For a good 20 minutes, Louis Leterrier´s "The Incredible Hulk" is a masterful work of a man struggling with his nature. We watch as Doctor Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) lives "off the grid" in South America in an effort to remain faceless and nameless to General Thaddeus Ross (William Hurt). Ross wants to harness the power in Banner-the ability to turn his anger into a green monster-for the military. It isn´t until fairly late in the movie, when Tim Blake Nelson´s Doctor Samuel Sterns enters the equation, does the story face plant into standard, boring action fluff. Until that point, this reinvention of the big green guy is firing on nearly all cylinders.
(I promise not to compare the 2008 version of the character with Ang Lee´s 2003 "The Hulk," nor to any other comic book inspired movies.)
Much has been made of Norton´s volatile nature when working on various projects and his apparent rift with Marvel over the final cut of this film. Yet it is easy to see why he would have fought for a certain vision of "The Incredible Hulk" separate from mindless action scene after mindless action scene: conceptualizing the character as anything but a computer generated image is nearly impossible. With any other super hero, there is a person under a mask or inside a suit giving life to the hero. A slight facial tick here, beard stubble there…they are real people playing a part. It is a credit, somewhat, to the visual effects artists that Hulk isn´t entirely devoid of all human features. There are moments where pieces of Norton show up in the CGI. But there´s not enough to ever make us feel Hulk is a real creature.
Add to that a particularly ho-hum action finale devoid of any depth, substance or "weight" and the last third of the film kind of just falls flat. I´d venture to say Norton saw dallies of the beginning of the film, noticed how both the Banner and Hulk characters work best shrouded in secrecy as opposed to in the open and lobbied hard for a cut full of character and short on action. (The upcoming DVD will reportedly contain an additional 70 minutes of material, no doubt a large chunk of which is character and story, not action.)
Banner, as played by Norton, is the polar opposite of Hulk in mental capacity, nature, physical type…everything. We believe, throughout the production, Banner is fighting an addiction of some kind, constantly keeping himself in check. That´s the dramatic through line of the film, not a standoff between Hulk and Abomination (more on him in a minute). In order to protect his loved ones and society in general, Banner sequesters himself. He monitors his heart rate, learns calming techniques. Leterrier shows us these scenes, sequences which might seem repetitive upon first glance, yet end up doing more to create the Banner character than any piece of dialogue can. And with every look, we see a weary Banner, keeping in step with what we´d expect.
Writer Zak Penn opts to show the story unfolding as opposed to constantly giving us verbal exposition. A main title sequence showing how Banner becomes the Hulk provides a perfect example of what his script does right. Penn assumes, rightly so, the audience knows the backstory and valuable time doesn´t need to be wasted regurgitating the same information again. He also never tries to scientifically deconstruct what happened to Banner. His condition simply exists and the characters move on. The script never bashes us over the head with exposition or needless dialogue, to its credit. Whatever other issues there may be with the pacing or finale, it´s not Penn´s script which is the problem. (To be fair, Norton did an unaccredited rewrite on the script, so the credit may not be completely Penn´s.)
We´re also given a fair amount of humor organic to the characters. The best line occurs early on as Banner tries to get his signature "You wouldn´t like me when I´m angry" across to coworkers in Spanish. The translation? You wouldn´t like me when I´m hungry. It´s not dumb humor or forced; each and every example comes from a honest place.
So where are the other problems? A big one-perhaps the biggest aside from the finale-is Liv Tyler´s Betty Ross. In a film where she isn´t required to do anything but scream ("The Strangers") or act ethereally ("The Lord of the Rings"), she has a shot of being taken seriously. Here, where she shares all her scenes with Oscar nominee Norton or Oscar winner Hurt, she is hopelessly outclassed. Her delivery is flat and without emotion while she looks too pretty to be involved in this story. We´re never convinced she and Banner are former lovers or that they still have feelings for one another. Before the next "Hulk" adventure, she needs to be jettisoned.
And then there´s the worst scene in the production, one in which Hulk and Betty sit in the rain, outside a cave, at night. A Beauty and the Beast moment to be sure, but also shamelessly pulled from Peter Jackson´s "King Kong." It serves a purpose in the film-to show Hulk being tender with Betty and her acceptance of Banner´s other self-but it comes off as a homage to a movie not worthy of one. Various bridge scenes seem to be missing from the theatrical product, scenes which would explain or allow the events to flow a bit better. The biggest offender is Banner getting from Guatemala to California with no money, official documents and his face plastered on every government watch list. My guess is we´ll see the intermittent events on the DVD.
Tim Roth, as Emil Blonsky aka Abomination, seems to relish his role as the film´s villain. Well, he´s not technically a villain, just a soldier doing his job. Not even Thunderbolt Ross is a true bad guy: he´s simply misguided and doesn´t quite understand what´s going on. To his credit, he comes around by the end of the film and Hurt makes him a sympathetic character of sorts. But it is Blonsky´s transformation from man to creature which parallels Banner, providing a different take on the same idea. There is no depth to speak of for either of these men, though they do tend to be a bit more than one note bad guys.
"The Incredible Hulk" is another brick in a long range plan by Marvel to eventually produce an "Avengers" film. Complete with a cameo by Tony Stark (Iron Man, for those not in the know) at the end of the picture, two pieces of that team are in place. Banner and Stark are a new breed of superhero, a group who is known to the outside world in both their human and hero personages. There is a subtext to this film in which a man trying to remain anonymous turns out to have a large amount of attention diverted onto him. In effect, he has to come out as being a green monster when all he wants to do is leave the alter ego behind. That juxtaposition isn´t played with enough and, with a little luck, will be a greater part of any further story with the character.
Unlike previous Marvel films, there is no tag scene after the end credits. Instead, two scenes which could serve as tags (one is the Stark cameo and the other is too juicy to spoil) are thrown on screen before the credits roll. While Robert Downey, Jr.´s moment with Hurt may be too long for a tag, it would have jived nicely with the one at the end of "Iron Man" featuring Samuel L. Jackson. Scene 2, for lack of a better term, should have been the last thing we see of any of these characters, for it seems to foretell something juicy, sinister and altogether exciting for the evolution of the Hulk. It´s spooky, exhilarating and a perfect jumping off point for "The Incredible Hulk 2," if we´re so lucky.
Is "The Incredible Hulk" perfect? Heavens no. The entire endeavor teeters on the edge of hilarity when the creatures eventually face off and Tyler´s Ross is the most useless and worst acted of comic book actresses since Elektra. However, there is enough good in the film, especially the first "Hulk-out" and subsequent action scene-which I haven´t mentioned to preserve the surprise-to recommend the picture. A solid 6.5 out of 10, only because "Iron Man" received a 7/10 and "Hulk" isn´t quite that good.