When he came to the cinema in 2003, he was sometimes laughed at. How should one take a film seriously in which the hero fights with mutated poodles? And then those purple shorts and that bright green complexion! Hulk by Ang Lee (Life of Pi) did not represent the hoped-for start of a superhero series. Rather, he quickly disappeared into the shadowy existence of insider tips and underrated pearls.
Tonight on RTL 2 you have the opportunity to rediscover a superhero film that almost 20 years later seems more up-to-date than many new blockbusters.
How the Hulk got to the mutant poodles
Unfortunately, Eric Bana is not quite on the same level as Hugh Jackman and Chris Hemsworth in the triad of Australian Marvel actors. In Hulk he plays scientist Bruce Banner. In an experiment, the unassuming man is exposed to gamma rays and the rest of the story is known – one thinks.
Because although the screenplay follows the basic outlines of the Hulk story, the film tells so much more. Because while Bruce is busy with his new uncontrollable Hulk powers has to arrange, his father (Nick Nolte), who he believed dead, is up to mischief. The superhero blockbuster turns into a father-son drama without letting up on action and pace.
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hulk
This father, by the way, is experimenting with gamma rays and poodles. And if you shake your head disparagingly when the Hulk fights a pack of monster poodles, neither understood nor deserved cinema.
Why the Marvel film was ahead of its time – and hugely underrated
Whatever the case, the poodles aren’t the (main) reason why Hulk deserves a reevaluation today. The focus is on a topic that now occupies almost all superheroes: coping with trauma (or as Jamie Lee Curtis would say: Troamaaa!). Half the MCU is in therapy right now because of the blip, Wanda wreaks havoc after losing her lover, and Shuri, unable to get over the death of her loved one, leads her people to war in Black Panther 2.
Since childhood, Bruce Banner has been haunted by a similar event that pierces Ang Lee into the consciousness of this film like the splinters of a broken picture. It’s there and everywhere, and yet it takes Bruce and us quite a while to see it in its gruesome fullness. When Banner’s green fury finally erupts, Lee stages this as both a liberation and a curse. All the pain fed by Bruce’s repressed memories erupts – but in doing so, he resembles his father in taking responsibility for that pain.
It’s a fascinating one Dealing with the superhero psyche, which no other film of the genre offered in this form at the time. Even today, one looks in vain for Marvel or DC films that walk the tightrope between comic spectacle (poodles! tanks!) and hero therapy. Not to mention the adventurous action staging, which imitates the panel look with split screens.
We’d all do well to give this Hulk another chance.
Podcast: The 10 best films coming to Netflix and Co. in 2022
Before the streaming year ends, we bring you another 10 upcoming titles we’re most excited about in 2022.
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In this installment of the Moviepilot podcast Stream Gefluer we talk about Guillermo del Toro’s dark new version of Pinocchio, the Will Smith comeback Emancipation, the Knives Out sequel Glass Onion with Daniel Craig and the horror hype Barbarian, among others.
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