view… C’mon, you can figure it out! THE PUNISHER SIGN! Now we know what Flolph was doing in his slummy apartment the whole time- he was working out the schematics so the cars would blow up to make his symbol of doom! What a trickster!

The movie ends with Flolph telling potential love interest, Flo, goodbye and leaving his “family” a buttload of stolen money. In a poignant moment, we see Flolph standing atop a hill, issuing a warning to rapists, murderers and other big baddies. So, in turn, I issue you a warning…

Rent it, watch it on pay-per-view, or better yet, don’t watch it at all. I guarantee you’ll be disappointed.

The drunk factor on this one is 6/10- while it wasn’t great, it wasn’t bad enough to merit any more than a 6-pack. As a side note: while watching this movie, I was not only irritated by Flolph, but also by the group of small children in front of me in the theatre who obviously bought their popcorn individually wrapped. What I mean is, each piece of popcorn must have had a wrapper because they spent the ENTIRE movie rattling plastic. I was ready for the Punisher to hop out of the screen and pistol whip them until they stopped.