Rating: Summary: Anti Climatic. Boring, Not worth the money Review: Boring boring boring movie. Some half way decent special effects
Rating: Summary: Bad Review: It takes way too long before you even see the Hulk. By the time you do, you want to become the Hulk yourself...and reap horrible, horrible vengeance on the people who made this movie.
Rating: Summary: Better Than Expected Review: I took my grandson to see this and he loved it. I knew I was going to be in for 2 hours or so of "hulking out" and I wasn't disappointed. My beef is with the DVD. The picture quality of the copy we purchased looked more like a patchwork quilt and the sound quality was so low that I had to crank up the volume on the TV to hear it properly. Also, there was a sound that can only be described as film running through a projector.The second copy was better in that the picture quality was good but that sound was still there for most of the film. When you purchase this KEEP YOUR RECEIPT.
Rating: Summary: HULK has some action, but more angst from Ang Lee Review: Bruce Banner (Eric Bana) is a man with secrets. Dealing with extreme repressed memories as the result of a tragedy that resulted in the death of his mother and the arrest of his father, Banner has become so withdrawn that it causes his break-up with fellow scientist Betty Ross (Jennifer Connelly). During the course of researching cell-regeneration, Banner must save a fellow worker from a potentially lethal overdose of gamma radiation. Now, whenever he's angry, Banner morphs in the raging green powerhouse known only as the Hulk. After the great success of X-MEN, DAREDEVIL and SPIDER-MAN, it was inevitable that Marvel's Jekyll & Hyde character, the Hulk would get his shot at cinematic glory. After all, in the 40 years since he first popped out of the comic pages, this rampaging monster had thrilled many a reader as well inspiring a classic TV series. When director Ang Lee (CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON) was tapped for the project, the expectations were very high indeed. While the final result is definitely impressive, it is not completely successful. Part of this stems from the fact that Lee plays the story completely straight, with hardly any traces of the humor that marks previous Marvel adaptations. While it makes sense with his overall vision, it makes the first 40 minutes of the film a bit of a drag. Indeed things finally start to pick up when Banner finally makes his big change to the Hulk at that point. As repressed Banner, Bana definitely nails the character. However, the character's very nature makes it very hard to sympathize with him. In contrast, Jennifer Connelly fares better as his concerned girlfriend. Surprisingly, the most effective performance comes from Sam Elliott's portrayal as General "Thunderbolt" Ross. While he comes across as a typical hard-nosed soldier, one can sense the conflicted depths of the man. The CGI created Hulk is also effective in providing the emotion that Bana seemingly lacks. Nick Nolte turns in a rather bizarre performance as Banner's long-lost father that strangely fits into Lee's directorial vision. Like the other Marvel movies, the action scenes in this flick are top notch. You only wish there were more of them and less angst in the picture. Overall, HULK is definitely a noble effort by Ang Lee to produce a serious look at the super-hero genre. It might not please everyone, but it is a unique entry in the super-hero film field. As a result, it is definitely worth your time and my recommendation.
Rating: Summary: This movie is a mess. Review: This movie is just awful. The bleakness of the story line is only slightly worse than the emptiness and vapidity of the acting. The love story between Banner and his girl-friend (Connelly) lacks any warmth or interest. And what should have been a powerful relationship between Banner and his father ends up ragged, confused, and senseless. For those old enough to have enjoyed either the Stan Lee comics or the TV show, ignore this movie. It is but a poor reflection of a creative and engaging sotry. This weak rendition will leave you empty and disappointed.
Rating: Summary: Needs Less Art, More Cinematics Review: The more I watch this movie the more I forgive it for disappointing me at it's summer 2003 release. Hulk really isn't bad, it's just misunderstood much like ol' greenskin himself. The problem is the creators mixed the wrong kind of filming techniques for this movie. One person wanted it to focus on the characters' drama, another wanted it to resemble a comic book, and another thought it should rely on it's sci-fi roots. I, like most who went to see Hulk expected a slam-packed, action-based summer blockbuster. What we saw was a movie that couldn't make up it's mind as to what kind of film it was trying to be! But darn it, the movie isn't as bad as people say it is. The acting was great, the action (what little there is) is heavy, and the Hulk looks awesome! One thing I really didn't care for was the infamous multi-panel presentation in certain scenes, combining multiple angles in the same frame. It was an annoying and unnecessary artistic endeavor. The first thing that happens when you put the DVD in your player is you're forced to watch half a dozen short previews for other Universal DVD releases. There is no way to skip these previews but you CAN fast forward through them. Universal does this on purpose in the hopes such forced advertising succeeds in selling more of their products and it's underhanded of them. The special features offer almost everything a viewer could want. I was particularly amused watching how the dogfight scene was filmed. Seeing the effects coordinators dress a real dog in a motion capture suit was something else. For those of us with an X-Box the 2nd disk has a nifty playable demo of the Hulk video game; a nice bonus. The making-of segments gave me a new appreciation of what went into the movie, and it will probably do the same for you. Personally I think Hulk is a worthy purchase. Watching a large green monster convincingly wreak havoc in a feature film is satisfying on a primal level.
Rating: Summary: Zzzzzzzzzzzz Review: Now I was really pumped about this one because Marvel was on such a role. But than this one hit. I was incredibly dissapointed with this one. I almost litterally fell asleep during it. This one did the complete opposite of the 80's marvel blunders, and that was focus too much on story. The plot of the movie is that Bruce Banner gets involved in an incident involving Gamma Radiation. What we discovered earlier is that his father injected him with a serum that he was experimenting with when Bruce was a babe. After the Gamma incident the serum kicks in and when Bruce gets pissed he turns into a very cartoony looking hulk. From there the military wants him to be stopped and his Father wants to find out how it happened. In the end his father also mutates into a creature that can absorb the elemnts and the hulk fights the monstrosity in and overly CGI battle. Overall this movie is pretty poor. In fact the only guy who I knew loved it was one who loves Ang Lee films and saw it as an artistic masterpiece. I think he was stoned at the time. Overall this movie is not very good.
Rating: Summary: Good Movie-Shameless Commercials on the DVD Review: The movie itself, effects and all were very good. Yes, the movie could've been paced a little better and the end was a bit anticlimactic. This I can forgive. What I can't forgive is the commercials for 2 Fast 2 Furious and some other flick on DVD, which you CAN'T skip on your DVD player. You can fast forward through them which takes several minutes, but cannot skip them and go to the Main Menu. This is the company's way of force feeding commercials on a DVD you bought for home viewing. Also, some of the "Extras" on the DVD are actually commercials. Yes. You click on the icons and see commercials for soft drinks and Mastercard. SHAMEFUL. I bought this DVD for the Movie. NOT commercials that don't allow you to skip to the Main Menu. In case you couldn't tell, I was pretty much disgusted with the way they released this DVD. Also there is no DVD insert with chapter stops. Just MORE Ads.
Rating: Summary: Good adaptation of the comic series that does too much Review: Good adaptation of the comic series that does too much too soon, and put too much of a story to make anyone feel turn off. Eric Bana makes a fine Bruce Banner And Jennifer Connelly makes a fine Betty but the movie does too much too soon with its plot and its characters. There is enough plot in here to make three movies, and not enough of the Hulk himself. This is one of those rare occasions that a sequel would be necessary because it at the very least a sequel would have continue the story and make the plot progression much better than having one movie that puts too much in the story too soon.
Rating: Summary: Cartoonish All the Way Review: Whenever Hollywood tries to film a successful comic book hero concept, the director's most pressing problem is deciding how to integrate the character's distinct persona into a medium for which it was not originally designed. The temptation to focus on special effects over characterization is usually too great to resist. With HULK, director Ang Lee completely disregarded the tension that resided in the comic version of Bruce Banner's split personality. On the inked page, artist/lettermen Stan Lee and Steve Ditko presented a dichotomous soul that drew in the reader, always making him wonder how the kind but ineffectual Bruce Banner could survive his transformations into the green Hulk without losing his inner self in the process. On the celluloid screen, what the viewer sees is a mess that includes (in no particular order) a troubled youth's attempt to bury horrific memories, a warped father/son relation that results in two, rather than one, monsters, a love interest that fizzles for lack of chemistry, a raging green golem that offers no rationale for that rage, and a series of special effects that are so patently computer enhanced that the viewer cannot submit to that essential willing suspension of disbelief that is always needed to make any far-fetched plot work. Eric Bana, who plays Bruce Banner, bears a stunning resemblance to what Toby McGuire of SPIDERMAN might look like in the next decade. Bill Bixby, who was the original television Hulk, managed to invest his role with the needed mixture of pathos, tension, and repressed rage. Bana simply sleepwalks through his rages which lasted only for as long as it took for the computer Hulk to make an appearance. Jennifer Connoly, as the love interest, shows none of the zip and zowie that she showed previously in A BEAUTIFUL MIND. Sam Elliot, who plays her four star general father, is your typically one-dimensional military man who can see the creature but not how to make that creature worthy of a hunt. As a hunter of escaped fugitives, Elliot could take a few lessons from Barry Morse, who, in his FUGITIVE days, knew how to invest his hunter's persona with bedrock personality. It came as no surprise to me that HULK tanked at the box office in only its second week. For a comic book hero to make the successful leap from the printed page to the celluloid screen, that hero ought to do more than merely leap mindnumbing distances. This mindnumbing, in HULK'S case, rubbed off on the film as well.
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