The Punisher
| State of Body | Punished (Sorry, I couldn’t resist) |
|---|---|
| Detail of Inspection | Inspected 3 times. |
| Forensic Investigator | winstoninabox |
| Comments | This body was unable to survive the multiple cuts of budget and length. |
At first glance it would seem remarkably easy to make a movie based on the Punisher comic book character. Gangsters kill ex-soldier Frank Castle’s family, he puts on a black and white costume, finds them and kills them. Simple really. But The Punisher tries to go beyond this. It incorporates excellent ideas, but gives them such scant treatment that finally it is just a hodgepodge. First I’ll look at where it should have made more decisions, and then I’ll have a go at an FF.
After listening to director / writer Jonathon Hensleigh’s commentary on the DVD The Punisher seemed to have two major problems. Apparently it underwent an enormous budget cut just before filming was to begin. It finished with a budget of about $30 million, which is admittedly really not that much for a Hollywood action film. It was to contain a Gulf War scene at the start that was to set up the relationship between Frank and his friend Jimmy Weeks. This relationship was to permeate the film, and ultimately contribute to the formation of character of the Punisher. Also the initial cut of the film came in at well over 2hrs, but it had a target running time of under 2hrs. With the removal of the Gulf War scene, and the cuts in editing required to get the film in less than 2 hours, Hensleigh felt compelled to remove the whole subplot of Jimmy Weeks.
But the film really suffers from the enforced editing. There are dangling bits that make it obvious that there should be more going on. Yet Hensleigh should have realized that with the budget cut there should have been a major story change and script rewrite. In listening to Hensleigh’s commentary he did a great job in trying to work around the problems that he was presented with, but many of them could have been alleviated by a thorough script rewrite. Again and again Hensleigh talks about the budgetary problems, but they are always in trying to commit to film what he had already put on paper.
For instance Hensleigh would have done well not to skimp on the action. If you’re going to have the comic book hero own an armored car, then have a decent car chase to use it in. Frank wastes valuable screen time building this armored car, only for it to be totaled in a car chase that last less than 30 seconds. Apparently 5 “Punisher-mobiles†were built for the film, with two being destroyed. What a wasted expense on something that is used so little in the film. While the car chase had to be scaled down due to budgetary restraints, action should be a feature of this film. As it is you wonder why the Punisher-mobile begins the chase by jumping a drawbridge (a very nice stunt), but then right after is crashing to its demise without any intervening action.
Hensleigh also cut a scene of Frank’s recuperation, thus reducing the part of Candelaria, the witchdoctor that saves him. This was again due to the budget. However it should have been left in, for in a comic book adaptation it is criminal to introduce a witchdoctor, only to write him out in his very next scene. A second advantage of the inclusion of the recuperation scene would have been to show Frank’s descent into madness.
But then The Punisher can’t decide whether it wants to be a comic book or gritty reality. The Punisher does well in bringing to the screen the Welcome Back Frank storyline as done by Garth Ennis. Ennis’ style marries wacky humor with ultra-violence. Hensleigh’s decision to incorporate this style is a very brave choice, but one that doesn’t succeed. The Punisher frequently has a grand operatic, over-the-top scene, and then tries to flip-flop into what is supposed to be a gritty and emotionally disturbing scene. For instance there is the ludicrous flaming skull formed by the burning cars after the movies final showdown, which is immediately followed by the scene of Frank considering killing himself. We want to believe that Frank crosses over into madness, but the previous silliness undermines this. A much more believable descent into madness by a revenger was Denzel Washington in Man on Fire. Man on Fire’s second half is relentlessly and realistically brutal, but in The Punisher the brutality never rises above the juvenile level.
This operatic style would have worked better if The Punisher had answered the question – what causes a man to put on a suit and fight crime? Hensleigh would have done well to get a time machine, jump forward in time, watch Batman Begins, and then go back and beat Chris Nolan to the punch. The initial motivations for the characters of Punisher and Batman are very similar – both experienced the loss of family at the hands of criminals. But whereas Batman Begins spends its first half meditating on the effects of this tragedy on its protagonist’s psyche, building the character of Batman upon the pain of Bruce Wayne, The Punisher does little to tease out the motivations of Punisher from the man who was Frank Castle.
The audience is left wondering why a former lawman feels that ultra-violence is the best, or even the sanest recourse for justice. Frank is shown to be depressed and alcoholic, but if he is to make the step to being a costumed vigilante, then he needs reasons to go beyond vengeance against only those who killed his family. Immediately after his return from the dead Frank sits himself outside society and the law. He makes no attempt to remain the person we were introduced to. It is like a switch has been flipped from law-abiding citizen to vigilante. The Punisher is in Death Wish territory, but whereas Charles Bronson’s Paul Kersey gradually realizes that by taking the law into his own hands against violent criminals per se he eases his sense of loss, Frank Castle makes no such transition. Without such a reason Frank can never become a costumed vigilante, but will merely be a revenger.
Hensleigh makes several futile attempts to explain Frank’s transition into Punisher, but none are convincing. Hensleigh believes that the murder of Frank’s entire family (yes, not just his immediate family, but his entire extended family get the bullet) is sufficient reason for a man to resort to measures outside the law. While this could be true, it doesn’t explain why Frank will become the crime-fighter known as Punisher, a man who wages a war on ALL criminals, and not just those whom have wronged him. Likewise is Frank’s depression and drinking. Good at building a case for a strung out man to hunt Howard Saint, but not so good at explaining rampant vigilantism. Hensleigh has a last attempt after the final shootout to explain the origin of Punisher. Just as Frank is contemplating suicide he has a vision of his wife. A poignant scene, but again lacks any reasoning as to why Frank becomes Punisher.
And then there are Frank’s 3 declarations of intent. The last is that “in certain extreme situations the law is inadequate, in order to shame its inadequacy it is necessary to act outside the law, to pursue natural justice.†Yet Frank has never once tried to act within the law. As a highly experienced undercover agent, one expects that Frank intimately understands the slow process that is a police investigation, which is then followed by the court case. Or at least he’s seen Law & Order. But about forty-five minutes into the film Frank comes back from the dead, and confronts his former police buddies Police Chief Morris and agent Jimmy Weeks with the claim that, “It’s been 5 months since my family was killed. I don’t see one man in jail.†Frank, as a witness to and attempted victim of the murders, don’t you think you should have come forward with a testimony?
And lets not forget Frank’s overly complicated revenge scheme. Some story about Saint’s gay henchman Quentin cheating with his wife Livia causes Saint to murder first Quentin and then next Livia. Its hardly very Punisher like. This is what should have been excised from the script, rather than any of the material that involved Frank. There is a silly fire hydrant swapping scheme to keep Livia Saint’s car space free; Hensleigh claimed it was inspired by a true incident. However as one can assume Frank drove himself and the fire hydrant there, he could just as easily have parked his own car in the space. Regardless of that, Micky Duka stated that Howard Saint was jealous of his wife and that he had her under surveillance, so it seems unlikely that Punisher’s plot had the necessary freedom to work.
Hensleigh stated that he invented this convoluted plot in order to do something different with the character. Hensleigh believed that it was worse punishment for Saint if he were to kill Quentin and Livia, than if he were to be simply killed by Punisher. Yet after everything else, that is just what happens. Within minutes of Saint’s killings Punisher resorts to exactly what Hensleigh claimed he wanted to go beyond – a shootout. It would have been better to just cut to the chase.
Another example of the over-complicatedness of the story is Micky Duka. Micky is an integral character in Frank’s scheme. Micky is introduced as a minor thug who is trying to move up to the big time with his first gunrunning deal. For some reason Frank spares him, even though it must be obvious that Micky was indirectly involved with the death of his family. But Micky’s lack of demise is due to him being comic relief rather than because of any known logic that Punisher would use.
The Punisher really seems to want to get to its quite picturesque final scene, as Punisher stands alone on a bridge and declares Frank Castle to be dead, without any thought about the emotional journey of the man. From now on he’ll wage a war against the murderers, rapists and psychos. I’m sure the irony is unintentional, as Frank is two-thirds of the way to waging war against himself.
And now to what Hensleigh could have tried. I’ll stick with the origin story for this movie, and keep the adaptation of Welcome Back Frank for The Punisher II. I think it’s worth visualizing a sequel at the conception of the first film; the character is made for a franchise. I would see these two films to be similar in tone to Lethal Weapon 1 and Lethal Weapon 2. The first movie will establish the Punisher character through a more serious, dark and gritty story; the second will lighten things up with more action and humor. Also the characters and events of Welcome Back Frank fit much better with an established Punisher, rather than with one still in the throws of formation. Darker and grittier it may be, but I also want to keep the style of a comic book film. I’d also like to make other little changes in production and costuming to give it more of a comic book feel, but that is for those departments to see to. And this may seem like a minor point, but I dislike the “The†at the front of The Punisher. I prefer the simplicity and directness of Punisher for the title.
Hensleigh’s biggest problem seemed to be budget, and so to keep it down there’ll be fewer speaking characters and no car chase. The action will be shootouts and fist fights. The locations from the first film will be used, with the addition of a police station and a courtroom. In fact the courtroom can probably be faked with tight shots and lower camera angles of Frank in suit giving reactions to a voice over from a judge. Punisher will be a character driven story of why a man decides to take the law into his own hands as a costumed vigilante.
We’re saving money on the cast so Punisher-like lets start culling them. Punisher requires no comic relief sidekick so Micky Duka never makes an appearance. The Punisher survived without Jimmy Weeks as an important player, so we’ll go one better and get rid of him all together. Instead we’ll beef up the already speaking part of Police Chief Morris. He’ll be the wise old voice of reason. Howard Saint doesn’t need a second son or a wife, so they too don’t make a casting call. With no female characters after the massacre it’s going to appear a little to testosterone-fueled, but we’ll have the motherly presence of Joan for the sequel.
That Frank’s entire extended family is murdered is not required. Apart from the expense of the extras, the increased body count, rather than increasing the pathos, merely dilutes the audience’s feelings about each death. We don’t know them, so why should we care. Let’s keep it to Frank’s immediate family plus his parents. With a throwaway line we can explain that Frank’s wife has no family alive, but she’s so happy that Frank’s parents have always warmly taken her in. With fewer victims there’ll be more time to flesh-out the ones we have.
To keep the pace fast let’s jump right into the action with only a brief written explanation:
Drugs plague the city. But two years of undercover work finishes tonight for DEA agent Frank Castle. For tonight, in a sting operation, he hopes to arrest the city’s criminal mastermind…
We’re definitely in comic book territory now. Frank, working in conjunction with the Tampa police and his old friend Morris for this arrest, has been posing as a drug dealer in the hopes of getting to the top dog. Unbeknownst to him though, it is not the criminal mastermind who shows up with copious goons, but the mastermind’s son – John Saint. John dies in the confrontation with the police, killed by Frank as he draws a pistol on him when the two of them are alone after a foot chase. Back at the Tampa police station for the washout, Frank is bitter those 2 years of undercover work that has cost him time with his family has been lost with no arrest to show for it. There’ll be some talk between Frank and Morris about plots involving the drugs and money laundering to set up the presence of the Toro brothers. We want them in the background of this movie, so they can move to the foreground in the sequel. Morris says that without a confession from John, they have nothing to link him to the drugs.
Following this Howard Saint and his team of lawyers, in some quickly paced courtroom vignettes, use the legal system to roast Frank over the death of John. Frank is suspended and takes his family to his parents’ home to try and piece their life back together again. Cue the ensuing massacre lead by Quentin as payback for John’s death.
Frank’s recuperation needs to be returned. Candelaria adds a little comic book hoodoo; he can talk about vengeance, life and death in a spooky way. Candelaria can also talk about how Frank has survived for a reason, and that his medicines can heal his body but only Frank himself can find peace of mind. Hooky stuff, but we are making a comic book movie after all. Thanks to Candelaria Frank has physically recovered from the attack, but mentally he’s shattered. He knows what has happened, but has no idea who executed his family – his memories about the event are patchy at best. What he does recall clearly comes from before the massacre. He remembers his feelings that he had somehow failed his family because of the commitments of his undercover work. And now he knows that that work has somehow cost him his wife, son and parents. He’s a depressed and rage filled alcoholic, but he has no outlet for that rage.
In the current movie Frank ludicrously finds the skull t-shirt that was a gift from his murdered son just sitting on the beach, when he returns there 5 months after the killings. Instead lets have Frank wearing the skull t-shirt when he is “killedâ€. The t-shirt, now with a bullet hole through the skull that lines up with the bullet scar on his chest, will become the costume he will don when he becomes a crazed criminal hater. During his five-month convalescence he refuses to remove the t-shirt. Its skull image and his son giving it to him haunt his dreams. Maybe he has a tic of touching his chest through the hole. YMMV.
Likewise, that he finds his father’s guns still in their display case after 5 months is stretching it a little. Frank does need the ‘nail drivers’ when he eventually becomes Punisher, but he’s not there just yet. For now they’ll be stashed as evidence with the police, to be returned at a later, and bloodier, point in the movie.
Frank, compelled by his memories, returns to the Castle estate 5 months after the slaughter of his family. But it has been repaired and resold. A new family lives there now and he can but stare through the window at them. So he possesses nothing, and has nothing to live for. Tampa Bay was going to be just a temporary sanctuary, and so he now has no home, no family, and no money. He makes his way into the city.
Frank wanders the streets homeless with only his skull t-shirt and painful memories. He witnesses some minor street crime (maybe drug deals), but does nothing to stop it. Again YMMV. Eventually he is arrested for some alcohol-fueled misdemeanor, and his identity, as the missing person from the Castle massacre, becomes known. He is passed into the hands of his former friend in the police force – Police Chief Morris. Morris is excited by Frank’s return from the grave – his testimony about the massacre is what Morris needs to start building a case against Howard Saint. There were no witnesses and only some little circumstantial evidence from the massacre. Morris suspected it was Saint who ordered the deaths as payback for his son’s, but as Saint is one of the most powerful men in Florida he could not go forward at all with the investigation. But Frank barely registers this information or the photos of Quentin and the other goons Morris shows him. He isn’t concerned about catching Saint; he really only wants to continue to feed his bitterness by drinking himself to death on the streets.
Frank returns to the streets, but what Morris said begins to sink in. Do those memories from the massacre contain the faces of Quentin and Saint’s goons? Meanwhile Howard Saint has heard that Frank is back, but that he’s a broken and addled alcoholic. Saint orders Frank killed, as there’s no sense in leaving any untied ends.
So Quentin and some goons comb the streets, until they bring a beaten and bloodied Frank to the Saints & Sinners Club. S&M fetishist Quentin tortures Frank, but is disappointed that Frank doesn’t seem to register that it was he who put a bullet in him. Howard confesses to Frank that it was he who ordered his family killed. He tells Frank that he is going to be shot by Quentin and his “security guards†as an intruder; the final ignominy for the former agent is that in death he will be remembered as a petty criminal. With the police already on their way Howard leaves so as not to be involved in the messy business. Before going Howard tells Quentin to inform him of all the unpleasant details – he’ll be at the building where the money laundering takes place. But Howard’s taunting, rather than being the final nail in Frank’s coffin, gives him the willpower to fight back. Frank’s memory about the day of the massacre clears, and instead it’s Quentin and the goons who are viscerally put to death rather than Frank. But as Howard predicted the police quickly arrive, and Frank is once again taken into custody. Although this time it is for the murder of Saint’s men.
Back at the station Morris tries to protect Frank from prosecution. Frank wants Saint’s blood, but Morris says he can’t help him do that. Morris can help Frank get Saint through the legal system, but Frank needs to come forward against Saint. Otherwise, it is Frank himself who will be facing a trial for the murder of Quentin and the goons. Morris says that Frank’s best course of action is to make a complete statement; this time together they’ll be able to beat Saint and his army of lawyers. But inside Frank the switch is starting to flip. There will be a little back and forth banter between Frank and Morris about right versus wrong, and the justice system versus vigilantism. After all, Frank had been a lawman all his life, but when he needed the court it was used against him. But Morris still believes that he will be able to make a case against Saint. With Frank’s remaining grip on sanity he decides to give the courts a last chance. Frank, post shave and haircut, is about to throw out the skull t-shirt he’s been wearing for about 6-months now. With the help of Morris and the justice system does he finally have a chance to put his demons to rest?
Not likely, as Howard Saint sends goons to the station to finish the job. At the end of it Morris is dead, but Frank now armed with his father’s guns that he retrieved from the evidence room during the fracas, has dispatched the goons. Before this Frank was psychotically depressed; but now he’s become psychotically vengeful. Frank feels no options are left to him. Societal justice has failed, he himself may likely end up on it sword, and the bad guys have killed the one man he trusted. It’s time Frank took matters into his own well-armed hands. He gets some body armor and other assorted weapons from the police armory, puts his now very bloody and ripped skull t-shirt on over the top, and as Punisher makes his way to the money laundering building for the showdown with Saint and his remaining army of goons. He turns Saint into street pizza as the Toro brother’s dirty cash comes tumbling down outside the building, thus setting them up as the bad guys for Punisher II.
The Punisher grew on me slightly over the three times I watched it, but it never outgrew it problems. It and the previously reviewed Daredevil are good DVDs for aspiring Hollywood directors or writers to listen to with the director’s commentary on. Both films had budget difficulties that impinged severely on the original scripts. By not going back to the drawing board The Punisher dealt with its budget cut more by crisis management than management under crisis. I hope the sequel doesn’t suffer a similar fate, for the definitive Punisher movie is yet to be made.