Marvel Origins: The Punisher

Updated
Marvel Origins: The Punisher
Faneditor Name:
Original Movie Title:
Fanedit Type:
Original Release Date:
2004
Original Running Time:
140
Fanedit Release Date:
Fanedit Running Time:
93
Time Cut:
47
Brief Synopsis:
After his wife and family are killed, G-Man Frank Castle takes it upon himself to distribute punishment to those responsible for the vendetta.
Intention:
The Punisher character is dark story of revenge and murder and while the film remains faithful to it’s source material for me a lot of this didn’t work. Working from the extended cut in which the character Jimmy Weeks played a more important role, I removed other elements of the film focusing purely on Frank Castles lust for revenge.
Release Information:
  • DVD
  • Digital
Special Features
DL DVD Only

2 trailers
Deleted/Extended scenes
Making Of (removes characters not involved in the edit)
Step up / In Time music videos (using stills from the film)
Editing Details:
The 2004 Punisher movie had two of the worst characters in Spacker Dave (Ben Foster) and Bumpo (John Pinette). They were too stereotypical and brought unnecessary humour to film about revenge. They appear briefly in the cafe scene but have no other involvement.

The character of Joan has also been removed and in doing so I’ve removed the proposed love interest between her and Frank. I didn’t like the idea that Frank could find love so soon after losing his wife. The film also has this morale tale that Frank could be a normal person if he choice’s to be. I wanted a Punisher movie were the main character had been tipped so far over the edge that they was just no way back for him.

Because of the removal of Frank’s neighbours the Russian fight scene also had to be removed. It takes away a lot of the violence to the film but for me the fight was too cartoony. plus if Howard Saint knew were Frank was living to send the Russian then why not just send 20 of his men with guns (he did it before)

Also removed is the scene were Frank relives himself to the media. He asks why no one has been arrested for killing his family then starts killing everyone connected and the police don’t do anything?

The family massacre scene has been trimmed and is no longer two family’s that are being wiped out. The popsicle from torture scene has been removed along with Mickeys voice over. It makes Frank Castle character a lot more darker and shows the lengths in which he’ll go to the truth.
Cuts and Additions:
Key Cuts

Removed the Frank Castle’s annoying neighbours and proposed love interest between Frank and Joan
Removed Frank confronting his boss in front of media
Family massacre scene cut so it’s just Frank’s wife, son and parents killed
Removed Punisher logo in flames after the car lot explodes
Removed Russian fight scene
Removed Witch Doctor character
Removed Popsicle from torture scene and Mickeys voice over.
Continuity error removed scene during funeral. Travolta is seen with shades then without
Roy Scheider speech at the party about both family’s being together
Removed Frank and wife on beach having conversion as i felt it was to sloppy
removed lame joke about Livia taking a train and Quentin been wrapped up in something after Howard had just killed them
Removed continuity error of Howard on fire then not during end
Cover art by Leeroy (DOWNLOAD HERE)
image

Trailer

User reviews

5 reviews
Overall rating
 
9.0
Audio/Video Quality
 
8.3(4)
Audio Editing
 
9.0(4)
Visual Editing
 
9.0(4)
Narrative
 
9.7(3)
Enjoyment
 
9.0(5)
Overall rating
 
9.4
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
10.0
Enjoyment
 
8.0
The Exclusion of Castle’s neighbours and the Russian Hitman certainly works to the edits benefit allowing the more darker and grittier aspects of The Punisher’s sociopathic bloodstained carnage to shine through and this is definitely my go to version whenever I am in the mood for Thomas Jane’s Punisher though I wish you’d kept the flaming skull in as I found it to be very stylistic and badass plus I feel like Frank is someone who would want to make his kills as stylistic and brutal as possible and it made Howard Saint’s death look awesome.

There was a fair bit of background noise throughout the edit and by background noise I don’t mean as in there was outside sound interference with the edit but rather a lot of picture noise which can generally be seen in daytime sky scenes and indoor scenes, I wish you could have altered the scene where Frank stabs the guy so hard that said guy yells like an opera singer so that said guy screams in agony like a normal person.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
P
Top 100 Reviewer 42 reviews
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Overall rating
 
9.6
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
10.0
Great edit: this is now a Punisher movie in spirit as well as in name. Darker. Removed implausibilites and efforts to soften the character. You can probably find better action films with the same basic story. It’s always a bit difficult to make Frank Castle stand out in the cinema as the basic story and motives pretty much constitute a genre and he's been beaten to the screen by characters like Paul Kersey; Castle himself is obviously a variant of the Mack Bolan type, so even in literature he’s not exactly unique. But if you want the Punisher, if you love fan-edits, and if you want a guns-blazing brutal action, you will love this film. It’s not a film about redemption. But with this edit, the bland Punisher film (2004) has been redeemed: at last, a good Punisher film is available. Thanks Leeroy!

User Review

Format Watched?
Digital
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
(Updated: March 10, 2014)
Overall rating
 
8.6
Audio/Video Quality
 
7.0
Audio Editing
 
8.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Narrative
 
10.0
Enjoyment
 
10.0
A worthy fan edit and definitely made the film a straight-forward Punisher film. Eliminated a lot of nonsense and focuses on the revenge and justice portion of the film which was much needed. I find this to be my favorite way to watch the film now and only hope for an HD form to obtain as the DL was sub-par in quality in the video department. Thank You to the maker, you did an excellent job!

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
DVD
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
(Updated: September 08, 2012)
Enjoyment
 
8.0
WyndorfDave August 7, 2011 @ 7:00 am

*This rating was given before reviews were required*
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(Updated: September 08, 2012)
Overall rating
 
8.3
Audio/Video Quality
 
8.0
Audio Editing
 
8.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
I downloaded the full dual layer DVD, to then use my pal DVDShrink on it and was pleased to find that the movies takes about as much space as a single layer disc which is great for my particular burning hardware situation and even if i had the hardware i know from experience fact that dual layer burning is a pain.
It’s clear that leeroy worked hard on making a cool menu and a number of special features, and dumping them is not what I’d prefer to do, for which i can only say sorry.

Onto the actual review

Video quality – Quite good standard definition video is presented, no compression artifacts are noticeable with a proper aspect ratio and thankfully my hardware dvd player supports PAL; but heres the thing: it has been a while since i watched the original movie and I don’t remember if the whole of the movie was as visually dark throughout as is presented here. Even broad daylight scenes in sunny Florida seems to have the light drained out of them and when it’s night or inside non illuminated spaces it was hard for me to make some things out. I’m pretty sure that i was supposed to be able to see The Punisher’s huge chest skull a number of times and it was so dark i just could see a weird smear. Yet overall still quite good – 8/10

Sound quality – Sound quality is also quite good, with no major noticeable edition pops, and only in a couple of places I noticed some sudden volume fluctuations, specially a couple of times when a quite scene shifted to some music. Nothing major, just could be polished a bit more – 8/10

Edit – to be honest The Punisher character has never been one of my favorites, Marvel keeps trying to sell him as edgy corner of their otherwise superhero heavy universe and he often falls into a cliched heavy mobster hating/vengeance territory. For stand alone movie purposes I would have expected a dark tale of vengeance, and that I did not get some years ago.

Now in this edit leeroy gets into the hard labor of removing some very thick layers of cheese that plagued the original release. Dumb comic relief characters have been heavily toned down or almost completely excised – specially Frank’s neighbors!; and whatever else had to be lost in order to remove them is more than justified.

I also read that a post family execution character that would have a love interest was excised, something that I just couldn’t remember even being there originally, yet I agree that that kind of thing would have been so out of place that words couldn’t describe it. Only negative is that I guess we lost Rebecca Romjin from gracing our screens but you can’t have everything.

Other small things are improved, such as a better pace so that the movie doesn’t drag on forever and somehow made Frank seem more smart and cunning with his revenge planning/implementing to me which was really good; specially during the climatic assault on the gathered mobsters and hitmen at the club.

Overall I have to say that I was entertained and enjoyed the experience exponentially more than I did the original, so a major credit goes to leeroy for that; Travolta will never be my favorite actor, and seeing him as a menacing antagonist is just too improbable for me but well thats impossible to fix.

Only one last note: I wish that the scene where Frank’s son gives him the skull t-shirt would have been taken out as i find it very corny.
As I have stated for other reviews, this movie will never be great but this edit has made it watchable. – 9/10

Overall a quite solid 8.33 from me, great job

Review by havok1977 — July 21, 2011 @ 6:25 PM
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