Hulk (2003)

Starring Eric Bana, Jennifer Connelly, Sam Elliott, Josh Lucas, Nick Nolte.
Directed by Ang Lee.
Written by John Turman, Michael France, and James Schamus.
Produced by Avi Arad, Larry J. Franco, Gale Anne Hurd, and James Schamus.
Distributed by Universal Pictures.
138 minutes.

LVJeff's Rating: 9/10

Beauty and the Beast

The team of writer-producer James Schamus and director Ang Lee is something quite rare -- a creative partnership that is not only dedicated to making films that have something to say about human nature and relationships, but also ambitious enough to try their hands at a wide variety of movie genres. Thankfully, they also understand what makes a movie a movie, tapping the potential of a visual medium that is capable of evoking strong emotional responses from its audience. Before Hulk, I've only seen three of their films, but they are enough for me to know what to expect from their projects -- beautiful movies with a gentle touch, often about the conflict between a person's natural desire to be selfish and the more humane urge to be selfless. In their movies, characters' self-centered actions affect the fates and feelings of others, and the humbling experience of learning and accepting responsibility for this is often a key theme.

Someone must have been either crazy or a genius, then, to let Schamus and Lee get their hands on Marvel Comics's "Hulk," a character known popularly as a guy who turns very big and very green whenever anyone makes him angry. They could've picked any of Marvel's leftover angst-ridden superheroes to dramatize and they went with the one whose signature line is, "HULK SMASH!" Conventional wisdom suggests one couldn't go very deep into the heart of a character whose basic hook is that he's quite a spectacle when he loses his temper, but leave it to Schamus and Lee to find a way to forge a story about relationships out of it. This sounds as if it's antithetical to the laws of the slam-bang comic book movie, but actually it's quite true to the comic book spirit and the movement started long ago by Marvel founding father Stan Lee in particular -- drama is created when people have to deal with things, thus high drama is created when people deal with extraordinary things.

I wouldn't have it any other way -- if anyone needed more psychological coloring, it would have been the Hulk, who, under someone else's charge, probably would have just been the simplistic smashing machine he's always been perceived to be. Under the care of Schamus and Lee, Hulk is about the consequences of selfish motives and the dangers of meeting adversity with conflict rather than an attempt to understand. And it isn't just about the Hulk -- it's about a rectangle of four people and a pair of generational rifts. One rift is emotional, between General Thaddeus Ross (Sam Elliott) and his daughter Betty (Jennifer Connelly); the other is physical, between scientist David Banner (Nick Nolte) and his son, Bruce (Eric Bana). For Bruce, that physical rift manifests itself as an emotional wound that finally blows wide open after he is exposed to gamma radiation and gains the ability to become the Hulk.

The two pairs of father-child relationships present a contrast between circumstantial and voluntary neglect. The autoritative Gen. Ross is too caught up in his military work to make time for Betty -- their relationship, however, is presented as repairable as long as the lines of communication are open. David, however, isn't interested in creating a relationship with Bruce. Bruce never knew his father -- they were separated after an incident in Bruce's very early childhood -- but as he slowly learns the truth about David, his inner rage begins to fester. The gap between them is not repairable, mainly because David considers Bruce less as an offspring and more as a creation -- a by-product of an earlier act of irresponsibility -- in sensing this, Bruce's frustration creates the drive to become the Hulk, and the ensuing hunt to destroy or contain him fuels it.

That the onus of making an earnest attempt to mend the rifts is on the fathers may seem a bit one-sided, as if to say the children can blame their parents for their current miseries. But the movie isn't about assigning blame as it is asking for the fathers to understand how their actions can scar the human beings who should be most closest to them. Coming from that angle, Hulk's main characters really should be the fathers; Betty and Bruce are victims and have little need to develop. Is this a narrative flaw? Perhaps, but the depiction of Betty and Bruce's relationship makes up for it by presenting another contrast, this time between how the victims should and should not handle the situation. Betty is always trying her best to understand Bruce, and she isn't spiteful beyond reason when dealing with her father -- she has patience and willingness. Bruce, meanwhile, pents up all his emotions, then becomes the Hulk and destroys things. As others attack him, he attacks them back. The love inherent within Betty's actions may be the key that solves the rage. (This brings up another contrast -- Gen. Ross and David butted heads in the past, and look where that got them.)

That's a lot of relationship gymnastics to sit through; as fascinating as it may be for a drama, this is a comic book movie and, as such, it demands comic book feel. Ang Lee adeptly handles this by giving Hulk the most comic book-like presentation of any of the recent comic book movies, often splitting the screen into rectangular panels, which transition from one to another by sliding and scrolling to new sets of panels. Sequences segue into the next by zooming in, zooming out, fading, wiping -- everything you can think of, sometimes accompanied by effects, like bubbling water (a friend suggests this is akin to turning the page in the comics). Lee uses angle-changing edits in mid-conversation, as if reading from one panel to the next in a comic book where the character continues a stream of words through several panels. The movie is given the Hulk's color scheme -- green and purple pervade throughout, with green often serving as anger's metaphorical hue. When the action sequences arrive, the screen-splitting/paneling stops to allow the computer-generated Hulk to take center stage.

The overall effect is beautiful. The Hulk is just convincing enough as a realistic cg-creation that he is fully acceptable within the boundaries of the film. It's a while before he arrives, but when he does, he brings a lot of dramatic tension with him as a result. His smashing is cathartic indeed, but it also comes with a sense of sadness, as all violent outbursts should -- violence diguises itself as being liberating when it actually is more confining, and this is depicted extremely well. All the while, the bemused facial expressions of the Hulk and the comic book paneling during the Hulk-less scenes keep the tale from feeling too heavy, maintaining a playful touch. I loved one scene in particular, when a helicopter airlifts a box that is then placed on a truck; the screen is split into five panels, and each panel is slightly ahead of the one before in progression of the action. It is quite fun to watch.

If I have any complaints about Hulk, they mainly have to do with Nick Nolte. He really overacts, and his character, David, isn't particularly well-written. David's final scene with Bruce/Hulk feels unnecessary, almost tacked on. Hulk also plays dangerously with its pacing, dragging in some parts and re-hashing in others. Overall, the movie is risky and ambitious, but it's also coming from James Schamus and Ang Lee, who have earned the right to be risky and ambitious. These are the people who gave us a superior depiction of a Jane Austen environment having only had experience in Chinese-language films. They gave us a highly-acclaimed feminist martial arts flick. They make beautiful movies, and this new one about a green monster that destroys things is, ironically, as beautiful as they come.

©Jeffrey Chen, Jun. 21, 2003

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