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The Main Characters
--Frank Castle (Thomas Jane) is a former Vietnam veteran who now works undercover for the government. On his last case a very wealthy man’s son is killed. He takes his revenge by murdering Castle’s entire family and thought he had killed Castle. But he didn’t now he’s back.
--Howard Saint (John Travolta) is a very wealthy man who makes his living smuggling money and other illegal things off the coast of Florida. One of his sons is murdered in a gun bust led by Frank Castle and Howard wants revenge. He sends a team of his goons down to murder him and his family while they vacation in Puerto Rico.
--Quentin Glass (Will Patton) is Howard’s right hand man.
--Joan (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) is an apartment tenant who happens to live in the same building Frank Castle lives in.
The Setting
The bulk of it takes place in Tampa, Florida with some parts in Puerto Rico.
The Movie
Frank Castle is a retired Army man who now works undercover for the government. He has a loving wife and a son. He has but one more bust to work on before he can retire and move away to London with his wife and child and finally settle down. He performs the gun bust on a pair of unwitting criminals and in a shootout Bobby Saint is fatally shot. Bobby Saint is son of a very wealthy and powerful man named Howard Saint. Howard gained all of his money mostly through illegal means and has a gang of people armed to the T working for him. He finds out Frank Castle was the one responsible for the death of his child so he sends out his assassins to murder him and his entire family while Frank is at Puerto Rico during a family reunion. The assassins succeed in murdering his entire family and they think they killed Castle. They didn’t.
Frank recovers and moves into an apartment tucked away where no one can find him and he starts plotting his revenge. He starts first by messing up Howard’s profitable smuggling business and then devises a plan where Howard suspects his wife and number one man, Quentin of an affair, despite the fact that Quentin is gay. Howard learns that Frank is still alive and sends a few special assassins after him. In the end, Frank goes on a rampage of death and destruction trying to kill Howard. Not for revenge, for punishment.
My Review
This is the action movie I’ve been waiting for over a decade. There hasn’t been a better action movie that has come out. Marvel really made a winner with this one and it will make everyone forget the original Punisher that came out in the early 90’s with Dolph Lundgren. The action is intense, the story is great and there’s nothing too wrong with this film. It even has its comedic moments. The whole scene where the Russian tries to kill Castle (played greatly by former professional wrestler Kevin Nash) is full of great one-liners and seemed more like a comedy than a fight. Of course, the ending sequence will have all action fans rising from their seats clapping that a great action movie has finally been made. This is a must-see for any action-movie fans and there’s enough story for anyone to enjoy and follow along. Excellent movie and probably my favorite Marvel movie besides Spider-Man. Thomas Jane was excellent as a beefed up hero hell-bent on revenge, Travolta was convincing as a heartless, ruthless killer and Romijn-Stamos worked well as a love interest for Castle, though don’t expect too much fluffy romance moments here. Just action, and lots of it. In my opinion, it blows Kill Bill Volume 2 out of the water and in a just world would’ve been number one in its debut week. Must-See.
Overall Rating
***1/2
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