Category: Theatrical Review

Since World War II, the United States government has been recruiting various people with psychic abilities to be a part of The Division. Now something that The Division needs has been tracked to Hong Kong, and there The Division contacts an ex-patriate named Nick Gant in trying to find it. Nick has the power of telekinesis and is basically know as a “mover” (with other psychics having powers that label them as “sniffers,” “watchers,” “shadows,” “pushers” and so on). Nick knows nothing, so The Division moves on, but immediately after that meeting, Nick is then contacted by a 13-year old “watcher” (someone able to see the future) named Cassie and informed of what his role is to be in this story… and then hijinks ensue…

… and not at a particularly exciting pace either… I’m not going to be recommending the new movie Push today, and before I get into the specifics of the story itself, one of the main reasons that Im not recommending this is something that’s just in my case, and that was a matter of poor presentation at the theatre that I went to see it at. First the sound was screwed up through the opening portions setting the whole idea of these psychics and The Division up. To solve that, the movie was stopped and then it started up again, this time with the sound working. Then, because this takes place in Hong Kong, there were portions of the film that were subtitled, and the way it was projected, you couldn’t see the subtitles as they were cut off at the bottom of the screen. So there’s a few strikes against this right from the start, thanks to poor presentation.

But sometimes, a movie can rise beyond that, unfortunately, in Push’s case, things are too slowly paced and convoluted to make this one anything to get excited about. This gets a lot of comparison to last year’s Jumper, and it’s easy to see, on the surface, they’re essentially about the same thing: people with “gifts” being hunted by shadowy organizations. And one of the traps this immediately falls into is just simplistically making The Division the bad guys of the piece. There’s no explanation given really to what they do other than just hunt down and recruit these psychics, and so just by reason that they’re the “authority” here, they’re evil. Now one thing that this has in it’s favor over Jumper though is that the psychics on the run here are generally much more likeable than the protagonists of Jumper having something a little more noble to be fighting for, unfortunately, it’s handled in such a way that things either happen to slow or too conveniently for you to either give a damn or think they’re just cool.

The cast is, for the most part, pretty good here. Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning play Nick and Cassie respectively, and they do a good job, there’s just not much that they’re really asked to do. The same can be said of Djimon Hounsou who plays Henry Carver, one of The Division agents pursuing this object (a serum that augments psychic abilities). Cliff Curtis, a real capable guy, is also one of the ex-patriates located in Hong Kong, and he’s solid, but if you want to see a better movie with him and Evans, I’d suggest Danny Boyle’s Sunshine over this one. The one person of the main cast who’s a real drag here is Camilla Belle, who’s another of the psychics living in Hong Kong, and she looks good but she’s just boring and especially when a particular plot turn happens, there’s nothing there to really get excited about with her (Belle was also in last year’s 10,000 B.C. where she also served as a drag on the story). Actually, the best parts of the cast are actors playing side roles, one of The Division’s other “movers” who’s just got a lot of fire in him when doing the physical stuff, and a whole group of Hong Kong psychics who really just chew up scenery when doing their thing, are way more fun to watch than the main cast.

In the end, this whole idea seems like it’s by someone who’s watched Heroes and X-Men and thinks they can do a better job with it and due to poor pacing primarily and convoluting the plot to make this appear complex, it instead just gets bogged down to the point that you just don’t care. This wasn’t really a good start to seeing new movies for 2009…

So even though this has been out for a few weeks now, finally I’ve gotten the chance to go see it, and I have to say, I was very suitably impressed, this really deserves the accolades that it’s been getting.

Slumdog Millionaire tells us the story of Jamal Malik a young man who’s had a hard life and has found himself on the Indian version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? and he’s worked his way up to the final question. but because of his background, Malik is suspect of cheating on the show, and before the nest show with his final question takes place, Jamal is being held by the police and questioned about his process. From there we see that the questions that Jamal can answer have some sort of significance with periods of his life involving both his brother Salim and a young girl who he’s fallen in love with named Latika.

Slumdog Millionaire is the latest film from British director Danny Boyle, who’s past credits ahve included Trainspotting, 28 Days Later and last year’s Sunshine. Boyle basically does something a little different with each film he makes, though there are consistencies of style with each film.

Slumdog is pretty riveting right from the start, and what it does to really draw you in is give you something as familiar as a show like Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? (even if it’s the Indian version) and then give you that parallel to Jamal’s life, with often that parallel having some pretty hefty significance.

Danny Boyle has a talented group of young actors working here with literally three actors each playing Jamal, Salim and Latika at different periods of their lives. All our great, but I have to give special notice to the youngest of these actors with the earliest portrayals.

I’m late to the party on this one, but definitely wanted to see it before the big Academy Awards show, and I totally think this is well worth seeing, and deserving of every bit of praise that it’s been getting. Before seeing this, I was pretty much rooting for David Fincher and Benjamin Button but now after seeing this, I’m pretty cool with either Danny Boyle or Slumdog Millionaire taking down the big awards. Very good stuff here and highly recommended.

(and now since seeing this, things are looking better for Slumdog Millionaire at the Oscars, as Danny Boyle has just won the Director’s Guild Award)

In 1941, in Nazi occupied Eastern Europe near the Belarussian Forests, four Jewish brothers, Tuvia, Zus, Asael and Aron Bielski flee to the forests to hide after discovering their parents killed after a hunt for Jews. The brothers survive by their wits and very soon, they take more in with them, beginning construction of a community deep within the forest, hidden from the Nazis. The oldest brothers, Tuvia and Zus soon come to a conflict between themselves as to whether they hide from the Nazis or join the fight with Russian resistance fighters, with Tuvia staying with the camp and Zus going off to fight, and eventually their paths cross again, as the settlement works hard to survive, soon growing ever larger.

This true story is the basis for the film Defiance from director Edward Zwick, who’s past films have included Glory, The Siege, The Last Samurai and Blood Diamond and it’s a truly inspiring story (at least what’s shown here), and just something to me anyway in that I haven’t heard more about this before.

Now while this starts off telling you it’s a true story, they do play around with the actual facts, giving just a little play to the fact that the Bielskis were always in trouble with the law and that their group did some pretty awful things in order to survive, and I have to wonder if Zwick actually filmed more around this or not. Now as I said above, I knew little of these facts, sand originally came away from this thinking a few nobler things about the Bielskis, and I’m still going to recommend the film, but it does make me wonder if there was more that was shot that wasn’t as rosy. I hope there was and hope further that it might be on the eventual DVD release down the road making for a movie that isn’t quite as black and white as this is.

What’s here makes for a good and inspiring movie, and had they shot this with more of the real things done by the Bielskis, I think it could’ve made this even more effective, though nowhere near as affirming as what a Hollywood picture would be.

Daniel Craig and Liev Schrieber head up the cast as respectively Tuvia and Zus. These guys are great together, they have some real chemistry and I’d actually hope that maybe down the road they might team up again in another film. Craig is always solid gold, but after finding out a little more of the real facts, I have to give more praise to Liev Schreiber here, as his Zus is a lot closer to what was there for real.

Initially, coming out of the film, I truly thought it was exceptional stuff. But after finding out a few more of the facts, I’d really wished Zwick and crew would’ve done more with that. I’d still recommend seeing this, but take the words “This is a true story.” with a grain of salt and maybe use this as the entryway to find out more of what really happened.

Randy “The Ram” Robinson is a pro wrestler who’s best days are 20 years past, and now he ekes out a living doing small local shows and working for a store. At one of his shows, he sustains a load of brutal injuries and then has a heart attack and suddenly starts to realize his own mortality. The problem though, Randy is all alone and he desperately doesn’t want to be as he tries to connect with a stripper, Cassidy who’s better days are behind her and his own estranged daughter, who he knows next to nothing about.

The Wrestler is the long-awaited fourth movie from director Darren Aronofsky, winning huge kudos for it’s poignant story and more for it’s performance by lead actor Mickey Rourke playing Robinson. And it’s highly deserving of all of the kudos it’s getting, absolutely no doubt about it.

Aronofsky’s movies are always a visual treat, and with The Wrestler he does something brand new for him, shooting the movie with the raw look of a documentary, but doing it in such a way where often the camera is right behind Rourke as he’s walking into a scene, giving us to the chance to sort’ve be in The Ram’s shoes. And yet at the same time, though we are behind Rourke, his presence is still just as strong as though you’re facing him.

Aronofsky has joked in the past that he’s Barton Fink with this movie (people who’ve seen Barton Fink will know that Im referring to the ideal that the title character was a high-minded writer who was brought to Hollywood to work on something less than his perceived talents), and it is just joking… he treats his subject matter with the same sort of respect that he did with movies like Requiem For A Dream and Pi.

Enough can’t be said about Rourke’s performance, though I have to say, I don’t necessarily see it as a comeback (though people said the same thing when he played Marv in Sin City as well, and that wasn’t that long ago) as I really thought he never left. But still, it’s tremendous work and you can’t help but feel for the guy throughout the movie, he’s obviously got a big heart, and like all of us, he’s made mistakes that he deeply regrets. He’s physically impressive, though also very much broken down. Aronofsky supposedly threw him through the proverbial ringer with this movie and it shows with this heartfelt performance. I think just as impressive though is Marissa Tomei as Cassidy, showing that that Supporting Actress Oscar that she won a few years ago wasn’t just a flash in the pan, and given the right material, as she is here, she’s just as impressive as Rourke.

It’s just terrifically well-made all around. Aronofsky makes all the right choices and ends this film in the best possible way. Word is very good of Rourke getting a Best Actor Oscar nomination for the film, and it’s totally deserved and I hope he wins it. Again, I think this is one of the better releases of 2008, and though the Oscar nominations aren’t out as of yet, it’s not sounding like this will be there for the awards for Best Picture and Best Director, and I just have to wonder how well this placed against the front runners. Regardless of that, this is still a fantastic movie and I can’t recommend it enough…

As an old woman named Daisy lies in her deathbed, she relates to her daughter, the story of the most important man in her life, a fellow named Benjamin, who began his life in the oddest of ways, displaying all of the effects of old age on an infant’s frame. As Benjamin grows older, he physically gets younger, leading to a perspective on the world wiser than can be expected…

And to say more about the story of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button would be to say too much. This story is better experienced by actually watching it unfold. And when you do watch it unfold, you’ll be experiencing yet another in a string of masterpieces from director David Fincher and easily one of the very best movies of 2008.

Fincher’s well known for the exacting control he takes on his movies (and if you’ve ever watched any of the special edition DVDs of Fight Club, Panic Room or Zodiac then you know what I mean) and Benjamin Button is no exception. This is a long movie, nearly three hours long, and yet it’s all so well paced and written so well that it never feels that way, for me, the time flew right by.

Originally based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald (which I haven’t read and I do know that liberties have been taken with the story), this screen adaptation is truly a magical experience. It’s the sort of movie that I’d like to watch as a double or triple feature with movies like Forrest Gump and The World According to Garp.

Brad Pitt plays Benjamin and Cate Blanchett plays Daisy and the performances are just excellent (Daisy is a dancer and it really looks like Blanchett learned her stuff here- and it’s not just in the steps but in her gait and how she carries herself in the non-dncing scenes). It’s easily, at least for me, the most heartfelt thing that Brad Pitt has ever done, and you feel his genuine kindness and sense of wonder about the world in most every scene.

This movie would be my actual pick to win a Best Visual Effects award for the year. Now I really like movies with big splashy effects as much as the next guy, but admire stuff more that’s just not so obvious. And here, the effect of aging is just seamless, and though it’s amazing to see, it doesn’t detract whatsoever. One scene in particular, where Benjamin is literally around the age of 18 is just about as convincing as it can be, you’ll swear that somehow or another, David Fincher has this amazing time machine and he was able to go and pluck Brad Pitt from that point in his life to play in this movie.

Right now, this is looking like a big contender at Oscar time, probably being pitted against Milk, Slumdog Millionaire, Frost/Nixon and The Dark Knight (these movies have been grabbing the nominations from the Writer’s Guild, the Producer’s Guild and the Director’s Guild) and even without having yet seen either Milk or Slumdog (and I do hope to before the Oscars come around) and whatever awards it garners, it’s totally well deserved. Don’t miss this one for a moment, it’s a terrific experience and as I said above, easily one of the best movies of 2008.

In 1977, British talk show host, David Frost conducted a series of interviews with disgraced former President Richard Nixon on television, and this movie, which is an adaptation of a stage play, seeks to go further than the surface, talking about the events that led to these interviews and more importantly the motivations behind both men in doing them- Frost sees it as a way to get back some former notoriety, while Nixon looks at it as a way of getting exoneration to an extent and being able to get yet another place in the sun politically. It’s a great examination of a historical side story, as well as a test of wills of two men who wanted so badly to fit in.

And it’s one hell of a good movie. This latest film from director Ron Howard is at least for me, my favorite of his since he did Ransom (my own personal favorites of Howard’s movies are Ransom, The Paper and of course, Apollo 13 which I can watch again and again). It’s an extremely well-paced work that lays the story out in chronological order, peppered with reflections from the side players (well, the actors playing the side players) about the event, done in an almost documentary style fashion, giving it much greater sense of event than how it actually played out, at least from my recollection of the time.

I can’t say enough about how well written this movie is, and it damn well should be considering that this is about an interview event, so it needs to capture you right from the start and fortunately it does.

Of course, much has been said about the performances of both of the leads, Michael Sheen as David Frost and Frank Langella as Richard Nixon, and the praise is well deserved. Sheen’s got a little more of a twinkle in his eye than the real Frost does and Langella is a much more physically imposing presence than the real Nixon was, but still it’s tremendously good work from both men, and it’s especially proven in one scene before the final interview takes place about a phone call between Nixon and Frost, that’s the best scene in the movie loaded with great scenes, and it just makes you wonder did this really happen this way? And it has some great support work from Oliver Platt, Matthew Macfadyen and most especially Sam Rockwell and Kevin Bacon who are just about as standout as the leads themselves.

The best thing this movie does though is it makes you want to find out more about the time or see the key moments of the real interviews again, and that’s just what a movie about a historical event should do. This is one of those that I’m looking forward to seeing again when it comes out on DVD and hopefully there’ll be a nice package made around it when it does hit. Highly, highly recommended and easily one of the best of 2008.

In the summer of 1944, Col. Claus von Stauffenberg of the German Army and a group of other ranking German officials, both military and civilian, attempted the last of the Germans own attempts to kill Adolf Hitler and wrest away control of Germany to peaceably negotiate an end to World War II. Valkyrie is the story of that attempt and it’s failure…

… and it’s one hell of a great movie from director Bryan Singer and star Tom Cruise. This marks the first time these two have worked together and I can only hope that they’ll do it again someday. Nothing is really spoon-fed to you here and though this plan seems like the best way to go about it, it always hangs on both timing and the wills of the players involved. What you have here is a pretty taut thriller, that still plays extremely well even though you already know the outcome.

I mention Tom Cruise specifically because he’s obviously the lead here, but the way the movie plays out, it’s way more of an ensemble than most might figure it to be, and there’s one hell of a good cast at work here. You’ve got Kenneth Brannagh, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson, Eddie Izzard, Terence Stamp, Christian Berkel and Thomas Kretschmann amongst this fine cast and all are doing great work, with some stand out stuff from both Wilkinson, Nighy and Berkel in particular.

I’ve seen a lot of people talk about how this will disappoint them because Tom Cruise doesn’t speak with a German accent in the film, which of course is a lame reason for disappointment, especially considering that the bulk of the cast is British and doesn’t speak with a German accent either. This film has a pretty clever way of getting past that right at the start and it’s something that’s been done with other films (most notably The Hunt For Red October) because as we all know, audiences for the most part hate to read their movies… so big effin’ whoop over the fact that no one has a German accent here. I’ve also seen complaints about how this doesn’t get into much in the way of Naziism or the atrocities committed by the Germans, and while that might be a little valid, it’s not what the movie is about, and it’s pretty evidently stated that this group came together because they didn’t believe in the legacy that Hitler was leaving behind with his Germany, though some (most notably Wilkinson’s General Fromm) have different ambitions growing from the outcome.

I was riveted to this movie right from the start, and honestly can’t wait to see it again. For me anyway, it’s right up there with HBO’s movie Conspiracy and Oliver Hirschbiegel’s excellent film Downfall (and to a lesser effect Wolfgang Peterson’s Das Boot) about key moments on the German side during World War II. Highly recommended…

The masked crimefighter of Central City known as The Spirit becomes embroiled in a plot by his archnemesis, The Octopus, to unlock mythological secrets that will garner for him the power to rule the world- all the while, also pursuing a mysterious woman from his past, the criminal Sand Saref.

The Spirit written and directed by Frank Miller and based on the comic strip series by legendary comics creator Will Eisner is a mixed bag. Miller is somewhat faithful to what Eisner has done, but decidedly, like Darwyn Cooke’s version of The Spirit for DC Comics, this isn’t an impression of Eisner’s work, it’s Frank Miller’s vision of the character, and what Miller has decided to do is go really big and over-the-top with The Spirit, not necessarily unlike what has been done in the past in movies with characters like Flash Gordon or Warren Beatty’s version of Dick Tracy. He’s embracing the sheer “comic book-iness” of it all rather than try to make it at all “real.”

The stuff that he does well, at least in my estimation, is the earnestness of the title hero, with The Spirit willing to show the extremes in his face between utter grimness and just wide-eyed silliness (stuff that Eisner did as well), and The Spirit himself is well portrayed by actor Gabriel Macht who really does a great job here and holds his own quite well. Scenes with him on screen are for the most part pretty cool. Another thing that he does well is embracing the sheer sexual quality of the many females in The Spirit’s life, and here those women are represented by such characters as the abovementioned Sand Saref, Silken Floss, Plaster of Paris and in a much more innocent way by Ellen Dolan (played by respectively Eva Mendes, Scarlett Johansson, Paz Vega and Sarah Paulson and they’re all terrific here, and just look fantastic).

Where the movie is hurt is in some pacing issues, scenes with The Octopus, Silken Floss and their toadies (all played by Louis Lombardi and it looks like he’s having a lot of fun with this), tend to go on to long and decide to show the characters in other lights that just fall flat. And personally, I think this was hurt also by the choice of using Samuel L. Jackson as The Octopus. Now in the comics, The Octopus’ face is never shown, and here, because it is Jackson, then Jackson does his “thing” as part of it and doesn’t really exude as much menace as he could. I think a better choice might’ve been to have done what was done in a movie like V For Vendetta where Hugo Weaving was cast as V and didn’t show his face through the entire movie. Weaving was still able to carry the day and preserve the mystery aspect of the character, and I think The Spirit would’ve benefitted from the same choice.

Other than that though, I had a pretty good time with the movie- it’s loaded with some great visuals (and the end credits show a lot of art from Miller’s storyboards for scenes) and has a great atmosphere about it, that is as long as your able to take the over-the-top manner in which it’s all presented, and Gabriel Macht as a leading man, is a talent to watch. This is a movie, much like Speed Racer that will no doubt be derided endlessly now (by most) but down the road could get a lot more appreciation.

The world is taken aback with the discovery an alien who has come to the planet. This alien named Klaatu has come with the idea of saving the Earth, not the people on it, but the planet from the people on it, with the rationale that the Earth is one of the few planets that can support a variety of lifeforms, and that it will be destroyed in it’s own time by it’s dominant lifeform. Klaatu lands in Central Park in New York City and is immediately intercepted by all manners of scientists, military and police, but one scientist stands apart from everyone else, Dr. Helen Benson an astrophysicist, who believes in Klaatu and wants to have the chance to show him that humanity can change. But looming in the background, is Klaatu’s gigantic protector, ready to strike…

And with that, you have the basic premise of The Day The Earth Stood Still, the re-make of the 1951 movie of the same name originally directed by Robert Wise. This new version is directed by Scott Derrickson who very much impressed me previously with The Exorcism of Emily Rose. Now, I’m not one of these guys who’s going to cry foul about remaking a classic like the original, in fact I’ll go so far as to say that considering the changes in technology, both in filmmaking and in our culture, this could be served well be a remake. And there are aspects to this film that are very well done with that, for instance, the fear that would go with this event is way more palpable here than it was in the original, as is all of the measures that are being taken to look into this. Where it veers horribly from the original though is in it’s final solution, basically looking to appeal more to the heart than intellectually, and though the original may be more simplistic in some ways, one thing that should be admired about it is that it was a more cerebral film for the time.

How does it veer? Mostly with the changes brought about with the Helen Benson character, who has been decided to be the heart of the film. At the start, we’re shown that she has a strained relationship with her son, who’s father was killed in the war. And then when she’s brought on board with a team of scientific experts, the focus of the film shifts solely to her- with the camera going for as many Jennifer Connelly close-ups as it can get, and the other players looking to her more with all of the answers. Later, as she’s on the run with Klaatu and her son, the relationship with the son comes to a head and then Klaatu sees that the potential for change is there in humanity…

… oh, please…

This change with the Helen Benson character smacks more of movie marketing and trying to get the female audience to care about the characters more than anything else, and as such, there really is no cerebral message to the film. A better solution, would’ve been to have had more of multi-cultural mix of the scientific experts be the ones to help Klaatu along the way rather than confined down to one person, and by what it does, it presents as it’s solution in the end as the all-tto familiar and none-to-true of “love conquers all.” It’s not at all believable in the end… and it’s a shame, because the pieces are here to be true to the original solution of the first film.

That main piece being one sole scene, done as a nod to the original, and featuring John Cleese in the role of the scientist Professor Barnhardt. It’s a great scene, with a great deal of weight as performed by Cleese, but in the end, it’s more of a throwaway here as opposed to what it should’ve been, just as it was in the original, the impetus to solving the problem.

Instead, we’ve forced on us this one character and her son, who’s relationship is forced (and also helps to serve some of the political commentary to the film- making me also wonder what this movie would be like if it had been made say two years from now instead), it’s never really believable- Jaden Smith plays the son (he’s the real life son of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith) and he’s just annoying as hell in the film. And on top of that being forced and unbelievable, so is Connelly as an astrophysicist, especially considering how important a player she’s deemed to be by the authority figures early on.

So wither Keanu Reeves as Klaatu? Well, again, I’m not going to fall in the traditional internet “hate” of Reeves, I actually like him my own self and I think he does a great job here… now with that said, he still wouldn’t have been my first choice in casting Klaatu. Recently, I watched the original movie again and along with that, a featurette on the making of the film. Now in the original, there were two actors being discussed to play Klaatu, Claude Rains and Spencer Tracy, both pretty big stars at the time. Rains fell through, and so the choice was going to be Tracy, who really wanted to do the movie. Then, studio head Darryl Zanuck got struck by the notion that when Klaatu takes off his space helmet, the audience was going to see Spencer Tracy and as such, not really have any mystery about it- then Zanuck was off to England and while there, that’s where he saw Michael Rennie and was struck with the idea that this guy should be Klaatu, and so he was… Now it was Rennie’s first movie part, and while I wouldn’t have gone with a total unknown as Klaatu, I would’ve gone with someone who was less a household name, as Keanu Reeves is, and my personal choice would’ve been Ralph Fiennes in the part. Still though, I don’t have any problems with Keanu Reeves here.

No, my biggest problem is with the casting of Jennifer Connelly and Jaden Smith and the importance that they’re given in the remake. Oh sure, the Helen Benson character and her son in the original are also quite important to that film, but not in the same way and not to the sacrifice of the cerebral quality to the original.

There’s still stuff here though that I think is pretty cool, that would’ve been even cooler had the focus not changed from head to heart. Changing that, changes the ideas behind the film considerably. And with a movie like The Day The Earth Stood Still and the high regard that people have for the original, this hurts it tremendously and as such, this remake is more a blown opportunity than the chance to make something that could’ve stood right on a par with the original.

Frank Castle, the vigilante known as The Punisher, continues his war on crime in New York City. As he’s busting up his usual Mafioso, while they’re engaging in a deal with the Russians to bring over bio-toxic material to sell to terrorist organizations, two things happen- Castle inadvertently kills an undercover FBI agent and he causes the head of this mafia cell, Billy the Beaut to become horribly disfigured. Billy renames himself Jigsaw and vows to take down the Punisher, all the while while Frank tries to make amends with the family of the agent that he’s killed… and of course, hijinks ensue.

Punisher: War Zone is now the third movie involving the titular character and also the third take on the character, and so far, the one that has the most fun with it yet. Director Lexi Alexander has decided with this version to really embrace some of the over-the-top aspects involved with The Punisher, and has delivered an ultra-violent R-rated version that pretty much lets you know this is the way it’s going to be right in the first few minutes of the film. What she’s got here is a very fast-paced and fun piece that’s certainly faithful to some aspects of the character. Marvel’s had so many different versions of what The Punisher is over the years, and what’s shown here is probably the most familiar to longtime fans (though I have to admit, I haven’t kept up as much as others, but there were certainly things that I recognized).

It’s a good-looking movie for sure, and the action is really nicely done, and the way I see it, it looks like all involved were having a pretty good time.

Ray Stevenson takes over the role of Frank Castle, and he certainly looks the part and he pretty much delivers the goods though this doesn’t really ask that much from him- he’s the driving force of the film though, symbolically more than anything else. More fun is had with all of the supporting cast in the film, primarily with Dominic West playing Jigsaw, who’s clearly having a ball on-screen. Doug Hutchinson plays his insane brother Loony Bin Jim, and he’s a cool little physical counter here, being a relatively small man, but obviously very deadly. The inspired casting choice award goes to Wayne Knight, playing Castle’s long-time tech associate, Microchip, Knight’s just perfect for the part, and actually provides more of the human insight to The Punisher. The cast is rounded out with good supporting turns from Colin Salmon, Dash Mihok and Julie Benz, amongst others, and like I said, all looking like they’re having a pretty good time here.

My expectations were relatively low going into this, as I really enjoyed the last Punisher film with Thomas Jane in the lead, so I wasn’t quite expecting a whole lot here. So I was pleasantly surprised to have had as a good a time with the movie as I did. It’s on the minor side compared to some of the other big comic book movies of the year, but there’s still a good time here, and if you can take the high level of violence that this has (and it’s pretty high), there’s s good time to be had. Very much recommended…