User reviews

this version of the Punisher is much different than the 2004 version.for one thing it is much darker,and probably more faithful to the comic book version.the pacing is very deliberate in this one,creating more atmosphere.there are some very good fight scenes in this movie.the biggest difference is the antagonist,which is much more deadly in this one and a worthy adversary for the Punisher.Dolph Lundgren plays the role in this incarnation and is much more imposing,with better physical presence.this is mainly due to his size.he definitely would inspire fear in the criminal element.Lundgren is not really a great actor,but he doesn't need to be for this role.overall,this a good movie,more subdued than the 2004 version.there is more physical action,but very little of things blowing up,which works in this film's favor. a strong7/10

I watched this movie when I was a young kid and I remember thinking "...Eh..." However, while browsing Borders, I saw the DVD for $6.99 and decided to give it another shot. I expected a fun action flick with lots of explosions, death-defying stunts, cool death shots, and a badass lead character. I was not disappointed. After reading so many bad reviews here on imdb I decided I need to write a review defending this movie. I don't know what other people expected when they saw this movie, but I certainly didn't expect much more than a cool action flick, and that is exactly what "The Punisher" gave me plus maybe a little more.

First off, Dolph Lundgren's stiff acting and menacing demeanor make him perfect for the part of the hell-bent, socially backwards loner determined to punish the scum of the Earth (His significant acting shortcomings are his assets here). The writer and director did a good job of showing many different facets of his personality and actually created a deeper characterization of the Punisher than I would have expected. Louis Gossett Jr. plays his his part competently enough. In fact, the acting was not all that bad all around (suitable enough for an action flick).

The action here is also pretty solid. Some examples: The opening sequence where Dolph punishes the trash-talking mob boss and his henchmen with style. In one scene, Dolph is driving a bus with children in tow while a hundred Japanese are firing machine guns and crashing their cars into the side of the bus...way cool.

The plot is pretty standard revenge bit with some minor twists and turns, but the ending is pretty cool and less predictable than most action thrillers, but then again thats not saying much :-)

FINAL RATING: 6/10 I doubt it will make anyone's top ten list, but this low budget action genre flick delivers the goods with solid action and semi-interesting characters, which is more than I can say for many big budget Hollywood action flicks (e.g. Cobra, Mercury Rising, The Watcher, the Art of War). Its not a movie to be analyzed, its a movie to enjoy. Action junkies should dig it, others should probably stay away.

"The Punisher" (1990) starring Dolph Lundgren and Louis Gossett, Jr. is a movie adaptation of the Marvel Comics character about a presumed dead police officer who wages a one man war on crime. In this big screen adaptation, The Punisher (Lundgren) rises from the sewers to battle the Yakuza (Japanese mafia) who have come to America to try to force the current reigning Franco crime family, headed by Gianni Franco (Jeroen Krabbe) out of business. To do this, the Yakuza headed by Lady Tanaka (Kim Miyori) have kidnapped the children of all the crime bosses. The Punisher reluctantly enters into this complex triangle to try to rescue the children.

I must say that "The Punisher" is a rather solid adaptation of the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Dolph Lundgren proves that he can carry a movie. He can really kick some a** in this film. The action scenes may prove to be the best parts of this movie. Probably the best action sequence is the scene where The Punisher drops through a glass window and begins shooting up a casino.

"The Punisher" get 2 ½ stars out of 5.

In fact, I have a suspicion that I will still like this one better even after the release of the new Punisher (2004).

That's because of a couple of reasons. Firstly, the acting. Dolph Lundgren acts very well in this film, portraying a grim, depressed, out of the ordinary action hero whose sole reason for living is revenge. Louis Gossett, jr. also does his best as Lundgren's former best friend. Jeroen Krabbe, in my opinion, is miscast as the big crime boss although he does his best.

Secondly, the action sequences are simply good. Lots of guns blazing, some decent camera angles and of course the whole 'red light' sequence near the end of the film, which I liked. The whole atmosphere of this movie is grim, gritty, depressed. Something I think the remake this year will not accomplish.

6/10

Grosly undervalued, the Punisher is 15 years later still one of the better Marvel Movies. Of course the movie has a weak plot, and sure it never really surprises it's audience, but it captures the spirit of the comic far better than many other Marvel-movies.

After the murder of his family, Frank Castle goes on a rampage against organized crime. He starts a war against criminals everywhere. The movie shows the Punisher for what he is, once a broken man, now a killer with a shade of humanity far hidden inside.

As a movie, the Punisher is average, there are far better movies in the action-genre. But as a comic-adaptation it is at the very least true to the comic.

I really liked this film, it´s true to the comic, and in some parts is better. For example in the comic Frank Castel has a truck full of weapons (most of them hi tech weapons) but were he gets the cash to pays for them. It´s a better adaptation than most flicks from those years (captain America for example) and it´s full with a lot of action and blood, its like a predecesor for Kill Bill. I give the movie a 7 out of 10.

The 80's and 90's were great times for action movie fans, few of the titles that came out were any good but there were plenty of them to keep the masses entertained.

Dolph Lungren here stars as the first outing for Frankle Castle aka The Punisher but if you're expecting anything to do with the character at all you'll be disappointed.

Trademark skull? Origin story? Connections to the marvel universe? Nothing. In fact the movie is so generic it could have just been a standard action flick where they at the last minute decided would be the Punisher.

This truly is just yet another paint by number action flick, standard formula, Lungren is wooden as always and the movie has as much to do with the Punisher as creation theory has to do with science.

Just no.

The Good:

Couple of decent characters

The Bad:

So incredibly generic

Lungren is terrible

Simply not a Punisher film

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Being in a house that blows up will not even phase you, in fact you'll have a chance to pose for cameras

5 seconds of origin story is apparently sufficient

The actor sidekick should have had been the lead

In the Marvel universe they still acknowledge the existence of DC characters

This is definetely a cool action flick. Dolph Lundgren plays Frank Castle, a New York cop who's family died in a mafia car bomb. That car bomb transformed Castle into The Punisher, a shadowy figure who's been waging a one-man war against crime. Louis Gosset Jr. plays Castle's friend and kindred spirit, a cop who's trying to capture The Punisher before any more damage is done to the public or himself. Some cool action scenes highlight this cool action flick.

This is a gripping story of one man's vendetta. An ex-cop named Frank Castle(Dolph Lundgren) whose family is wiped by a mobster(Jeroen Krabbe), executes a revenge, originating a bodycount with several enemies. Frank is moved to brutal violence and metes out his own justice when his wife and sons are murdered. He kills 125 baddies in five years, as tells a TV newsreader and still going on. Meanwhile, he attempts to stop the Japanese mafia ruled by Lady Tanaka(Kim Miyori). Castle sets out to killing gangsters, such as an one army man. Frank's ex-partner named Jake(Louis Gossett) and a cop(Nancy Everhard) try to catch him.

The picture packs action packed, thrills, shootouts, chills and lots of violence and explosion. The tale bears a remarkable resemblance with Charles Bronson films of the series 'Death wish', for the matter, the vengeance,as the starring becomes a hit man and making as judge, jury and executioner and no better the mobsters he's pursuing. Adapted for a Marvel Comics Group character and written and drawn by Gerry Conway and consultant by the famous Stan Lee. Exhibited direct to video in United States, though in Europe showed in theatres years later being realized. The movie is set in US but filmed in Australian Outback. The motion picture is professionally directed by Mark Goldblatt, he's a prestigious editor and occasionally director(Dead heat). This adaptation was a flop and obtained lukewarm reception by the public. The recent and superior version(2004) directed by Jonathan Hensleigh and starred by Thomas Jane, Rebeca Romijin Stamos and John Travolta achieved much success in the box office, in spite of the extreme violence and crude scenes. It's a must see for Dolph Lundgren fans.

Relatively few comic-book-based films are true to their origins. For instance, Spoilers follow.

In the first Batman film, The Joker is killed In the second, The Penguin dies. The Swamp Thing films strayed significantly from their ... roots. So, okay: this version is markedly different from the comic book.

Within that context, the film is entertaining. Dolph Lundgren plays a laconic Punisher, who finds himself in the middle of a war between two crime organizations. As with the second version of Blade, our hero finds himself in a reluctant alliance with some of his enemies to confront a more dangerous group of enemies.

Actually, where the newer film (remake?) gives a better origin story, it takes forever to get going; this one gets right into the action. Rather like the Hamlet soliloquy in The Last Action Hero.

The violence is ludicrous, the plot inane and the dialog insipid. I couldn't even find a way to laugh at the ridiculous quality of this movie. Shame on Louis Gossett Jr. for lending his talent to this one. Dolf Lundgren is his normal untalented self.

No, this is not CITIZEN KANE. But it is an entertaining film that did make a somewhat unbelievable Marvel "hero" to celluloid.

Lundgren plays Frank Castle, a former NYPD detective (originally a military special ops expert in the comic) who loses his family to a mob hit. This pushes his already unstable personality over the edge, and he becomes a one-man judge, jury, and executioner. The VERY underrated Louis Gossett Jr. plays his former partner, determined to find him and keep him out of the gas chamber.

This movie is quite a decent action film. It actually delves quite deeply into the characters' motivations, their histories, their personalities. I agree with earlier comments that, out of the lot of action stars, Lundgren does bring at least some dramatic chops to the role. I really couldn't imagine Schwarzenegger playing this part, though Stallone or Willis might have been better choices.

The action sequences are done quite well for a low-budget film. The director, Mark Goldblatt, served as editor on films such as TERMINATOR 1 & 2, the underrated PREDATOR 2, TRUE LIES, STARSHIP TROOPERS, ARMAGEDDON, and PEARL HARBOR, so he definitely has knowledge of how to properly compose an action sequence. He also served as Paul Verhoeven's 2nd Unit Director on the original ROBOCOP.

The movie is rather tough to find, and though it strays away a bit from the source material, it does manage to flesh out a rather one-dimensional character.

A new version of THE PUNISHER is now being prepped, starring DREAMCATCHER's Thomas Jane as Frank Castle and directed by Jonathan Hensleigh.

Aside from missing the trademark skull outfit,you can't deny that Dolph looks like the Punisher. This isn't supposed to be anything more than an action movie,and thats what makes it work. Sure,there are some pretty lame lines uttered,but when it comes to action,this movie delivers the goods. Production values are good and so is the score. If the X-Men movie had had this much action,maybe it wouldn't have been so boring and worthless.

I like all there new Marvel comic book adaptations,they are fun,but as far as casting goes the best two were Christopher Reeves as Superman and Dolph Lungdren as the Punisher.

This is a gritty and very violent movie. Tha action is fast and furious and most of the characters are hard to like...a dark movie. Castles, as most of you know, has had his family killed by the Mafia,he goes on a killing rampage as the Punisher...125 dead in 5 years and just does not care...that is the background story.

In this movie the Mafia is so weakened by Castles that the Yakuza have stepped in and are taking over, Mafia children are kidnapped and people are dying by the dozen as castle does his thing...Lost of knifes in bodies and lots of lead poisonings in a short compact action film.

Neat story,a tortured and emotionally close to dead Dolph Lungdren and good supporting cast makes this one of Dolph better efforts and certainly worth digging up if you can find it.

Dolph Lundgren, either by choice or deficiency, plays Frank Castle (AKA The Punisher) with all the intensity of someone who has a very, very bad hangover. It's one thing for an anti-hero to be laconic, quite another to be almost catatonic. As always, co-star Louis Gossett Jr. gives a performance that suggests that he believes he's in a much better film, here playing Castle's former Partner Jake Berkowitz (I'm guessing the character was named before Mr. Gossett was cast).

This first cinematic incarnation of Marvel's 'The Punisher' is moderately diverting when something is being kicked, cut, shot or blown up, but sadly they decided to let people talk as well.

I've seen the user rating, I've read the users reviews but the majority are wrong, completely wrong. The people who slated this need to maybe watch movies from around the late 80's before casting judgment.

People need to realise this was made in the late 80's. Yes the music was cheesy and some of the acting was corny but the action was brilliant. Good plot, good action, great casting makes for an all round good film.

Yes it had its flaws but overall it was an easy to watch action film with a likeable protagonist in Frank Castle.

If this film was made into a cartoon version, exactly as it is, people would be raving about it.

When "The Punisher" first hit video racks in 1989, I was a rabid teenage comic book collector, and at the time "The Punisher" was one of my favorite Marvel titles. I had a huge collection of "Punisher" comics and never missed an issue, so needless to say, I was quite stoked to finally see Frank Castle hit the big screen (or I suppose I should say "small screen"). Unfortunately, on my first viewing of "The Punisher" I absolutely HATED it. I was so infuriated at how the producers played fast-and-loose with the character's back story and mythology that I actually wrote a letter to Marvel listing off my complaints about the inaccuracies in the film ("Why wasn't Frank wearing the Skull Emblem? Why was he living in the sewers like a damned Mutant Ninja Turtle? He's not an ex-cop, he's an ex-Marine! Where was the War Wagon? Where was Microchip?" etc., etc...)... what can I say, I was young, and Hell hath no fury like an Enraged Geek.

Twenty years have gone by, I'm now a retired Comic Book Geek (I sold off the bulk of my collection, including my "Punisher" books, in the late '90s), and one day I came across Dolph's "Punisher" in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart. I had only vague memories of the film by this point so I figured "Ehhh, what the hell." Now that enough time has passed that I can separate this film from the original source material (I'm still convinced that when New World Pictures obtained the "Punisher" license, they didn't bother to read any of the comics -- they just plugged the characters' names into a generic action movie script they already had laying around in a drawer somewhere), I actually enjoyed "The Punisher" a lot more than I did back in the day. It's still "The Punisher" in name only, and the lack of attention to detail still bugged me a little, but on its own merits, "The Punisher" was a pretty decent B-grade action movie. If carnage is your thing, this flick will definitely satisfy in spades. There are crazy gun battles seemingly every two minutes (using approximately 50,000 shell casings per frame of film), martial arts smackdowns with ninjas, a surprising amount of gore, and decent stuntwork for what was obviously a low budget film. I've never been a big fan of Dolph Lundgren but I have to admit he captured the haunted, tortured look in Frank Castle's eyes and he did present a hell of an imposing figure, stalking the underworld in black leather biker gear and carrying Big F'n Guns. The storyline is silly at best (in a nutshell, Frank's war against the Mafia is interrupted by the arrival of a new gang from the Japanese Yakuza who wish to muscle in on the territory, leading Frank into an uneasy truce with his former targets in order to eliminate their common enemy) but the actors play their roles well (particularly the Japanese actress who portrayed the insane Yakuza head Lady Tanaka and the ever-reliable Louis Gossett Jr., adding yet another Angry Cop role to his resume as Castle's former police partner) and the amount of pyrotechnics thrown on screen will ensure the viewer never gets bored.

I still have not seen either of the two recent "Punisher" films that supposedly are more faithful to the character's comic book origins, but I'll probably get to them one of these days. As of right now, this early draft has shot up a few notches in my estimation and I'd say it would make a decent rental/purchase for the action junkies out there. Ignore the ramblings of the Comic Book Geeks who hate this movie. I should know, I used to be one of them.

A vigilante already responsible for one hundred and twenty five murders continues to bring the punishment to mobsters and for a little more fun fights off the yakuza. I myself like a good actioner and to enjoy a movie like this, it's no secret that you have to put your brain on hold to take in the action. Dolph Lundgren makes a capable vigilante and there are enough surreal moments that satisfy on the visceral level. However movies like this always suffer from the less than stellar acting, the cheesy villains and a script that is made to never get in the way of the action. On these terms The Punisher succeeds in delivering the required action and remains an adequate Lundgren vehicle.

* *1/2 out of 4-(Pretty good)

I can see this movie wasn't that badly reviewed and people have made some good arguements for it, but I just did not enjoy it. The costume was nothing like the comic book and though Dolph looked like the punisher he did not act like him. He was to dreary and slow talking the real Punisher is not this silent and brooding. But overlooking that, this Punisher is always seemingly unprepared. He runs out of ammo quite often or he is stuck using a 12-gauge when he needs a machine gun. The villians aren't to great either, but this is Marvel's fault because they sell the rights to their characters to whoever. The Kingpin or Jigzaw should have been the villians instead we get nondescript mobsters and the Japanese mafia. If Marvel would just sell the rights to all their characters to a major studio they would be much better off and their movies would not be so cheaply made. Look what New Line did with Blade and Fox did with X-man, if you sell the rights to your characters to good studios you get a better movie.