Directed by: Louis Leterrier
Starring: Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, William Hurt
Other Actors of Note: Tim Blake Nelson, Ty Burrell
Plot:Depicting the events after the Gamma Bomb. 'The Incredible Hulk' tells the story of Dr Bruce Banner, who seeks a cure to his unique condition, which causes him to turn into a giant green monster under emotional stress. Whilst on the run from military which seeks his capture, Banner comes close to a cure. But all is lost when a new creature emerges; The Abomination. Taken from www.imdb.com.
"No worries Betty, I mean testing experimental technology on yourself worked so well in Spider-Man and The Fly."The Hulk goes into a more real world in this version of The Incredible Hulk. Explaing the Hulk's origins in the first 5 minutes it gives this movie time to use the already established mythos to play around a bit. This story borrows a great deal from the 70s TV show and constantly nods back to it with little in-jokes like an obligatory Lou Ferigno cameo, the playing of the "lonely man" ending theme from the show, scenes of Edward Norton hitchhiking, and using the alias "David" There's even a couple of nods at the comic like whenever Betty throws Bruce a pair of bright purple stretch pants and there's a little nudge nudge wink wink moment like with the yellow spandex comment in X-Men.
With no disrespect to Eric Bana who delivered a good performance as Banner in the first Hulk film, Edward Norton makes the role his own and plays it well as everyone predicted he would. He makes a much more interesting Banner and seems more everyman than Bana was ever able to accomplish
The Hulk this time is given a good villain. The Absorbing Man last time was a horrible choice, it would be like making a Daredevil movie and then having Stiltman be the villain. Tim Roth as Emil Blonsky manages to overcome the fact that he's 2 feet tall and become a character that's both badass and terrifying all throughout and as he grows more powerful it just gets worse.
With no disrespect to Eric Bana who delivered a good performance as Banner in the first Hulk film, Edward Norton makes the role his own and plays it well as everyone predicted he would. He makes a much more interesting Banner and seems more everyman than Bana was ever able to accomplish
The Hulk this time is given a good villain. The Absorbing Man last time was a horrible choice, it would be like making a Daredevil movie and then having Stiltman be the villain. Tim Roth as Emil Blonsky manages to overcome the fact that he's 2 feet tall and become a character that's both badass and terrifying all throughout and as he grows more powerful it just gets worse.
Edward Norton and Tim Roth: Actual scale.Liv Tyler manages to overcome the fact that she can't act by not talking a lot. This was a good choice on the director's part as Liv Tyler's best ability is to look pretty and smile/cry when the need arises. She does that well.
And while I respect William Hurt and the job he did in this movie, Sam Elliot was born to play Thunderbolt Ross. He just had the voice and the stage presence to pull it off perfectly.
"I can't stop coming! It feels so good!"
"Busey smash!"
"So you're saying the 'beef it's what's for dinner guy' played this role last time?"
"Look if you turn it upside down the car moves to the other side of the tube. Neat."And while I respect William Hurt and the job he did in this movie, Sam Elliot was born to play Thunderbolt Ross. He just had the voice and the stage presence to pull it off perfectly.
"I can't stop coming! It feels so good!"Visually the Hulk is a beautiful movie and one primary color shines throughout, green. The director appears to have not wanted us to forget it and truly you can't find a frame in the entire film that doesn't have at least one shade of it though it's more subtle at times than others. It was an interesting choice visually and I liked it.
The comic book panels from Ang Lee's Hulk have been done away with. It was a neat idea but it just makes watching cumbersome and hard to concentrate on. On a plus side the Hulk looks less like a big green Robert Z'Dar and more like a giant green Gary Busey. There are complaints that he still looks CG but this only seems to be during action sequences there are many scenes where I could swear there's a large animatronic unit in place. But here's a side-by-side comparison.
"Even Shrek look more realistic than Hulk!"
The comic book panels from Ang Lee's Hulk have been done away with. It was a neat idea but it just makes watching cumbersome and hard to concentrate on. On a plus side the Hulk looks less like a big green Robert Z'Dar and more like a giant green Gary Busey. There are complaints that he still looks CG but this only seems to be during action sequences there are many scenes where I could swear there's a large animatronic unit in place. But here's a side-by-side comparison.
"Even Shrek look more realistic than Hulk!""Busey smash!"As you can see the new Hulk looks tons better than the old one. The action is a bit toned down in this movie as compared to Ang Lee's film. While the original film had the Hulk smashing tanks and fighter jets and jumping several miles in a single bound through the desert, this one brings things back to the comic and TV show roots. Hulk rather than being 15 feet tall (as in Ang Lee's film) is a mere 9 feet (the one in the comic was 7 feet tall originally) and remains that one size consistently. What's more the Hulk can't jump more than several feet at one time which was somewhat disappointing but at the same time makes more sense.
"So you're saying the 'beef it's what's for dinner guy' played this role last time?"Certain liberties were taken with Banner and the Hulk in this one that I support. The Hulk is played out much like King Kong with Betty Banner, he seems less than human and doesn't even talk until the last 10 minutes of the film when he utters the now legendary "Hulk SMASH!"
Banner is portrayed as Shellshocked and is even a bit reminiscent of Sylvester Stallone in First Blood as he has flashbacks from when he was the Hulk. Banner is portrayed as tortured but not helpless, he is seen learning several sorts of anger management and maybe even learning to control the Hulk itself.
Also of note is this change to the Hulk's origin. While the original had the rather unbelievable origin of being hit by a nuclear bomb blast this one says the Hulk was a mistake in trying to recreate Captain America's supersoldier formula (Though Cap is never directly referenced the Super soldier program is mentioned as having been closed down in the 40s and is later referred to as having been "put on ice" perhaps in allusion to Captain America's being frozen.)
Indeed the story is where this Hulk succeeds over Ang Lee's Hulk, while Lee's had a lot of action and decent acting it was also poorly written and had a lot of questionable ideas (Hulk Poodle anyone?) the problem was that in between scenes of the Hulk tearing shit up the movie was slow and at times boring. The scene leading up to the final confrontation with Absorbing Man seemed to drag on forever and when it finally got there it was nigh impossible to see. Now admittedly while the new Hulk's fight scenes don't give you the headache you got from watching Transformers' fight scenes, dammit they try! The fight scenes in The Hulk are really just payoffs, but even with the Hulk only making 4 onscreen appearances in the entire film you never feel gypped, the in between scenes are just as interesting and the Hulk's presence is felt and even dreaded at times especially early in the film.
Banner is portrayed as Shellshocked and is even a bit reminiscent of Sylvester Stallone in First Blood as he has flashbacks from when he was the Hulk. Banner is portrayed as tortured but not helpless, he is seen learning several sorts of anger management and maybe even learning to control the Hulk itself.
Also of note is this change to the Hulk's origin. While the original had the rather unbelievable origin of being hit by a nuclear bomb blast this one says the Hulk was a mistake in trying to recreate Captain America's supersoldier formula (Though Cap is never directly referenced the Super soldier program is mentioned as having been closed down in the 40s and is later referred to as having been "put on ice" perhaps in allusion to Captain America's being frozen.)
Indeed the story is where this Hulk succeeds over Ang Lee's Hulk, while Lee's had a lot of action and decent acting it was also poorly written and had a lot of questionable ideas (Hulk Poodle anyone?) the problem was that in between scenes of the Hulk tearing shit up the movie was slow and at times boring. The scene leading up to the final confrontation with Absorbing Man seemed to drag on forever and when it finally got there it was nigh impossible to see. Now admittedly while the new Hulk's fight scenes don't give you the headache you got from watching Transformers' fight scenes, dammit they try! The fight scenes in The Hulk are really just payoffs, but even with the Hulk only making 4 onscreen appearances in the entire film you never feel gypped, the in between scenes are just as interesting and the Hulk's presence is felt and even dreaded at times especially early in the film.
Two things of note, as well as introducing The Abomination as the primary villain there's a big allusion to a sequel as we another Hulk rogue The Leader appear toward the end, admittedly only briefly but it's a sign of good things to come.
And finally the best scene in the goddamn movie, I will not spoiler tag this as it is common knowledge at this point and was quite the buzz on the internet for months before this film came out. At the end of the film Robert Downey Jr. appears as Tony Stark.
The scene is at the end of the film, not the end of the credits, which is a wise decision as the credits to a Marvel comics movie have more names on them than the guest list to Paris Hilton's vagina. This was also infinitely more satisfying than the tack-on scene at the end of Iron-Man for me. Mostly just because Samuel L. Jackson is 10% of the time a good actor and 90% of the time a guy who says fuck a lot and talks about his distaste for reptiles on aircraft. That and this more than a "Hi I'm an ominous black guy standing in your living room with an eye patch" Downey Jr. alludes to an actual "team" though if you've been paying attention they've been mentioning S.H.I.E.L.D. and Stark Industries all over the place.
I give 2008's the Hulk a 5 out of 5, make it part of your collection!
And finally the best scene in the goddamn movie, I will not spoiler tag this as it is common knowledge at this point and was quite the buzz on the internet for months before this film came out. At the end of the film Robert Downey Jr. appears as Tony Stark.
The scene is at the end of the film, not the end of the credits, which is a wise decision as the credits to a Marvel comics movie have more names on them than the guest list to Paris Hilton's vagina. This was also infinitely more satisfying than the tack-on scene at the end of Iron-Man for me. Mostly just because Samuel L. Jackson is 10% of the time a good actor and 90% of the time a guy who says fuck a lot and talks about his distaste for reptiles on aircraft. That and this more than a "Hi I'm an ominous black guy standing in your living room with an eye patch" Downey Jr. alludes to an actual "team" though if you've been paying attention they've been mentioning S.H.I.E.L.D. and Stark Industries all over the place.
I give 2008's the Hulk a 5 out of 5, make it part of your collection!
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