Punisher War Zone

• 411 Movies Interview: Ray Stevenson of Punisher: War Zone

  Published on: March 24, 2009

  411's Tony Farinella sits down with the Punisher for an exclusive interview!
  
  Punisher: War Zone has been called one of the most violent films

  
  in recent memory. It features an intense performance from Ray Stevenson (Rome) as he channels the cold and calculated Frank Castle. Recently, I had the pleasure of interviewing Ray Stevenson, and we discussed a number of interesting topics, including the violence in the film, director Lexi Alexander, his career, his training, and a whole lot more. Punisher: War Zone is currently out on DVD.

  "...I read all the background material, and I wanted to bring that comic book onto the screen without pulling any punches, without shying away from the obvious violence that's there and also the serious moral questions that it raises and the fact that there's no redemption for Frank. This character has set himself on a course and accepted the fact that there is no light at the end of his tunnel..."

  Read the full interview here.

  

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• Exclusive Interview with Punisher Doug Hutchinson "Loony Bin Jim" + Punisher DVD contest

  Published on: March 17, 2009

  Behind The Scenes' Eric Fell had the opportunity to talk to Punisher: War Zone's Doug Hutchinson. Hutchinson plays the role of Loony Bin Jim in the film that arrives on DVD and Blu-Ray March 17th (which you also have the chance to win HERE).

  Eric Fell: First of all Doug, thank you for taking the time to do this interview.

  Doug Hutchinson: My pleasure Eric.

  EF: I've seen the movie and it was pretty crazy. It was like Death Wish on an energy drink. 

  

  DH: Steroids... or Monster Full Throttle.

  (Both laugh)

  EF: What was it that attracted you to the project?

  DH: Lexi Alexander, the director. I initially passed on the script. I found it really entertaining but I didn't really relate to the role of LBJ (Loony Bin Jim). And so I passed and my agents couldn't succeed in twisting my arm, so all of a sudden I got a call at home from Lexi Alexander and she pitched me passionately for about five minutes. She gave me her perspective on the role, said she didn't want anybody else to play it but me and when we finished with her conversation she had me wrapped around her little finger. I took the plunge and I'm glad I did because I had a blast working on it, but Lexi was definitely the reason.

  EF: And I'm assuming it went well working with her onset and your buoyant description of it being a blast.

  DH: It was awesome. She really allowed me and the rest of the cast to try new things and bring fresh ideas to the table and so I had the right to just go crazy...and so I did.

  EF: You did...go crazy. Would you say it's more liberating or more hindering to play someone that unbalanced, I'll put mildly.

  DH: I would say liberating because how often do we get to do that in life? It's a lot of fun just to let your hair down and have the permission to play like that. My challenge in playing a role like that is since I've played a plethora of villains in the body of my career thus far. When I'm always faced with playing another antagonist I'm always challenged by how can I infuse this one with freshness. How can I make it different from the many villains I've played in the past. Hopefully make it something different to watch instead of playing the same old, same old.

  EF: One choice I noticed you made in the film was not to blink. The first scene you're in, you rarely blink and that reminded me of Hannibal Lecter. It brought a real intesnity to the character.

  DH: I'm so happy you picked that up because that was definitely something I did on purpose. That was something I was hoping to bring to the character. It's also interesting you brought Hannibal Lecter up because that was part of Lexi's initial pitch. In her pitch she kept bringing up that Anthony Hopkins was one of her favorite actors and I love his performance in Silence of the Lambs obviously. I've been dabbling a lot with the idea of stillness in film performing and I'm trying to apply that message of stillness and since LBJ on the page, was so off the map what I wanted to do was play the extremes. In other words, when he's not ripping the intestines out of the abusive orderly, he's really still and almost childlike. So the open eyes and the looking into you kind of thing.

  EF: Another thing I noticed was there was an antagonistic relationship with everyone in the film, except for LBJ and Jigsaw. They almost have the healthiest relationship in the film.

  DH: (laughs) Yes it is.

  EF: They're some of the most vicious people I've seen in a long time.

  DH: I'm happy you picked that up to because that was important to not only me, but Lexi and Dominic that we establish that bond between these brothers. That it's this loving, verging sometimes on uncomfortably incestual, but they really care for each other. It was a really nice opposite to play, to humanize these deranged characters instead of just to play two dimensional monsters. There were a few windows of opportunity to do that and the first one was the reveal of LBJ in the mental institution and I hope it wasn't just me, but it was somewhat touching when Jigsaw walks in and they haven't seen each other for ten years and LBJ wakes up and says 'Brother, is that you?' and he goes 'Yeah' and he comes over to the bed and takes my hands and there's this real beautiful moment between each other and these guys really care and they'll kill for each other. They'll do whatever it takes.

  EF: I want to ask you about the bathroom fight as well. That was a pretty intense, close quarters fight. How long did that take to stage?

  DH: Oh my gosh...we took almost a half day to shoot that scene I think. It was really involved, I did as much of it as I could without a stunt double. I wanted to be in it as much as possible and only have our stunt guys do that outrageous flips and bouncing and jumping off the walls and all that martial arts stuff. It took a long time because every single setup was a new hit or a new punch or scratch. One of the things I really enjoyed about working with the stunt coordinator is that he was really down with...I didn't want it to come off too stagy. I loved the viciousness of the fight so what I was suggesting was "What if I bite him in the neck here and scratch his eyes out here and pull his hair" because LBJ would fight dirty. It's fight to kill. It wasn't this clean sort of martial arts fight type of thing. I hope we injected that vicious unpredictability to that fight scene.

  EF: With the bite to the neck, I actually went 'Oooh, ooh!' in that bit.

  DH: (laughts)

  EF: I guess you were doing a lot of your stunt work with Ray Stevenson. What was it like working alongside him?

  DH: It was so cool. I thought he put in a stoic, moving performance as Frank Castle. Ray pretty much embodied the role when he was on set. He was a silent and an introspective character, but he'd step off the set and he's this friendly, jovial, guy all excited about... well, his wife was pregnant at the time and they were about to have a baby boy and his eyes would light up talking about his wife. He was passionate, fun, kind. I hope to work with him again, he's a real champ.

  EF: He seems pretty intimidating, but everybody in this film was scaring me a little bit. The Punisher wasn't a classic hero, he was a force of nature kind of like Jason from Friday the 13th. He just comes in and leaves all this chaos in his wake.

  DH: Like a machine...

  EF: Yeah, and I thought it was very cool.

  DH: Yeah, one of my favorite scenes in the movie is actually when we've busted in the house and we've taken the wife and the child and the tables turn and it's when Colin comes in and basically has our cohorts at gunpoint and is about to arrest them. So he just pulls out his gun and blows him away and says 'No, this is justice'. We're not going through the court system, we're not going to allow the slightest possibility that this scum of the earth will run free. I just dispatched justice. That was him, he was no mercy.

  EF: It was one of those moments that reminded me of when I was little and rented Death Wish.

  DH: Totally, I loved your description. I hope you don't mind if I use it...

  EF: Please do...

  DH: Death Wish on energy drink... Death Wish on Full Throttle.

  EF: Thank you for your time...I'm behind on Lost so I'm deliberately not asking you about that because I don't want to get spoiled.

  DH: That's OK. To be honest with you I don't know how much I could answer anyway because they don't tell me anything. I just go to Hawaii, shoot the episode and that's all she wrote.

  EF: Very cool.

  DH: I would like to mention a project I'm involved in. It's a passion project of mine. Last year I created a web series and you can view it at www.vampirekillers.tv. It's a story about four twentysomethings who have been solicited by a faceless entity in the LA area to hunt and destroy thirteen very alluring female vampires who have an agenda to take down the human race.

  EF: That sounds great.

  DH: I created it, produced it and we built the site last year. You can go to the site and watch the first six episodes. They're all approximately a minute and a half to three minutes in length. Let me know what you think. I'm hoping to take it to the next level this year and take it to a series.

  EF: I'm a big fan of monsters and vampires so I'm defineitly going to check that out. That's vampirekillers.tv?

  DH: Yes, vampirekillers.tv. And then, I also did another movie for Lionsgate called The Burrowers. It's actually a horror western that we shot with Clancy Brown, William Mapother and David Midthunder shot. JT Petty directed it. It was Lionsgate, they did it with a small theatrical release but it's also going to be available on DVD next month on April 21st.

  EF: Very cool. I love the mashing up of genres like Blade Runner which is Sci-Fi and film noir. That sounds really cool and I'll be looking forward to that too. Well once again, thank you so much for your time Doug and I'll check out Vampirekillers.tv tonight!

  DH: Please do, and thank you for the interview Eric I really enjoyed it. 

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• Exclusive: Lexi Alexander on Punisher: War Zone

  Published on: December 5, 2008

  Superherohype has caught up with 'Punisher: War Zone' director Lexi Alexander. Alexander shares details on the process of the movie including not being approved for a budget right away. She also chats about Marvel's involvement, the violence, being a female director and ideas of what's going on next. 'Punisher: War Zone' stars Julie Benz, Colin Salmon, Dash Mihok, Dominic West and Ray Stevenson. You can catch it in theaters now.

  "... I immediately brought onto the project a military advisor and gun advisor. There's a company called GUNMETAL, and they're marines and Special Forces guys. I basically let them take the lead and they showed me weapons and they showed me choices, and they put them in front of Ray and me and then I visually said, "I want this one, this one, this one..."

  Read the full interview here.

  

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