Hulk

[EnemaEms]

My God, nothing could prepare me for how awful of a film this would be. My girlfriend and her son hated it. My friends hated it. So I rented it to see how bad it truly was. My God, what an abysmal film. It starts off interesting and then just goes downhill. Ang Lee took this film way too serious and it kills the story, action, and pace. The effects are some of the worst I have ever seen. The fight with the dogs was as fake looking as it gets, and it was even in the dark which usually hides the weaknesses of CG. No Hulk for an hour (big mistake), and the film should have about 30 minutes trimmed off of it. To see how a comic book film should be made Universal, Watch the X-men films, Spider-Man, and Superman. Maybe your sequel will be an improvemnet.

 

Anyway, the DVD looks and sounds spectacular and the Hulk really put good use to my SVS, but the fact of the matter is that my DVD player feels violated for having this disc in it.

 

I know many folks here loved this film, and that is great, but for me it was probably the biggest letdown I have ever had for a film.

 

-Dean-

[iainl]

Originally posted by RingWraith@Oct 30 2003, 02:52 PM

the film should have about 30 minutes trimmed off of it

I've said it before, and so I might as well say it again. The problem with the film is that it does indeed need 30 minutes trimming from it, but that no-one will agree on where. I'd take much of the last hour out as fairly boring by-the-numbers action sequences that feel saggily paced, while the people expecting a summer blockbuster didn't like the first hour of dialogue, exposition and plot.

[blackcalx]

I went in with no expectation other than well-done CG and effects, and that is exactly what I got. I would have felt cheated had I seen it in the theater, but it wasn't a bad rental.

[Angel P]

Take the 30 minutes off of the ending. The battle at the end was totally worthless. I didn't mind it so much that it took awhile for the Hulk to appear as long as the main characters were interesting but they weren't.

[EnemaEms]

I didn't mind it so much that it took awhile for the Hulk to appear as long as the main characters were interesting but they weren't.

Exactly. Take Spider-Man for instance. We don't see Spidey for quite awhile, but the characters were interesting. Hulk's characters were so Blah it isn't even funny.

 

Dean smash DVD!!!

(If it wasn't a rental I would of. )

 

-Dean-

[Angry the Clown]

I'm actually in the minority who is very, very fond of Hulk, and have been since my initial theatrical viewing. Most interesting was that Hulk never interested me in its comic book form, and I loathed the television version. I originally had no intent whatsoever to see the movie, especially given the feeling I was getting from the promotion the film was getting with its TV spots, trailers, toys and fast food franchises.... etc.

 

It's the promotion that I think caused a lot of its problems, a everything billed it as a "Hulk Smash" kind of movie, which is partly why I never had any intent to bother seeing it. Turns out, typically, a lot of people wanted just that, to see him roaming about doing what Hulk does best, which is why I was so pleasantly surprised to see a really elegant character driven film, which was such a rare thing to find in a summer movie. I can understand why people who wanted the basic type of thing were unimpressed. If so many were left angry by so much of The Matrix Reloaded being dialogue heavy, then this was not the next movie that type of moviegoer wanted to be made to go and see by whatever studio was releasing the next bigger summer movie that week.

 

I admired Hulk for taking a risk. I admired the studio for letting Ang Lee do (for the most part) what he wanted, though I still carry no praise for their lack of faith in promoting the film as what it actually was, and to the right audience, instead of hyping it up as an action movie for teens and what not. The risk didn't pay off of course, with Hulk being yet another summer release to fade fast after its first week, so it saddens me to know I'm unlikely to see anything so creative in a summer movie again anytime soon.

 

I like films with many layers that take their time. Few summer movies do that and I rarely like summer movies for that reason, that they simply are not to my tastes, but Hulk was. Oddly we've all become accustomed to the typical summer movie, so much so that we accept a lot of the garbage thrown out way, which is really a dreadful thing, but more on that in a second.

 

I loved X2 as many of you now, partly because that movie wasn't insulting the intelligence of the viewer and that became another rare gem of the season for me. That was the better movie, and I am not comparing them due to their roots both being set in the pages of a comic book, but because X2 was far more consistent a movie, and it had broad appeal to mass audiences, but I like I say, it did not insult their intelligence. Whether the masses realized X2 wasn?t just more garbage being fed into their multiplex brains I can't say, but for those who go and see these typical types of summer movies, X2 rewarded them, and so to did it reward those who want that bit more.

 

 

Take Spider-Man for instance. We don't see Spidey for quite awhile, but the characters were interesting.

 

It's funny because I dislike Spider-Man the more I view it. I found it very basic and by the book like Sam Rami was doing paint by number on the whole thing. I don't hate it, but its huge success continues to baffle me, though I still feel it did as well as it did because that kind of movie simply came at the right time, especially as far as people of America were concerned. Again though I raise the thought I've raised before that audience expectations have perhaps lowered over the years as much as the quality of films themselves have, which can play part in allowing for such generic movies to be such big draws at the box office.

 

One can use Danny Elfman's musical scores to appreciate the different approaches various comic to movie adaptations he has composed the music for have taken over the years. Batman is a wonderful score, strikingly triumphant with a dark and sinister tone, fitting for Burton's take on it all to be sure (though I am not at all fond of the movie). His Spider-Man score is much like the movie in my mind, very basic, not overly memorable... His Hulk score I find wonderful however as it is multi-layered and in many places a loving tribute to Elfman's hero, Bernard Hermann. What's especially worthy of note however is that Ang Lee pushed Elfman to be different, which I think is what brought out such an eclectic score from the composer, and I think it was Lee's drive toward his entire cast and crew that resulted in Hulk in fact being such an eclectic motion picture in general.

 

Hulk, I still continue to admire and appreciate the more I see it. The only aspect that continues to distract me somewhat is mutant dad, which of course leads to that end battle which I agree is indeed flawed. I always felt the father character was a menace enough just being his deranged woman beating, murdering self. For a film that in fact turned out to be so much about human conditions, it did surprise me they turned to upping the part of the protagonist to a physically mutated being which goes so much against what Ang Lee had set up during the rest of the film.

 

I like the fact Hulk is in the film so little. There's not much Hulk as a character can do if you honestly break down what the comic gives to work with. Ooops, Banners pissed again. "roaarghhhhhhhhh!!!!!" and so it would go on. This was the type of movie the trailers made me fear the studio was going to deliver. With Hulk being such a metaphor for the anger with in us, and Ang Lee blatantly playing on that, I would have been thrilled to have seen the film end in the most ballsy manner in showing both Banners in the situation we see them in at the end, pre mutant break out and fight, and for Bruce to have finished him AS Bruce, and not the Hulk. That would have been fascinating and a very rewarding ending in relation to the overall tone of the rest of the picture.

 

The knocks against the computer animation do continue to surprise me however, because I still maintain it is the best work ILM have done in over five years, and it's work that was partly aided due to Ang Lee's personal involvement. I was quite drawn to the way Hulk moved, and his skin texture and the way it reacted to various elements (most notably water). It does interest me how peoples opinions on the effects differ, and I do think an awful lot of this has to do with the quality of the film print and projection system they viewed it on theatrically, and no of course at home, as no two TVs, even ISF calibrated are going to look the same. Ang Lee touched upon this in his commentary too, how it took them an awful lot of time to make the balance of light and dark right, and that peoples perceptions differed so much.

 

As always, different strokes for different folks. With the possible exception of Paul W.S Anderson movies, I like to think that there is really no such thing as a bad or a good film because these things never ever gain total unanimous decisions from the public, and that?s a good thing. I would like to think in this case though, even those who bash much of Hulk could still find it in themselves to accept its attempts to be creatively different and refreshing, which from a Hollywood studio, in the summer season of all things, is so rarely allowed.

 

Daniel

 

PS: If you've read this far.... Thanks!

[heavy liquid]

Wow, great read Daniel!

 

It's funny because I dislike Spider-Man the more I view it. I found it very basic and by the book like Sam Rami was doing paint by number on the whole thing. I don't hate it, but its huge success continues to baffle me, though I still feel it did as well as it did because that kind of movie simply came at the right time, especially as far as people of America were concerned. Again though I raise the thought I've raised before that audience expectations have perhaps lowered over the years as much as the quality of films themselves have, which can play part in allowing for such generic movies to be such big draws at the box office.

 

I completely agree with your take on Spider Man. Not bad, but not all that great. I enjoyed it at the theater, but it hasn't held up for me at all. And the Green Goblin mask was ridiculous (IMO). We should have been able to actually see his face, so he could convey emotion to the audience.

 

I haven't seen the Hulk, but I think I'll give it a rental this weekend.

[iainl]

Originally posted by Daniel Brecher@Oct 30 2003, 06:11 PM

The knocks against the computer animation do continue to surprise me however, because I still maintain it is the best work ILM have done in over five years, and it's work that was partly aided due to Ang Lee's personal involvement.

I think a large part of this is the trailers. ILM did some seriously impressive last-minute work on the film, and while in the trailers he looks like shiny CG rubbish, in the actual film, on a decent 35mm print, dust, rubbish and general 'stuff' take the shine off him and all of a sudden he works wonderfully.

 

At least, that was my experience.

[rustyjaw]

Not to go too far OT here, but I think X2 was about the best comic-book-to-movie I've seen yet. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even a smidge more than Spiderman. It's my most anticipated DVD next to the extended LOTR:TT and the now released Reloaded.

[EnemaEms]

Ed,

 

I agree with you about X2. Until that film came out, I felt the 1st X-Men was the best comic book film to date.

 

-Dean-

[Mark E]

I like X2 quite a bit myself, though I have yet to see The Hulk. But I have to say I think Magneto's actions towards the end with regards to Charles didn't gel with the characterization I'd seen thus far. But maybe I am projecting .

[Calvin]

I admired Hulk for taking a risk. I admired the studio for letting Ang Lee do (for the most part) what he wanted, though I still carry no praise for their lack of faith in promoting the film as what it actually was, and to the right audience, instead of hyping it up as an action movie for teens and what not. The risk didn't pay off of course, with Hulk being yet another summer release to fade fast after its first week, so it saddens me to know I'm unlikely to see anything so creative in a summer movie again anytime soon.

 

This is also my opinion of the film. While I do think that it does start off slow - the fact that it was a different kind of movie was pretty cool. It made you think. The comic book panel cuts were awesome as well - though it took me a while to figure that out.

 

Universal totally botched the promotion of the film - that is why it did so-so at the box office. This isn't an action film - but everywhere you went - that is what it was being touted as. Heck I even saw Hulk Fruit rool-ups & Hulk fruit juice!! You get people's expectations up for that - and the unwashed masses couldn't help but be disappointed.

 

( of course - I have copies of the Superhero Roast, the Justice League pilot, & the FF movie,so what do I know? )

 

X2 is still my favorite comic film,though.