3:25PM, Nov 18, 2008
Ang Lee's 2003 incarnation of the comic book hero divided audiences like Moses and the Red Sea. With Ed Norton about to take over the role, skymovies.com reviewer Rob Daniel and Editor Rich Phippen go toe to toe on the subject of Hulk.
Why Ang Lee's Hulk Is Offensively Bad, by Rich Phippen
The 2003 reincarnation of the Hulk was being touted as the next big comic book thing after the brilliant Spider-Man.
With CGI effects now capable of more than just Louis Ferrigno in ill-fitting Madhouse jeans, the Hulk seemed like the next most logical step in the path to comic book supremacy at the cinema.
Although the Superbowl trailer was ill-judged, the menace of the fleetingly seen Hulk was clear, and the presence of a director whose formidable dramatic credentials only just outweighed his action sensibility was too much to ignore - Hulk promised so much.
Which is why, when it delivered so little, the majority of us that saw it weren't just disappointed, we were downright pissed off.
The opening act isn't so bad. The story heads in the right direction as Bruce Banner is hit by some hardcore gamma rays, and the monster inside is slowly unleashed on the audience.
Lee does what all good directors should do with a monster - hide him for as long as physically possible.
But once he hits the screen it soon goes awry. Nothing to do with the monster, mind. It's the script. Something's gotta be done about the script!
Lee and his cohort, James Schamus, spent so much time worrying about psychological and underlying themes, they forgot about the plot.
The structure of the overall story arc is awful - once Banner's infected with the radiation that makes him the Hulk, the story falls apart. He spends most of the running time escaping the military, getting locked up, trying to remember stuff, running away again and, that's right, getting locked up again.
Meanwhile the presence of Nick Nolte creates an air of farce - hamming it up with scraggly hair and a beard, Nolte overacts so much it's a wonder he didn't turn green himself.
And let's not forget the Sam Elliott and Josh Lucas, who were both asked to play bad guy characters based on those written in the 60s.
Most comic book movie scripts plunder the original stories for characters, while re-writing them for a modern and cinematic audience.
Not Hulk. The characters are fleshed out in full one dimensional glory, with only Jennifer Connelly and Eric Bana given any hope of dramatic depth. Josh Lucas' Glann Talbot is incredibly simplistic in his motives, while Elliott's General Thunderbolt Ross is, well, his name's Thunderbolt for chrissakes.
However, it isn't in the appalling structure or hammy supporting performances that really destroy this flick - it's the one thing we thought would be superior - the direction.
24 had not long been on TV, with it's multiple simultaneous camera views, and clearly Ang Lee's regular editor, one Tim Squyres, was smitten.
But 24 relies on multi-camera shots to keep the viewer up to date with multiple story strands. So why would Hulk require five different, simultaneous camera shots of a man walking down a corridor? Was that in the comics? If so, then why?
And it gets worse. In an effort to invoke the comic book feel, Lee and Squyres use every single (clichéd) trick they can - at one stage an explosion leads to a character flying through the air, only to pause midway, just long enough to have a random outline drawn around his body.
Crucially, what Lee and Squyres seemed to forget is that comic books and films are completely different mediums. Anyone who wants to see Hulk in comic book mode can buy a comic - we came to see a film version, and that means adaptation and invention, not crass attempts to copy hand drawn images.
And so to the big finish. Somehow Nick Nolte stands in front of some gamma rays and gains the ability to become anything he touches. It's an idea with promise, but when you've watched an action movie told as an interpersonal story, you don't expect - nor deserve - to see a final fight featuring one character as a giant ball of water.
Without a decent idea of how to end it, Ang Lee drops a bomb on the set piece and creates an explosion of CGI bullshit. Like George Lucas before him, Ang Lee used a host of computer graphics because he could, not because he should.
Thanks to, among other things, the performances of Bill Bixby and Ferrigno, not to mention the score from composer Joe Harnell, the TV show had more wit, invention, pathos and purpose than Ang Lee could have dreamed of. Give me Louis Ferrigno's trousers any day of the week.
Rich Phippen
