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'The Punisher' only hurts audience with its familiarity
Scene from 'The Punisher'
Gene Page/Lions Gate Films
Director: Jonathan Kensleigh
Stars: Thomas Jane, John Travolta
MPAA Rating: R for violence and language
Michael Machosky can be reached via e-mail or at 412-320-7901.
"The Punisher" comic first showed up in the mid-'70s, and stuck out in the comic world because of its black-humored, nihilistic antihero, who avenges the murder of his family by hunting down and killing criminals.
Unfortunately, this scenario is similar to almost every action movie ever made since the '70s. And they all end the same.
From "Dirty Harry" on, the outside-the-law vigilante who's as violent as the bad guys has become an essential American fantasy. It appeals to some dark animal part of our brain that doesn't want to wait for the muted justice of due process. In vigilante movies, the tenuous sanction of "eye for an eye" is all the moral justification we need.
This "Punisher" follows that template to a fault. If there was some new twist or characterization here, this could work. Talented artists like Frank Miller didn't have trouble making "The Punisher" comic compelling. But "The Punisher" doesn't get much further than "Rambo" before it gives up.
Frank Castle (Thomas Jane) is an undercover cop, one bust away from leaving the force and moving to London with his family. But the sting goes awry, leaving a young man dead.
He happens to be the son of Howard Saint (John Travolta), a powerful mafia don. Saint finds Castle celebrating with his family in Puerto Rico, and sends his goons to mete out revenge.
Castle's entire extended family is wiped out by the gunmen, but he somehow clings to life with a bullet near his heart. He recovers gradually, vowing with cold fury to return to Saint's city. He returns, finding that the authorities -- and his cop buddies -- have done nothing.
A mysterious loner moves into a decrepit city building. "The Punisher" has arrived to start his work.
Jane makes a suitably cold and emotionally barren Castle, muttering most of his hardboiled quips through clenched teeth. Travolta can play the smooth criminal in his sleep -- and does -- but he keeps his Travolta-isms in check just enough to be a plausible Saint. As Saint's wife, Laura Harring trades on her slinky femme fatale image from "Mulholland Drive" to limited effect. And supermodel Rebecca Romijn-Stamos is way miscast as a lonely waitress who falls in love with Castle.
As for Saint's hitmen, one is a soulful guitarist seemingly pinched from "Desperado" and the other is a 'roid-raging Russian grappler, who seems based on Dolph Lundgren's boxer in "Rocky IV."
It's a hard-"R" story, and nobody's thinking about comic books when Castle's family is gunned down at the family reunion, nor during the excruciating scenes of torture. Die-hard fans of the comic probably won't be disappointed. But as stylized ultraviolence goes, it's just bad luck to open the same day as "Kill Bill Volume 2."
