Reviewed by Emrys
The first thing you're likely to notice about Hulk is that it is nowhere near your typical action superhero movie. In fact, the first thing you'll probably be thinking is "Where is the action? This is Hulk goes smash. Where is the smashing?" Don't worry, there's plenty of smashing. But in the mean time Director Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon) has made a very typical Ang Lee movie. For those of you not familiar with his work, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon is slow, melancholy, graceful, emotional, and deep, which is all really wonderful for a Chinese kung fu movie. But for us here in the United States, we tend to like our superheros more for their ability not to die then for their ability to overcome their personal weaknesses and or trials and tribulations. So, if you're looking for something to tide you over until Matrix: Revolutions is released, look somewhere else. On the other hand, from the perspective of this reviewer, Hulk is probably far better then Matrix 3 is likely to be.
Yes, I quite enjoyed it. I think the deviation from the tried and true action formula was a welcome change. There has been a lot of comic book movies released lately, some of them better (X2) then others (Bulletproof Monk). But they all have the same theme, more or less. Good guys versus bad guys in a duel to the death. Now don't get me wrong, there are plenty of guys, both good and bad, in Hulk. But the primary conflict is never about winning a war, or conquering the world, or wiping each other out. Hulk is a movie about one man's struggle with his own history, and his own emotions. When Bruce Banner is irradiated with Gamma Rays in a lab experiment gone awry, it releases something inside of him that was always there, but he never knew existed: Rage. When this rage is finally let loose, the resulting abomination, The Incredible Hulk himself, is only capable of lashing out at his surroundings. Bruce, on the other hand, only wants to have a normal life. Throughout the movie there are many scenes which show the conflict between Bruce and his inner demons.
Of course, this conflict isn't always completely internal, which is where the fun parts begin. Ang Lee uses some innovative and cool video techniques during many of the scenes of the movie. These shots are intended to put the movie I the context of a comic book, showing us scenes from different angles and putting more then one scene in the same window. So, getting back to the fun parts I mentioned, when Hulk jump off a sand dune onto the back of a tank, and procedes to tear it apart with his bare hands, we get to see it from every direction.
To conclude, there are many good reasosn to see this movie. The most obvious is that its very cool to see the giant green man from the famous comic book tear a tank apart with his bare hands. If you're a fan of Ang Lee's work, this is another badge on his roster of achievements. On the other hand, if you're not a big fan of having to interpret your movies, or getting a lot of character angst, you might want to skip this one and go see Pirates of the Carribean instead, which I hear is going to be pretty awesome.
