Critics Scoreboard
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...
Average Critic Score:
33
(36 sources)
33
(36 sources)
-
75
Rolling Stone
Among the recent spate of comic-book movies, from "Spider-Man" to the "X-Men," The Punisher is unique. Read Full Review » -
75
-
70
Washington Post
Unlike some of its recent ilk – "Spider-Man," for example – The Punisher is, no disrespect, a thoroughly morose and bilious affair. That is precisely what I like best about it. Read Full Review » -
63
Miami Herald
Considering the horrible buzz that had dogged the movie since its trailers first premiered, The Punisher turns out to be a likable underdog. Read Full Review » -
63
Baltimore Sun
The Punisher punishes. That's what he does, and that's all this movie does. Read Full Review » -
60
Los Angeles Times
That rare comic book movie that actually feels like a comic book. Which turns out to be mostly, but not entirely, a good thing. Read Full Review » -
50
Christian Science Monitor
The most entertaining scenes focus on the lovable louts and losers who share the boardinghouse where the protagonist - based on a comic-book character billed as a superhero without superpowers - prepares his grisly exploits. The rest is mayhem. Read Full Review » -
50
TV Guide
The second attempt to bring a dark corner of the Marvel comic-book universe to the screen, this comic-book-based revenge story is undermined by its inconsistent tone. Read Full Review » -
50
Philadelphia Inquirer
For such a formulaic vigilante film, The Punisher has a far better cast than it deserves. Read Full Review » -
50
San Francisco Chronicle
It's a prevailing sense of humor that makes this an entertaining, if silly, film adaptation of the Marvel comic. Read Full Review » -
50
New York Post
Travolta is terrific as a bad guy, making Saint almost sympathetic. His co-stars however, flounder in a sea of bad lines, with poor Romijn-Stamos getting stuck with the worst. Read Full Review » -
50
Chicago Sun-Times
The Punisher is so grim and cheerless, you wonder if even its hero gets any satisfaction from his accomplishments. Read Full Review » -
50
Chicago Reader
There's something to be said for letting a comic book adaptation operate at the level of a comic book--i.e., with cheap laughs and ice-cold sadism. Read Full Review » -
42
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
It's hard to imagine how anyone could sit through this thing except squirming critics and violence addicts in need of a particularly gruesome fix. Read Full Review » -
40
The Hollywood Reporter
A tone-deaf muddle that shifts moods more often than its lone wolf vigilante rubs out bad guys, clocking in at a punishingly paced two hours and change. Read Full Review » -
40
Variety
Fires blanks. Thoroughly routine, pic plays like a paint-by-numbers pilot for bygone basic-cable teleseries. Read Full Review » -
40
Film Threat
The movie lives up to its “R” rating in the final scenes, but it’s too little too late. Read Full Review » -
40
Village Voice
With topical revenge fantasies already available (Dogville, the Kill Bills) and with Roy Scheider on hand as a gun-loving paterfamilias, The Punisher mismanages its greatest asset: an unusual embarrassment of camp riches. Read Full Review » -
40
Empire
A creaky script which avoids tackling the morality of Castle's actions, while Hensleigh doesn't do himself any favours by slowing the film's momentum with leaden editing. Read Full Review » -
40
Wall Street Journal
Punishes the audience with a flat starring performance; Mr. Jane finds few sparks of life in a hero who wasn't all that lively to begin with. Read Full Review » -
38
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
An overemphatic revenge fantasy devoid of even a trace of excitement or wit. Read Full Review » -
38
New York Daily News
It features an insane amount of violence and a number of visual references to the comic, but it lacks the original's humor and spirit. Read Full Review » -
38
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38
ReelViews
The Punisher isn't Frank Castle; it's Jonathan Hensleigh. And the punishee is anyone sitting in the audience. Read Full Review » -
30
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Sadly, The Punisher is about little more than bullets hitting bone, and how good it might feel to be on the right end of a gun. Read Full Review » -
30
The New York Times
Its lack of subtlety is clearly a point of pride, and Mr. Hensleigh's flat-footed, hard-punching style has a blunt ferocity that makes "Kill Bill" look like "In the Bedroom." Read Full Review » -
30
Salon.com
If you can get past the goofy writing, there's lots of noisy action in The Punisher, but little of it is particularly exhilarating. In fact, it's more of an endurance test. If you can sit through it, you should consider yourself duly punished. Read Full Review » -
25
Boston Globe
The movie is as grim and grave as the comic book. But it lacks atmosphere. It's often illogical and drubs you numb with its single dimension: noisy retribution. Read Full Review » -
25
Chicago Tribune
In a case study of how to screw up a simple, powerful revenge story, director Jonathan Hensleigh punishes audiences with an unbearably sluggish action movie that requires the word "action" to be placed in quotes. Read Full Review » -
20
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20
LA Weekly
As bad as the movie is, when it tries to be funny -- a hired killer who sings to his victims, a fat man named Bumpo, and an interminable fight scene choreographed to “La donna è mobile” -- it somehow manages to get several degrees worse. Read Full Review » -
20
Dallas Observer
The Punisher would be almost offensive were it not so inconsequential. There's just something terribly off-putting about a movie in which every gruesome death is a punch line, where a villain's homosexuality is used to lure him to his death and dozens of innocents are gunned down just to launch a film franchise. Read Full Review » -
16
Entertainment Weekly
The Punisher is a moronically inept and tedious piece of death-wish trash. Read Full Review » -
16
Portland Oregonian
It actually makes the 1989 version (starring Dolph Lundgren) look pretty good by comparison. Oh, yes. It's that ghastly. Read Full Review » -
0
Washington Post
Don't hold your breath waiting for The Punisher to be original, not for one second of its torturous two hours. Read Full Review » -
0
Austin Chronicle
The Punisher is such a bad film that it becomes inadvertently entertaining; it’s enough to make you pine for the original version of the black-clad Marvel Comics’ badass, played to awful imperfection in 1989 by Dolph Lundgren. Read Full Review »
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