Puny human

Time for a quick review. I saw The Hulk today. I must say that I was extremely impressed. I won't give any spoilers but we all know who the Hulk is. Bruce Banner gets irradiated with gamma rays and turns into big green guy when he gets angry.

Needless to say, it isn't much plot for a film.

So, Ang Lee and co made a plot which is similar yet different than the original comic. Much in the same way that Spider-man was tweaked for the film, so too was the Hulk's origin tweaked. And this is very much an origin film, but much more so.

One of the comparisons that I've seen is to King Kong (presumably the original black and white film and not the remake done in the 70s). I think a comparison can be made because one of the strongest points in the film is that the audience can make a clear connection with this CGI monster. The wife mentioned The Iron Giant as a comparison as well, and I believe that it is apropos too.

The direction is very interesting, utilizing frames within frames and other odd effects. This gives it a comic book "feel" in a sense but doesn't detract from the film, IMHO. There is certainly a more art house/experimental feel to the film than Spider-man or the X-Men films. All in all I liked the direction a lot. It was occasionally a bit confusing but all in all it was more cool than anything else.

The acting was also very good, with Eric Bana and Jennifer Connelly doing very good jobs, I thought. Sam Elliott was also very good as General Ross. Personally I wasn't that big of a fan of Nick Nolte's interpretation of his character but that might have been Lee's direction as well. The character themselves felt relatively complete and interesting throughout the film. There were some areas of poor dialogue but all in all they felt very believable to me.

And now to the "moment of truth": the CGI. The Hulk was a completely computer generated character, much in the same way Gollum was. He is certainly better than he appeared in the Super Bowl ads. Not perfect, of course (I had difficulty when Bana was just wearing greenish paint -- green skin looks unnatural anyway) but it never got to the point where it broke the suspension of disbelief. I have a feeling that a few more months in the render farms would have helped it but all, in all The Hulk looks good. More to the point, he felt real. Real enough to feel sorry for and cheer for. I personally liked it.

And great opening credits.

Verdict: ***1/2