During a recent viewing of The Punisher, I kept thinking about the reviews, which were almost universally negative. I can't figure this out at all. It's a really solid action movie, with pornographic levels of violence. Arrows get shot through necks! Knives get jabbed into people! Hot water is thrown in faces! And guns, guns, GUNS!!!
It even has great action movie dialogue:
THE PUNISHER
(extra gravelly)
God's gonna sit this one out.
YOU
(watching the movie)
Yeah, motherfucker!!! DESTROY!!!!
If The Punisher isn't awesome, then no action movie possibly can be -- and we know that's not the case. So why do so many people pretend to not like this movie?
Is it because comic book movies are judged on a different scale from movies with other source material? Why do the effects-laden Lord of the Rings movies deserve multiple Oscars, while the in-my-opinion-better Spider-Man films don't get so much as a nomination? Why is Daredevil -- an entirely passable movie with some good villain performances -- given worse reviews than the unwatchable Resident Evil: Apocalypse?
I think Rotten Tomatoes (.com) is a better representation of movie quality, since they canvass all the actual reviews. Daredevil got a 44%, RE:A got a 27%.
IMDB scores tend to fall after a release, once the hype has died down.
So RE is no good? Damn it.
I'm still going to see it though. I'm thinking a suck-fest double feature this weekend. RE followed by Wimbolden.
In RE:A, most people were laughing at Common-Sense-Spouting Comic Relief Black Guy (tm), but I was laughing at the scene where Jill enters a police station and shoots four people in the head without being so much as reprimanded.
(Also classic: hero jumps out of helicopter firing two guns and accurately kills zombies; Mila Jovovovich inexplicably drives a motorcycle through a church window in the nick of time even though there's no reason she should think people are in there to save)
RE:A's greatest crime, though, is its lack of zombie mayhem. I think maybe one dude gets eaten by zombies, at the very end. Everyone else gets a little bite or something. Nobody ever gets their torso ripped in two or their liver played with. Bah I say!
I have to say that Daredevil really sucked considering the plot and how well it was put together on a storyline.
But Spiderman and its sequel were really great. They deserved some awards.
I TOLD you Punisher was a good movie! Oh, and Lord of the Rings got oscars cuz its good, spiderman didn't cuz its BAAAAAAAD. Same with Daredevil- definitly not passable to me. Did you see Napolean Dynamite?
Sigh, I spent all last night playing the movie opinion justification game and I am weary. For anyone who values my warantless opinion:
RE:A at least watch-able if not good
DD: I accepted it at the theater showing, I despise it on two subsequent viewings.