GAMES: GameSpot | GameFAQs MUSIC: Last.fm | MP3.com MOVIES: Metacritic | Movietome TV: TV.com
Home | About Metacritic | About Metascores | What's New | Wireless Versions | Discussion Forums | Advertising Inquiries | Contact Us | RSS
Metacritic.com: We Deal With Criticism
     Help
> Switch to Advanced Search  
Film Video/DVD Music Games TV

Film

Upcoming Release Calendar
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

 

Wide Releases

sort by name sort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 

Limited Releases

sort by name sort by score

67 $9.99
75 24 City
66 Adoration
74 Afghan Star
48 Alien Trespass
56 American Violet
82 Anvil! The Story of Anvil
57 Away We Go
81 Beaches of Agnes, The
62 Big Man Japan
28 Big Shot-Caller, The
78 Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
55 Brothers Bloom, The
82 Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
xx Call of the Wild
63 Cheri
62 Cherry Blossoms
63 Dead Snow
65 Departures
18 Downloading Nancy
58 Easy Virtue
70 End of the Line, The
77 Every Little Step
64 Examined Life
80 Food, Inc.
38 Gigantic
56 Girl from Monaco, The
67 Girlfriend Experience, The
87 Gomorrah
89 Goodbye Solo
63 Great Buck Howard, The
79 Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
xx Home
82 Hunger
91 Hurt Locker, The
16 I Hate Valentine's Day
81 Il Divo
54 Is Anybody There?
71 Jerichow
58 Julia
74 Lemon Tree
36 Life is Hot in Cracktown
40 Limits of Control, The
42 Little Ashes
64 Lymelife
50 Management
57 Merry Gentleman, The
66 Moon
35 New York
62 Not Forgotten
xx Offshore
78 O'Horten
64 Outrage
40 Paris 36
54 Pontypool
71 Pressure Cooker
52 Quiet Chaos
83 Revanche
67 Rudo y Cursi
86 Seraphine
65 Sex Positive
70 Shall We Kiss?
77 Sin Nombre
59 Sleep Dealer
74 Song of Sparrows, The
54 Stoning of Soraya M., The
82 Sugar
84 Summer Hours
61 Sunshine Cleaning
28 Surveillance
42 Tennessee
63 Tetro
64 Throw Down Your Heart
80 Tokyo Sonata
63 Tokyo!
70 Tony Manero
74 Treeless Mountain
88 Tulpan
74 Two Lovers
83 Tyson
83 U2 3D
60 Under Our Skin
69 Unmistaken Child
69 Valentino: The Last Emperor
22 What Goes Up
45 Whatever Works
57 Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 



Printer-Friendly Version Email This Page Discuss In Our Forums

Punisher: War Zone
Lionsgate

Punisher: War Zone reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 30 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
7.3 out of 10
based on 24 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 57 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for pervasive strong brutal violence, language and some drug use

Starring Ray Stevenson, Doug Hutchinson, Colin Salmon, Dominic West, Wayne Knight, Dash Mihok, and Julie Benz

Waging his one-man war on the world of organized crime, ruthless vigilante-hero Frank Castle sets his sights on overeager mob boss Billy Russoti. After Russoti is left horribly disfigured by Castle, he sets out for vengeance under his new alias: Jigsaw. With the "Punisher Task Force" hot on his trail and the FBI unable to take Jigsaw in, Frank must stand up to the formidable army that Jigsaw has recruited before more of his evil deeds go unpunished. (Lionsgate)


GENRE(S): Action  |  Crime  |  Drama  |  Suspense/Thriller  
WRITTEN BY: Matt Holloway
Art Marcum
Nick Santora
Lexi Alexander
 
DIRECTED BY: Lexi Alexander  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: March 17, 2009 
Theatrical: December 5, 2008 
RUNNING TIME: 107 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA | Canada 

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

75
TV Guide Jeremy Wheeler
Rarely have moviegoers seen such a two-fisted wrecking ball of vengeance such as the one realized here by Ray Stevenson.
Read Full Review
75
San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub
Assuming you can appreciate the high level of gore and assorted sadistic weirdness, the action is satisfying.
Read Full Review
58
Entertainment Weekly Clark Collis
Dominic West (The Wire) plays a facially mutilated Mob boss as if he's in a broad SNL sketch.
Read Full Review
50
Variety John Anderson
Along with torrents of gore, Punisher: War Zone has moments that are deliriously funny, because the violence is so awful and so casual.
Read Full Review
50
Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
It looks great, it hurtles through its paces and is well-acted. The soundtrack is like elevator music if the elevator were in a death plunge. The special effects are state of the art. Its only flaw is that it's disgusting.
Read Full Review
50
Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
The film works a bit better than the 2004 "Punisher" installment, the one starring surly, dislikable Thomas Jane as Frank Castle.
Read Full Review
50
Village Voice Luke Y. Thompson
The script isn't what matters here: This is a slasher movie with guns, and, uh, huh-huh, that's pretty cool.
Read Full Review
50
ReelViews James Berardinelli
This is essentially a Steven Seagal movie without the Ponytailed One, and may appeal to those who enjoyed Seagal's rather bland, cookie-cutter action films.
Read Full Review
40
Film Threat Scott Mendelson
Although it's possible to enjoy the first act and third act carnage without paying attention to the plot mechanics, the storyline itself continuously reminds us of the fallacy of Castle’s quest.
Read Full Review
40
Empire Tom Ambrose
Another violently unsuccessful attempt to bring this comic book character to screen.
Read Full Review
40
New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman
No worse than the second. Still, it pales in comparison to the first, which starred Dolph Lundgren. And that, right there, should tell you everything you need to know.
Read Full Review
40
Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten
The blood and gore quotients of Punisher: War Zone are extremely high and are sure to sop the appetites of the series' fans and virtual bloodlusters.
Read Full Review
38
USA Today Claudia Puig
The dialogue is beyond clichéd, and performances feel cobbled together from other movies.
Read Full Review
38
Boston Globe Ty Burr
If most December movie releases are epic-length and Oscar-ambitious, then Punisher: War Zone has to be considered Hobbesian counterprogramming: It's nasty, brutish, and short.
Read Full Review
38
Philadelphia Inquirer David Hiltbrand
The acting is better than the script deserves and Lexi Alexander's cut-to-the-hearse direction lends the film considerable kick.
Read Full Review
38
Premiere Staff (Not credited)
A disappointingly schlocky effort that gives up on trying to make a realistic Punisher movie, settling instead on a hokey, multi-colored-neon gun rave best enjoyed in Rob Zombie's family room.
Read Full Review
30
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
This awful sequel dispenses with any such pretense, its cartoonish characters running an endless gauntlet of hypergruesome violence.
Read Full Review
30
The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck
So unrelentingly violent that all but teen boys might as well stay home.
Read Full Review
25
The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
This is junk, a bunch of hard-R action scenes kept together by the thinnest of plots.
Read Full Review
25
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
There is no stylistic thrill to this blunt object of a callous action film. It's content to bludgeon the audience into numb resignation.
Read Full Review
20
Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan
Anyone with a modicum of good sense -- or a weak stomach -- will take it as a warning to stay the heck away from this literally and figuratively deadly "War Zone."
Read Full Review
20
The New York Times A.O. Scott
Does it have to be so witless, so stupid, so openly contemptuous of the very audience it’s supposed to be pandering to?
Read Full Review
0
New York Post Kyle Smith
With its dopey fight scenes, grimy look and goopy gore, this movie is so far from ept that inept is the wrong word. It's anti-ept.
Read Full Review
0
Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
All Alexander proves in Punisher: War Movie is that a martial-arts-trained woman can make a film just as stupid, coarse and numbing as any muscle man.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 7.3 (out of 10) based on 57 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Mike De gave it a3:
I really wanted to like this movie but it was terrible. No plot line, the Punisher looked old as dirt and the acting was bad. Man, I thought this was going to be a good movie but I was disappointed. Aside from a couple of good violent scenes a la chair leg to the eye of the bad guy, you should give this movie a miss.

richard b gave it a10:
The critics must be smoking the good stuff because not only was this one of the best marvel movie, it was the BEst ACTION movie of 2008. Not many people saw it in the theaters because there were not many commercials. except for the blood and gore it was a clean movie for kids to see. No nudity or dirty stuff like watchmen.

Michael R gave it a0:
God awful piece of garbage! If you like this movie, you have no taste for quality film.

Angel E gave it a10:
This movie is amazing! If you love the comics or are a fan of violence you will really enjoy this movie. Be warned it is not for the tame. I didn't think I would like this new Punisher as much as I liked Jane, but Stevenson does an amazing job. He is the grizzled war vet that you read about when you look at the Punisher comics. The Punisher is violent and if you think you are going to see an Oscar performance you came to the wrong movie. Again do yourself a favor and buy this movie. It deserves to be acknowledged and a sequel deserves to be made. This is one of the best, if not the best comic movie ever!

Patton G gave it a10:
This is one of those movies the critics were completely wrong about. Any fan of Frank Castle who's even looked at a comic book knows that the last two movies were something awful. War Zone takes it in the right direction, and Ray Stevenson does a much better job of portraying Castle than does Jane - heck this movie even has a halfway accurate back story which already puts it over Jane's Punisher any day. The action is intense and gritty, just like you'd be reading one of the comic books. The acting isn't the greatest thing in the world, but anybody who's going to watch this movie and enjoy it isn't there for the acting - or even the gore - you're watching it to see Frank Castle kick the crap out of some scum, and War Zone finally lets him do it.

George M gave it a5:
First, off...its better than the first attempt...but not by much. The first Punisher film (IMO) was horribly miscast and was totally lacking in substance and character...this version of the Punisher stays true to the brutality and "no nonsense" of the Punisher character himself...but its thrown in with some of the most over the top, gratuitous "action" ive ever seen in a movie...it will probably tickle your funny-bone more than it will raise your pulse. One thing they nailed was the casting of the Punisher...Ray Stevenson walks the walk and talks the talk...and has the "look" down to a T and unlike the first film, this movie has a Punisher that truly has NO problems dispatching the guilty without remorse (as the Punisher character should)...but the weak story tarnishes this. There is a story...its just not in the least bit interesting, which is fine, because i dont think this film was going for anything "thought worthy"...but more "balls to the wall". Dominic West plays a decent enough villain...and he plays the character well, seemingly having a good time being a slimy, tough talking mob boss...obsessed with his looks (his accent during some of the dialog gave me a HUGE chuckle). If you are looking for something action packed, story-less, and hammy then this will be your "cotton candy" for an evening...cant recommend as a buy however. Overall...its worth a look...if anything, just to watch something loud and dumb which is nice from time to time...but to also see a potentially cool Punisher character...and afterwards, you can wonder what wouldve have happened had they gotten it right...oh well. Recommened as a RENTAL

Chris D gave it a10:
Hey look, a movie that actually stays true to the comic books, and everyone hates it. Big surprise. This is how the punisher is supposed to be.

Read more user comments...

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page
Home | FILM | DVD/VIDEO | MUSIC | GAMES | TV | Forums | About Metacritic metacritic.com

Popular on CBS sites: iPhone 3G | Fantasy Football | Moneywatch | Antivirus Software | Recipes | E3 2009

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use