Quickly Descends into Mindless Summer Movie Madness

Rating: 6/10 (17 April 2016)

This movie begins pretty strongly but quickly descends into mindless summer movie madness. Dr. Banner (played by Edward Norton) is hiding out in Brazil, in the beginning, being taught breathing exercises to control his anger which is actually pretty interesting. The opening Hulk scene is also really memorable by delivering the Hulk in more of a monstrous fashion rather than some of the more traditional action sequences later in the film. As the movie goes on, however, it seems to dumb itself down more and more. We are given a damsel-in-distress performance by Liv Tyler as Banner's lost love...who is introduced as being involved with another man which doesn't seem to do anything but serve as a plot point. We are given the stereotypical "bad military man" chasing Banner with an unmemorable performance from Hurt. Worst of all, we are given an inexplicably suicidal merc who wants to confront the monstrous Hulk for nothing more than a seeming adrenaline rush. This reaches absurdity when, at one point in the film, this elite military veteran becomes so brazen as to confront the Hulk, weaponless (he literally throws his rifle away), goading him on. Even with all of the bad aspects, the movie does do a good job of remaining fun. The Hulk scenes really deliver exactly what you would want from a Hulk movie. Norton also does a decent job of playing Dr. Banner. Even Tyler's performance works some scenes were being the damsel in distress really fits (such as a cave scene during a storm midway through the film). Overall, this is a movie that is enjoyable for fans of comic book films or the Hulk, but doesn't really deliver enough to be memorable for a more neutral movie goer.