Homage to Punisher: War Zone

Punisher: War Zone is my ultimate "Guilty Pleasure" movie.

By that, I never mean I enjoy Punisher: War Zone as a terrible movie or despite it is a terrible movie. Hell no! This movie is easily on of my Top 10 favorite movie of all time! It is BEAUTIFULLY casted, shot, and directed, how come anyone say this movie is not awesome? Oh yeah, I forget most people are wimps. 

What I mean by "Guilty pleasure" is, I enjoy this movie in FULL AWARENESS that some of my enjoyment come from the fact that this movie showed how the Punisher butcher so many monsters.

C'mon admit it. You also have that joy, usually at the end of the movie, when the good guy finally kill the bad guy. Like in every Die Hard movies. Like in the end of most Schwarzenegger or Stallone's movie. For me, that kind of joy is a guilty pleasure.

The difference between The Punisher and those other movies is: you got that satisfaction from the beginning until the end, not only in the end. If you read his comic, especially the MAX series, you know exactly that every single killing he made induce that "guilty pleasure."  Almost in every chapter, every scene, Punisher is killing or torturing then killing some criminals whose humanity is CLEARLY non existent. This movie has exactly that same tone and atmosphere.

For example, The Punisher track down some junkies who were also parkour addict. The movie showed those junkies just robbed and butchered a shop owner by axing his head. Yup, the movie really showed a dead old man with a big axe on his head. Not to worry, shortly after that, the Punisher ambushed them on a roof. He blew up the first parkour junkie with a rocket, snipe the second one, and interrogate the last one ... before throwing him to a pointy fence, stabbing the junkie's chest from below, and finally the Punisher jumped on his neck! That tone and atmosphere create far superior "guilty pleasure" compare to the joy of seeing Schwarzenegger or Stallone mowed down the antagonist's mooks with big machine gun. If you prefer that kind of "guilty pleasure," don't worry, the Punisher also slaughtered those cannon fodders in over-the-top shoot-out.

Okay, let's begin with the nuts and bolts of this movie. 

The Story

The story is simple: Punisher slaughter a mafia family, Billy Rusotti escaped but his face was screwed, then he hunts the Punisher after freeing his batshit insane younger brother! Anything else are trivial. Many people complained the story is idiotic. Who cares!! This movie is about TONE, and ATMOSPHERE, what kind of story do you expect? The Godfather? Serpico? Silence of the Lambs? Naaah, this movie is too awesome, it never need any good story. NEXT!!

Thomas Jane
From this blog

Ray Stevenson
From this site

The Punisher

I already mentioned that the Punisher is one of my favorite character. In this movie, Ray Stevenson portrait him PERFECTLY! He is physically intimidating, hard like tungsten, but could show his sentimental side. After he killed the wrong guy, he really manned up to his responsibility, and visited the guy's widow, prepared to receive any retribution, even handing her a loaded revolver. In other words: he really got the Punisher's character.

This is in contrast with the previous Punisher: Thomas Jane. Look at him.

1) He is a pretty boy, not a nasty killing machine!!

2) He is a schemer, not a punisher!!

3) He never killed anyone by PUNCHING HIS FACE!!

Hands down, Ray Stevenson IS the Punisher. I am sure if both of them met, before Thomas Jane's Punisher can scheme anything, his head was already ripped off by a punch from Ray Stevenson's Punisher.

The Antagonists

As the main antagonist, we have Dominic West playing Billy Rusotti a.k.a Jigsaw. He is a narcisstic-sadistic-cartoony-douche whose pretty face screwed by the Punisher, burned by anger, but start crying whenever he saw a mirror. Lucky he got a loving brother! (See the next paragraph) I like this villain. I really like it! He is goofy, cartoony, and violent at the same time! But he also love his brother sooo much that he released him from a mental hospital. Speaking about his brother ...

Then we also got Loony Bin Jim alias LBJ alias James, the younger brother of Jigsaw. A psychopathic-high adrenaline-batshit insane-cannibal who eat a male nurse alive. Remember about Jigsaw start crying whenever he saw a mirror? LBJ also loved his brother so much that he broke every single mirror in the vicinity of his brother. Who said a monster couldn't love anyone? 

Speaking about the antagonists ... one of my favorite scene from this movie is when those 2 brothers recruited an army from the darkest part of New York for the final battle. Jigsaw made a speech about "freedom" and "American dream" in front of a gigantic american flag, in front of Chinese triads, Irish mobs, and black gangsters. That was ... SUPERB! Man, I really didn't know whether to be awed or laughed my ass off when I saw that speech for the first time! Now I know. I have to STAND UP and give a SALUTE!! That scene is too awesome to got any other reaction.

The Supporting Casts and Actions

Other than the main casts, the supporting casts are also excellent. Same like Ray Stevenson IS the intimidating Punisher, Wayne Knight IS the resourceful Microchip, and Dash Mihok IS the bumbling detective Soap! 

I also loved the fact that in the final battle, the Punisher used an assault rifle instead of submachine gun like MP5 or machine gun like M60! I always have a soft spot for an assault rifle ...

Oh yeah, he also has a good reason to be alive even after receiving tons of shots from those mobs: he was equipped with dragon skin body armor! Holy shit!

BTW if you are a gun buff, and interested in finding out what kind of guns were used in this movie, check this site!

In the end, this movie is not a financial success. Predictable. Most people are too wimpy, not manly enough to enjoy the Punisher MAX comics, let alone watch this badass movie. No problem, at least I saw ONE awesome Punisher movie.

Final Verdict: 99 out of 100. This film is very enjoyable for me from the beginning until the end. Watch it if you love action, gore, and black humor. RUN FROM IT if you are too wimpy, if blood splattering from decapitated neck makes you scream. You are NOT manly enough to watch this movie!