June 23, 2003
Plank, the new Hulk?
To: Universal Pictures
CC: Ang Lee
Enclosed you will find three receipts for The Hulk, one child and two adult matinee tickets. There is also an invoice for $17.40 which is itemized below.
138 minutes of The Hulk at $20.00, which is approximately 14.5 cents a minute.
18 minutes of which were actually enjoyable and I will gladly pay for.
I am owed a $17.40 refund for the remaining crappy 120 minutes.
Thanks in advance,
Tara Liloia
This movie was so bad that I had to come home and write a good screenplay to counteract its existence in the world. My four-year-old asked to leave after an hour. I had to convince him to stay in hissing whispers, all the while wondering why I was staying myself. Eventually I came up with this gem of mommyhood, "We're staying because Daddy wants to see this movie and sometimes we do things that Daddy wants to do. After we're done, we'll do something that you want to do." He spend the rest of the movie daydreaming about the park. And snacks.
Here are some filmmaking tips from cinematic me:
Staging fight scenes in total blackness allows no one but Navy SEALS wearing night goggles to enjoy them. There was some fight involving dogs, I think the Hulk won. There was some smashing in a lab, I think the Hulk won. There was a whole lot of hopping around the US, I think the Hulk won.
Emotionally repressed != Emotionless. Plank from Ed, Edd and Eddy has more charisma than Eric Bana. Shout out to Plank. An emotionally repressed person has strong feelings that they attempt to hide. Think of Leonard Nimoy in the role of Spock -- there was something behind the stoicism. A spark that simmered beneath the surface that he fought hard to control. Where was that in Bana? He was a placid pond in a tranquil Japanese garden until he suddenly exploded with rage.
If I had wanted to watch the talented Jennifer Connelly do nothing more than stare wide-eyed and stunned at the incredible events around her, I would have rented Labyrinth. She has grown as an actress and I expect to see her as more than just set dressing. One of the first scenes between Bana and Connelly, I can remember thinking how the pacing was off and the scene tedious. There was no chemistry between the former lovers. I can barely blame Jennifer for her lack of interaction, Bana wasn't giving her much to work with.
An hour of laboratory montage does not an intellectual or entertaining film make. As an audience member, it takes more than the use of a centrifuge to convince me that someone is intelligent. I'm never going to marvel, "Jeez, did you see how well Bruce autoclaved?" The dialogue was tired and cliche. Vincent Vega felt more clever than this supposed genius duo.
A man who turns green, huge and destructive when he's ticked off can be interesting enough. There is no need to invent implausible superbeing kinfolk for him to fight. I always saw Bruce Banner as a sadness-tinged guy trying to make his way in the world with this crappy affliction. He wasn't a superhero and that's what endeared him to us. Making him fight his superdad reduces all of the potential subtleties of their relationship to good guy vs. bad guy. Not to mention that Bruce's "hulkism" is supposed to be a genetic trait, like my red hair. I don't know about you, but I can't will my hair color onto passers-by the way Bruce was able to will his hulk power into his father. But that's just me.
Taunting us with an important plot point packaged neatly as a repressed memory is exasperating. Especially when the repressed memory is obvious from the first flashback. Ang, you showed us a knife being held as if to strike. Clearly, Bruce's father didn't kill Bruce, so... who do we think he killed? Take a lesson from Wolverine in the intriguing repressed memory department.
Comic book style only works in comic books. The worst part of the film, the absolute worst, was the crushed look on my husband's face when an explosion behind a halfhearted villain results in him being catapulted out of the frame and into his own white-outlined overlay, then frozen in that comic book pose. Dave adores comic books. I sent him off food shopping yesterday and he sheepishly returned with food and a stack of X-Men. (Don't think I didn't look in the bag to see what you like, D.) But even he sensed how wrong it was to grind the natural flow of the film to a stylistic halt with this visual tom foolery.
And that was just the worst example. The entire film was littered with split screens and comic-like boxes in which several different kinds of action are taking place. It became like the Blue Man Group -- three things happening so fast that you had to pick one to focus on just to make sense of it. If you tried to watch all three, you lost out on everything.
Kudos to the CG character engineers. They did a better job acting than Eric Bana. If they decide to create a sequel, maybe they can animate the Bruce Banner part as well.
Comments
What are you doing taking a four year old to a PG-13 movie?
Apparently you don't know us or our 4 year old very well if you are asking that question.
On top of that, people all to often treat kids horribly and as if they are less of a person because they are little. Kids are capable of a lot more than we give them credit for.
A prime example of this is when people talk baby talk to babies. I hate this. Do we want them to grow up and speak like this to other people? No, so why do we do this?
We take Trevor to a lot of movies, as well as watch a lot of movies at home together. Generally speaking we do not let him watch movies that are rated R, but I imagine that in the next few years as long as he is with us, we will let him. We talk about all of the concepts that are taking place in a movie as well as make sure that he understands what is real and what is pretend. He is a smart kid and it would be an injustice to insult his intelligence by dumbing his world down via force feeding him Teletubbies and other mindless products of the media.
This movie is like your friends really smelly sock. He tells you how bad it smells, how he had tears in his eyes from taking one good whiff. Yet you can't help it. Despite all your good judgement you grab the sock from his hand and inhale deeply. It's the morbid curiosity, it's the need to know for yourself...
I'm seeing Hulk tonight.
Will, can you at least sneak in so that Universal doesn't get your money?
Nice. So now you are suggesting that my friends commit crimes in order to appease you? Freak.
You're right, Dave. I can think of much better reasons to commit crimes.