Lexi Alexander Discusses 'Punisher: War Zone' Teaser

The teaser trailer for Punisher: War Zone caught us all by surprise late last week -- even the movie's director, Lexi Alexander. She updated her blog talking about the reaction to the trailer, as well as her own feelings about it. She's surprisingly mixed about the cut of the teaser!

"I'm not sure what kind of impression I would get from this trailer if I didn't actually know the film. I am utterly impressed, though, they managed to find that much PG rated action footage at all. It had to be a challenge to cut a trailer from our action stuff without showing any gore and blood." She is quite keen for us to see the exploding heads that result from Frank Castle's bullets, and hopes that an eventual red band trailer will let us see one.

One of the criticisms I have heard repeatedly is how neon the film seems to be. Everything is bathed in a rather Joel Schumacher light. I'm always hesitant to criticize anything on so little footage, but I had to admit, we haven't seen that much neon lighting since the 80's. Alexander actually addresses all such criticism and explains the look she was going for by way of several Punisher panels. Apparently, the color scheme was inspired by the Punisher's MAX books.

She writes, " Don't expect this Punisher to be set in an ultra-realistic world. Every director has to make a call on the vision and style of a film and putting The Punisher in a realistic and gritty setting would be like having Det. Vic Mackey of The Shield run around with a big ass skull on his chest, or Ray Liotta's character in NARC suddenly go: 'Hey, I think I just saw a guy whose face looks like a Jigsaw puzzle.' Ha ha. Real crime stories and comic books are two different worlds for me. It was my first priority to please The Punisher comic book fans."

I'm actually looking forward to this one, largely because of the cast, and because Alexander's enthusiasm is downright infectious. Plus, I can't help but get behind a badass chick directing a character like the Punisher. She can be proud that she's already sold a ticket to my fangirl mother, who isn't remotely interested in The Dark Knight or Wolverine, but who wants to prebuy a ticket for Ray Stevenson alone. You should have seen how mad she was when the trailer wouldn't work. Good lord.


[via SuperheroHype.com]