Is the hulk incredible? Maybe. Is his movie any good? Not really.

Rating: 4/10 (13 June 2008)

The Incredible Hulk is poised to be a reboot of the popular comic book character, after the previous attempt at a Hulk movie a few years back bombed at the box office, as well as amongst fans. Marvel has done everything possible to ensure that history doesn't repeat itself: Louis Leterrier, a director known for his kinetic, hyper-violent Transporter flicks, helms this version as opposed to Ang Lee, the director of the original Hulk, known for making "artsy" films. Academy award nominated actor Edward Norton stars in this one, as opposed to Eric Bana in the 2003 version, who was a relative unknown at the time. Despite Marvel's best efforts, The Incredible Hulk is still a disaster this time around. It shows promise in the beginning, but quickly delves into nothing more than a $100 million B-movie.
Quickly skimming through Bruce Banner's transformation into the Hulk by gamma radiation overdose during the opening credits, the movie jumps right into the meat of things, with Bruce living in Brazilian slums, hiding out from the U.S military, particularly General Ross. General Ross has made it his mission to get Bruce's blood, which is radiated with gamma rays and causes Bruce to turn into the big, green monster whenever he gets excited. His plan is to use it as a weapon, creating numerous other "hulks", and he'll stop at nothing to get it. Most of the movie is an on-the-lam take on the superhero genre, with Banner evading Ross and the U.S army, while KGB agent Emil Blonsky begins taking gamma radiation doses so he too, can turn into a monster, and take down Banner for Ross.
The Incredible Hulk starts out with promise, showing Bruce dealing with the effects of his "condition", trying to learn how to control himself and maintain a low profile at the same time. It's interesting to see how Bruce tries to deal with the infliction, and it's filled with the right mix of drama and humor (one particular lost-in-translation moment had the audience cracking up). Not before long, the military shows up and a chase overtop the roofs of the slums ensues. It's easy to see why Marvel chose Leterrier during the chase; he knows how to handle an action sequence, without delving into shaky-cam or redundancy, despite the long length of the sequence. However, by the end of the scene, Bruce "hulks" out, and that's when the problems begin.
The first apparent problem is that the Hulk looks like he's came straight out of the video game tie-in. There's been a lot of detail put into certain aspects of him, including scars and muscle tone, but nothing has been done to give him any sense of realism. He looks like a cartoon and his movements and actions are similar to those of a CG-animated character. Yes, the "hulk" is created almost entirely using digital effects, but after movies like Transformers and Iron Man, where the effects were almost seamless, the hulk seems more in line with Sci-Fi channel level effects (for those who aren't familiar with the channel, it specializes in schlocky, cheap science fiction such as Python Vs. Boa).
The bad CGI appearance of the Hulk marks the movies descent into cheese. From that point on, the film no longer provides anything of interest about the characters or their situation: it serves only to show stuff blowing up and the hulk smashing things. Despite Edward Norton being a gifted actor, he has nothing to work with here. There's no emotion, no depth to the character of Bruce Banner. Liv Tyler is given even less as Bruce's ex-girlfriend, Betty. She's pretty much relegated to following Bruce around for the entire film, not showing any personality or character whatsoever. When the movie isn't going for cheap thrills and action, it makes a few flaccid attempts at evoking emotion, such as having Bruce and Betty hug each other in the pouring rain as angelic music chimes out in the background. Or having Bruce, attempting to provide thoughtful insight on his condition, say it feels like "having LSD poured into you".
There's nothing wrong with a film, especially a superhero movie, going straight for mindless thrills and action. However, The Incredible Hulk doesn't deliver on that either. The action sequences are too cheesy, too over-the-top and ungrounded in reality, to be remotely thrilling. Take for instance, the Hulk's second battle against the U.S military, as well as a gamma ray enhanced Emil Blonsky, General Ross's right hand man. The hulk stops smashing through things and tears some metal chunks off a vehicle, and wields them as blades, spinning them through the air. Blonsky begins doing back flips and moves out of the Matrix films to dodge each of the Hulk's attacks. It doesn't fit in with the style of the movie to have them partaking in a hyper-stylized fight more akin to a Jackie Chan film. It's completely out of character for the movie and just plain ridiculous.
Then there's the finale, in which Blonsky, fully transformed into The Abomination (a hulk-like creature, but with more strength) fights the Hulk on the streets of Manhattan. The fight looks as convincing as something out of Kung Fu Panda, with a jumble of badly animated monsters leaping around the street, using cars as boxing gloves and chains to strangle each other with. It's just silly. It could be thrilling if it was more grounded in reality, if we cared about the characters whatsoever, if there was any sort of depth to the situation beyond Bruce deciding to go beat the monster up. There isn't. It's the type of scene some B-movie director would shoot if he had the same amount of money.
The Incredible Hulk doesn't add any depth to the story of the hulk, yet also fails as a mindless action film. It shows potential, but ultimately fails. Marvel had their chance, two actually, and it's time to put this series to rest.