Movies are Stupid Round Eight: Legend The Super Mega Ultra Director's Cut for Real this time, we swear.

I honestly don't know where to start. There are films that beg to be made that go unmade. There are films are should never have been made that get six sequels and a remake twenty years on. Occasionally there are films that beg to be made, get made and then everyone realizes what a bad idea it was to begin with. Legend, at least the super mega cut recently released on DVD, is such a film.

As I understand it, and I clearly understand very little, the early 1980's were a hotbed of fantasy film making. After John Milus (director of Red Dawn) helmed Conan the Barbarian to box office success every sword and sandal property that could be had for cheap was optioned by Hollywood underdogs like Canon films, Roger Corman and the like. Where Conan the Barbarian was based on a much beloved character with 50 years of history behind him, the copycat films were based on hastily written scripts churned out by Dungeons and Dragons fanboys hoping to get their big break. Within a very few years the video store was full of classics like Deathstalker, Ator, Blademaster, Yor: Hunter from the future (who was from the distant past) and so on. Terrible films all and because they were terrible the American viewing public shunned them en masse. They also shunned them after masse but before Sunday night football which is as it should be.

This put many an un-kissed basement dweller in a tough position. For once they were seeing reasonable facsimiles of their favorite stories, but the stories were badly told and laughably constructed. What could have been a golden age of fantasy story telling on the big screen was turning into an exasperating exercise in VHS fastforwarding to get to the best parts of movies starring that guy that was in the remake of Tarzan with Bo Derek. But soft, a champion was rising to give us a new story with a real budget and known actors. Ridley Scott, director of Alien, Bladerunner and, one day, G.I. Jane was making a film called Legend. It had swords. It had sandals. It had Mia Sara. What more could one ask for? For what more could one ask?

Here's the problem with Legend: It doesn't make a whole lot of sense even for a fantasy film. The plot, regardless of which version you watch, is basically this: There is a mean guy/goat named Darkness who lives in a big scary tree with goblins and fat guys and living furniture. He's really evil and he'd like to be evil full time, but that pesky sun keeps him from getting out and about to spread ruin and strife as is his wont. You see, the sun is his destroyer. We know this because he keeps telling everyone who will listen. This is like Superman telling every villain that his weakness is kryptonite (or Richard Lester - BA-ZING!).

So, Darkness has a plan to get rid of the sun. He's going to kill himself the only two unicorns in the world. This act, apparently, will keep the sun from rising and allow him to walk the Earth unfettered. No fettering for him, not after his plan is enacted. To this end he hires a goblin named Blix to go kill him some unicorns and bring back the horns as proof. I guess the complete lack of sunlight would not be proof enough, gotta have those horns.

Off Blix goes to slay the magical beasts and he takes two half-wits with him because that is just what you do with the lord of evil asks you to fundamentally change the course of the entire world for him. When it comes to important tasks Idiots = Success. But where to find a unicorn? The fabled beasts don't like goblins. If only there was someone pure of heart and intact of hymen who could approach these majestic critters and hold them still long enough to allow the goblins to slaughter them. If only...

Enter Mia Sara. Mia plays Lilly, a princess. We know she's a princess because she sneaks into the home of a local couple and steals their food. If that wasn't enough to communicate her pedigree the peasant wife keeps calling her Princess Lilly, so there. When she's not stealing eats from poor people she's running around the woods with Tom Cruise who is dressed like a homeless Robin Hood. He can talk to the animals and climb trees and swim. This qualifies him as a forest boy and Lilly loves her some forest boy.

In order to impress his lady fair, Forest boy take her to see the unicorns who are so special and so sacred that they are never to be touched. This being the case, it is only reasonable that Forest boy should take his under-aged girlfriend with boundary issues to see them. And what is the first thing she does? Touches the unicorn. It's a good thing too because Blix has been following her. I don't know why he follows her. He's got no reason to follow her, but he was so he's ready when it's time for the unicorn killing. With a quick shot of poisoned dart the beast goes down.

Anyway, the mutant horse is dead, the mate is captured and taken to Darkness even though he totally told them to kill both the unicorns. Lilly is captured as well and it is up to Forest boy, a couple of dwarves and a half-naked 12 year old to save the day. The long and short of it is that they infiltrate the giant tree by walking up to it, finding a entrance, and going inside. They meet up with one of the half-wits from Blix's party who tried to cross Darkness and was presumably destroyed but it turns out not to be so. Then they do the only thing they can do, they split up. Forest boy and 12-year-old nudist find Lilly just as she is being seduced by Darkness into being all evil and wearing a black dress (the harlot) and they hatch a plan. Darkness keeps telling folks about the sun being his arch-nemesis so they decide to use plates as mirrors to reflect sunlight throughout the tree, direct it down all the corridors with perfect precision and blast Darkness with a big old laser beam of sunny goodness. This is exactly what they do and it works exactly as described. Darkness is destroyed and Lilly was just pretending to be evil and is soon back in her white dress again. The band returns to the forest where the unicorns are restored, somehow, and all is right with the world. Except everyone is still stupid.

Obviously this script could have used some work. Questions are raised at every turn and then never answered. Why doesn't Darkness just kill the unicorns himself? Is he trapped in the tree? Clearly the unicorns vex him but just not enough to actually do anything about it himself. Why does Blix need Mia Sara to touch the unicorn before he shoots it. Those horses are on screen for a good five minutes only yards away from the goblins before they interact with anyone. Blix holds his shot for no reason. Also, why does Forest boy take Lilly to see the unicorns if they aren't to be disturbed? What did he expect his 15 year old girlfriend to do when she saw fantasy creatures at play in the forest? I could go on asking questions about practically every scene, but I won't. What would be the point? See, another question.

When the film was released in the US it was cut by about 30 minutes and the original soundtrack by Jerry Goldsmith was replaced by a New Wave soundtrack courtesy of Tangerine Dream. That's a weird choice to make for a fantasy film right up there with Lady Hawk's rock and roll incidental music. However, I submit that the Tangerine Dream score, once you get used to it, is the superior score. In the Director's cut, and European release, the Goldsmith score was intact but it's very blah as soundtracks go. For all the action and strange imagery the Goldsmith tracks just sort of hang in the air doing nothing. They don't give you an auditory description of the scene, they don't punctuate the action or stir feelings in you the way a great soundtrack should. The music isn't poorly written or produced, it just doesn't seem to fit what's on screen.

Not only does the US release of Legend get the better music, it gets a trim job that cuts out most of the long listless shots of nothing. There are pieces and parts missing from the plot because of these cuts, but that doesn't matter as the intact plot doesn't make sense either. The result is a tighter more quickly paced film that doesn't make you feel like you're watching a fantasy version of Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

That's the major problem with the Director's cut: it drags. We don't need extra shots of Forest boy and under-age girl sitting around the forest. We don't need another iteration of Darkness telling people about his weakness. We don't need extra shots of empty corridors inside the big evil tree. What would have been nice is some sort of backstory telling us who in the hell these people are. Now, LOTR was way too long. All three movies could have been trimmed down considerably and so could the novels for that matter, but part of that length was taken up explaining where folks were, why they were there and what they hoped to achieve. Legend doesn't do that. We are never told anything about any of the characters besides their names. We know from inference that Gumps, Dwarves and fairies are commonplace because nobody freaks out when they see them. We know that goblins are evil because of the dialog that says "I'm so evil because I'm a goblin!" We also know that unicorns control the rotation of the Earth and the weather. And there are great opportunities to tell a better story, give it some meat, some foundation. When Forest boy goes to get his armor and weapons he is led into a cave under the forest where several suits of bejeweled armor lay untouched. No reason is given for this. He accepts the armor without question and carries on to the evil tree to fetch his woman...well...little girl friend. Oh, and about that tree. Clearly there is a ginormous evil tree full of evil not too far from Lilly's kingdom. It appears to be right down the road from the forest but it is never mentioned or named specifically, so we assume folks just don't mind it very much. Maybe it's invisible unless someone steals your under-aged girlfriend. In the same way that killing a unicorn arrests the Earth's movement in the heavens so too does kidnapping a child bride enable your enemies to see your secret hideout. You'd think that Darkness would think of this eventuality and post some guards, but he doesn't. And how did he become Lord Darkness to begin with? Is it a hereditary title? Was he duly elected by his peer man/goats? Do they maybe take turns? This week Lord Darkness is Tim Curry, next week: the guy that played Riff Raff, the week after: Susan Sarandon. Barry Bostwick could maybe be an evil maintenance guy that never gets things as clean as he could given the time and resources at his disposal. But, such is the nature of evil.

Digression being the better part of...something, I find myself at the summation. Neither the Director's cut or the US cut of the film are particularly good. But, the Director's cut is too long, has an uninteresting musical score and adds nothing to the story despite 30 extra minutes to work with. I had always heard from fans of Legend that a Director's cut would be a Holy Grail of moviedom. More story, more FX, better music; but it was not to be. What those fans fail to realize is that Legend is a cult classic in this country because of the goofy score, because of the shorter runtime. Sit through the director's cut just once and you'll understand. Just as Robert Wise cut extraneous footage from Star Trek: The Motion Picture and improved the final product, Ridley Scott has infused his already nonsensical story with more nonsense and removed the parts that made it bearable. Ergo, to wit, therefor, Legend: the Director's cut is stupid.

Movies are Stupid Round Seven: Wolver-what?

"X-Men Origins: Wolverine" makes my head hurt in new and strange ways. I'm not talking about the liberties that the writers took with established comic book canon, whatever that is. Comic books are notorious the world over for having no real continuity at all. People die, are reborn, die again and then just show up for dinner like nothing ever happened. Worlds are destroyed only to be referenced later when they are needed and major characters can get a new history overnight only to have it pulled back when it is expedient for the publisher. So all that crap is right out for me. Let's explore some of that "canon" for just a moment before I get started on how bad this movie is and let me make something clear about my intentions.

For the record: I don't want this movie to fail. In fact, it is doing gang-buster business everywhere. At a production cost of 150 million dollars it has already passed the 200 million dollar mark worldwide. Its success is assured and I'm gratified because, even though this movie is crappy, I want the brand to survive long enough for some good films to be made in the future. That's what I hope for and nothing that I write here is meant to discourage movie ticket purchases, which is fine since no one ever reads this blog anyway and there is absolutely no chance that anything on this site could impact a major blockbuster film. Still, it's my blog and I can feel self important if I like...and I like.

Okay, Comic book canon regarding the characters in this movie.

Wolverine: Originally Wolverine was just some Canadian agent with some gloves that had sharp bits glued on. There was no indication that he was even a mutant. The claws were never retracted, nor was there any dialogue or panel which revealed that they were anything more than pig-stickers that he slipped on before a fight. He wore a goofy-looking yellow and blue costume (which he still wears, by the way, because that makes total sense) that had little cat whiskers on the mask. Yes, he wears a mask even though his identity is of no consequence. He's not protecting those he loves. He's not scared the government will learn his true alter-ego. He works for the government and they know exactly who he is...up to a point and, frankly, nobody cares who he is because he just showed up for one issue of Hulk. That's Wolverine's intro. No real name, no back story, no significance of any kind.

Sometime later the character is introduced again in X-men, written by Chris Claremont. Suddenly he's a shadowy man without a past named Logan. He's got a healing ability that allows him to...heal. Come to think of it, I have that ability. Just the other day I cut myself shaving and within a few minutes the bleeding had stopped and a few hours after that the wound was virtually gone. A few days later it was as though I had never sliced my face open at all. I guess what I'm getting at is that Logan's power is to do what any other human can do...only somewhat faster.

In addition Wolverine has had metal grafted to his bones and metal claws pop out of either forearm. It is never suggested that this is part of his mutation. No one knows where he got these upgrades and no one really seems interested in finding out, least of all Logan. I'll have to say that if I woke up with unbreakable metal bones and blades popping out of my body I wouldn't give it a second thought. So, Logan is a freak and he doesn't care. Later, his metal bones are given an origin story of their own called Weapon X. This one off series explained that he was experimented on by a person or persons unknown to make him into a killing machine. They are surprised when he starts killing everyone. Mental Note: If I ever design a device or process that has a specific application, I will make sure that I don't just leave it lying around to be used by whomever whenever. I'm careful that way.

Later still Wolverine got retconned into a Canadian from the 1800's with bone claws that he did not have in the Weapon X story. Suddenly his half-brother is Sabertooth, who also has claws of a sort. This unmakes established Marvel comics stories from the 1980's and 1990's that showed Logan in ancient Japan or running with the Indian tribes pre-colonization. But, as we have established, I don't really care about that.

Sabertooth: Sabertooth first shows up in the pages of the Amazing Spider-man as a part-time bank robber/full-time dork. He is literally just a big guy in a lion costume who robs people and gets his butt kicked by Spider-man. That's it. No mutation, no powers, no interesting history.

After a fashion he shows up as a mutant with healing powers who menaces Wolverine now and again. Later there seems to be a father/son relationship there. Then there's not. Then there is again. Then they get a house in the village together and open a tea shop. Then they break up vowing to see other people but still be friends because, after all, life is about relationships and connections that can last forever. That last part is made up...I think.

General Stryker: This guy doesn't exist in the comic world. There is a collection of X-Men stories called God Loves Man Kills that feature a Reverend Stryker who hates mutants, but otherwise this guy is a total movie construct created for the plot of X-men 2. There is no back story to alter because he never existed before Bryan Singer's brilliant sequel.

All of the above is to show that I both know my comic book history and that I do not care. That's an important element of comic book movie viewing. The average comic has about 40 years of history behind it. There have been so many contradictory stories and wackadoo plot lines that no modern screenwriter could be expected to take them all into account nor would we want them to. At one point Batman was turned into a half-man half-fish creature. I don't want to see that. Superman once had a "Power Suit" and was made of electricity for some reason. That movie would suck.

It is the job of a screen writer to take the best parts of a character from another medium and place them into a new configuration that makes sense for the big screen. Honor the work that has come before, certainly, but don't feel constrained by it. Most of it really does suck. Now then, to the movie review.

Wolverine is a stupid movie because it simply refuses to make sense or follow a logical progression of events. Going into such a movie one is asked to accept certain truths in order for the story to be told at all. If you've given your 8 bucks for a movie called Wolverine it can only be because you already understand that he is a mutant that can heal, has metal claws and wild hair that is never explained. That is a given. As a fan of comics and a movie goer, I don't ask much of such a film, only that it have some kind of story that I can understand. I want them to show me the character of my choice in a new tale that unfolds in an entertaining way. As weird as the concept is for the Wolverine movie, the same basic rules of storytelling apply. If things happen for no reason: that is bad. If characters say things out of context and never explain them: that is bad. If the plot involves completely unlikely scenarios that are never commented on by the characters: that, too, is bad. To-wit, therefore, Wolverine is bad.

We start with a young James Logan (James Howlett for you comic book nerds) who is sick in bed. It is the 1800's in Canada, James' father is killed by the groundskeeper which causes James to fly into a rage despite his sickly condition. He sprouts bone claws from each hand and promptly runs the groundskeeper through. His mother is horrified, the groundskeeper is eviscerated, and James' friend Victor (Dog, for those of you who read Origin by Joe Quesada, Paul Jenkins, and Bill Jemas) seems indifferent. Turns out that the groundskeeper was James' real father and that Victor is his half-brother. Both Victor and James run off into the night swearing to stick together as brothers should. And stick together they do through the entire opening credit sequence. They fight in the revolutionary war, the American Civil War, World War 1, World War 2, Korea, and end up in Vietnam where they are executed by firing squad...only it doesn't take.

This brings us to our first storytelling hiccup. Two men are taken before a firing squad. They are shot many times and do not die. The result? The two men are put in the brig. Apparently the U.S. Government doesn't know what to do with two unkillable soldiers in the middle of a war that is going badly. So, General Stryker shows up and offers them work as secret agents with special privileges. Given their situation, they accept the offer and immediately find themselves on an airplane with several other strange agents who possess various powers. There's a guy who can run really fast and shoot things while flipping through the air. We'll call him John Woo. Then there's a guy in a cowboy hat who we will call Cowboy Hat. Then there's Wade Wilson, played by that guy who was in Van Wilder and is currently in Scarlett Johansson (HEY-O!), who is some kind of sword master. We can tell this because he has a sword.

Their first mission is to go to an African nation and attack an office building. There's armed guards and such outside so it must be full of bad guys. I mean, they are Black and they do have guns. If I've learned nothing else from Hollywood it is that Black guys with guns are bad. Now, Cowboy Hat is Black and he has a gun, but he's with a group of White guys and an Asian guy so he must be okay. Anyway, they lay siege to the building fighting their way to the top floor where they ask some guy about a paper weight he has on his desk. Why they couldn't make an appointment, I don't know. But Stryker must know about the paper weight, so everybody has to die right now.
Soon they find themselves torturing villagers in the jungle. James doesn't like this and tries to put a stop to it, but the others are bound and determined to shoot unarmed people. James cares about them so much that he just leaves them all to die. Later he gets a job as a lumberjack. We flash forward seven years and James has a girlfriend, a house on a mountain impossibly far from town and good, honest work cutting down trees. Also, he enjoys buttered scones for tea and pressing wild flowers. Whether or not he wishes he'd been a girlie like his dear Mama is unconfirmed at this time.

So, James and girlfriend live in sin on a mountain happily until General Stryker shows up to warn James about Victor. Seems Victor has gone crazy...er and is on the hunt for former group members. Imagine if David Lee Roth was hunting down former members of that band he was in during the 80's. Not Van Halen, but the other one that had that song that was on that album. You know, he wore goofy tribal face paint in the video. Anyway, it's like that, but with mutants.

No reason is ever given for this hunt, which only seems to effect two of the former team members, but James doesn't seem too worried about things. And why would he be? It's only his psychotic brother who has grown into a murder factory with the same powers James has. What's to fear? Certainly not his own bloody murder or that of his woman at the hands of Victor. Let that be a warning, ladies. If your man is unconcerned about the serial killer at work in your town...you are doomed. Don't take a shower, don't go for a jog alone, don't even go into the basement. You're done like dinner.

Victor kills James' girlfriend. Surprise, surprise. In his rage, James goes after Victor who is helpfully waiting in a bar for him. They fight, Victor stomps James and leaves him for...mildly injured. That's another problem with the film. They keep showing Wolverine in peril that is by no means peril. The guy can literally heal any wound, so what could be scary about a gun shot or a good old fashioned ass-whoopin'?

Now James wants revenge...even more...so he seeks out Stryker who offers to put him into the Weapon X program that will make him indestructible and give him metal claws instead of gooney old bone claws. He accepts, is taken to a secret lab and made into a killing machine. All of that is fine, I guess, but the set isn't anything like the one they showed in three other X-men movies nor is it located in the same underground base. This one is at the top of a mountain and seems quite small. The other was a sprawling compound underneath a giant dam at Alkali lake. The whole second half of X-men 2 takes place there. Suddenly that's all out the window.

Long story already too long, Wolverine escapes the lab, leaps to freedom down a huge water fall and stumbles naked onto a farm where he befriends an old couple, destroys their bathroom and hides out in the barn. Then there is some more fighting with government agents who want Weapon X back, a helicopter explodes and then later Wolverine is in Las Vegas or Reno or something. He jumps around a lot. Cowboy Hat and another team member from the old days, we'll call him Fat Guy, run a boxing school. Wolverine shows up and demands to know where Victor is. You see, he can't find Victor, who wants to be found, but he can track down obscure people from his past just fine.

Fat Guy turns him on to a mutant from New Orleans who escaped from Victor previously, oh and Victor and Stryker were working together to entire time in an attempt to make James mad so that he would undergo the Weapon X process thereby becoming a walking abattoir who could then go forth and kill Victor. It's the perfect plan, really.

So it's off to New Orleans where this mutant named Gambit has adopted the philosophy of "Hide in Plain Sight" because Wolverine just walks into the first bar he comes to and there the guy is playing cards. Clearly Victor and Stryker don't want him back because all they would have to do is go pick him up at their leisure. Why they never look for him in the exact place they caught him the first time is anybody's guess.

Wolverine questions Gambit about the secret location where mutants are being held. Oh yeah, did I mention that mutants from all over the world are being held hostage...because they are. And it's up to our man/animal Wolverine to stop it. Victor appears and Wolverine and he fight it out, but just before Wolverine can serve up the Coup De Gras, Gambit leaps into the fray long enough for Victor to vanish in a puff of plot contrivance. Then Gambit runs up a fire escape but not before Wolverine can start chopping it apart with this claws. I guess Gambit is a slow runner because it takes Wolverine a while to get that thing chopped up.

After all that, Gambit agrees to fly Wolverine to "The Island" to save the mutants. Not only is Gambit a certified pilot, but he has his own plane standing by. What luck! And they fly across the country in a little Cesna until they arrive at...Three Mile Island. Dun Dun DUN! Soylent Green is People!

Wolverine enters the base to confront Stryker and Sabertooth only to find that his girlfriend was never dead. Apparently those heightened senses that make him such a good tracker can't tell a dead person from a living one. Anywho, she's in a on the plot that we explored before. Seems Stryker has her sister and the only way to get her free from this mutant prison was to go and live with Wolverine for seven years and make him fall in love with her only to later pretend to die. That's some plan. Stryker is obviously the most patient man in the known universe. He knew all those years ago that he would want to use Wolverine for the Weapon X project and that the only way he could get Wolverine to agree to it would be to break his little mutant heart and have his older brother beat him up. But wait, there's more. Turns out that he didn't even really care about the Weapon X project, he just wanted Wolverine's DNA so that he could make Weapon XI. Dun Dun DUN again!

Now you and I both know that you can get DNA from a coffee cup or a hair brush. There is no need to dunk a man in a mineral bath and fill him with metal in order to replicate his cells. DNA is everywhere. For some reason, unknown to the audience and unknown to the screenwriter, Stryker felt the need to make things far more complicated. And there may be good reason for that. Maybe in comic book world DNA works differently than I think it does. In fact, I'll say that it must because Stryker is later seen injecting tissue from Cyclops into Weapon XI's eyes in an effort to give him laser vision and it works. The final act of the film involves Wolverine fighting Weapon XI, who has been given the powers of all the other mutants via osmosis, on top of one of the cooling towers at Three Mile Island. Turns out that the partial meltdown that happened in 1979 was actually the result of mutant combat and not a faulty steam valve. Not only that, but the combat destroyed the entire cooling tower and wasted a large portion of the power plant itself. You and I don't remember that happening because the mutants must have used their psycho powers on us.

"Wolverine" ends with a defeated Weapon XI plunging into the cooling tower as it crumbles and Stryker resigning to shoot Wolverine in the head with a special Adamantium bullet. You see, if you have a very hard armor it can only be penetrated by something of equal density. For example if you shot a steel bullet at steel plate it would easily puncture it. That's how matter works. Need to break through a wooden door? Why, just grab yourself a little piece of wood and smash that door down. Yes sir, when you thought this movie couldn't make less sense, it finds a way. It is persistent in its quest to suck, like a Terminator or a virus.

Stryker shoots our hero in the head, thus destroying his memories or something. Gambit flies away. The trapped mutants are saved by Professor X at the last minute and Wolverine wanders off to find out who he is.

You see, it is a terrible movie...a stupid movie. It establishes rules and then doesn't play by them. Like a toddler it wants its own way even if that way is unreasonable or foolish. Characters appear, do something and then are gone again without explanation. The schemes of our villain don't make sense to anyone not confined to a state mental institution. The resolution isn't even a resolution because everyone just sort of wanders off. Characters that were established as not knowing each other in previous films spend time together in this one. Sabertooth, a seven foot tall monster with wild hair and a mouth full of sharp teeth in the first film, is around 6 foot 2 with a buzz cut in this one. While I feel you can change things between media, comics to film, you can't change established scenarios and characters in the same film series. Imagine if the Godfather Part 2 had all new actors with different personalities but the same character names as the first film. All the action happens in Chicago and nobody seems to notice. Later Don Vito Corleone shows up after having died, but nobody freaks out. That's how Wolverine is. It violates comic book canon...so what? The problem is it violates itself and not in a sexy way like the internet ladies do, but in a way that costs you eight dollars and two hours of your time.

Movies Are Stupid Round Six: Hulk gets Smashed

Often, I will start my blog with a statement of faith. I have faith that the director had a vision that was somehow compromised. I have faith that the writer of the film in question wanted to tell a great story, but something went horribly wrong. I have faith that the actors really were doing their very best, but it just fell short somehow. Let's take all that as rote, shall we. I only review movies that I like. What follows is my examination of a film I like so much that I bought it on HD-DVD even after that format was dead just because there was no Blu-Ray version yet. Did I mention that own an HD-DVD player? That gives you an idea of my prowess at predicting the future. Your lucky numbers are 6-10-3-7 and 44.

Hulk: Golly. What a train wreck this thing is. I'm sort of at a loss as to where I should start. The beginning is usually a good place, I'll go there. So, the year is 199_ and Hulk is in production at Universal. The director has a bold vision for the project, Stan Winston studios is producing prosthetics for the shoot, the screen writer is well known and respected, things are looking good. However, the script is, by all accounts, a mess. The director is tired of the studio questioning his ballooning budget and comic book films are largely looked down upon. The Batman franchise is riding high on the success of Batman Forever, so the purse strings of Hollywood have been loosened somewhat. But every studio exec has his limit and Hulk was becoming a budgetary freak show. Soon the money would dry up, the director would leave and the movie would not be made.

Enter Spider-man. Spidey opens with the biggest box office weekend take in movie history (at the time). It goes on to gross a gazzillion dollars at multiplexes everywhere and every child and man-child from coast to coast and around the world owns at least one Spidey action figure and everybody wants the video game for PC and Playstation 2. This after the moderate success of X-men sets the stage for comic book fandom's golden age of movies, television shows, video games, and fan fiction porno. Now is the time for the biggest of all Marvel comics heroes to have his day. The Hulk is back and he's ready to smash all comers. At least, that's what we all thought.

Mistake #1: The Director. Ang Lee is awesome. Watch Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and you will believe. Smart, soulful, exciting and grand...these all describe his film making style. He is unafraid to court controversy with films like Brokeback Mountain or Ride with the Devil. He delivers on the action with Crouching Tiger and he makes us all a little wiser with Eat Drink Man Woman and The Ice Storm. His study of the human condition is second to none and his understanding of personal conflict and the need to grow as people is astounding. Ang Lee knows how to tell a story and grow his characters. I think maybe that's the problem. Essentially Hulk is a character who gets angry and smashes things. Pick up a copy of The Incredible Hulk at your local comic shop or at the grocery store and you will be treated to 40 pages or so of a big green guy breaking things and US Army personnel trying to kill him. That's pretty much every comic issue since his debut back in the 1960's. His niche in the comic book world is a small one and his mission is simple. The Hulk must smash and smash he does with great aplomb...also with a steel girder or other large blunt object. In short, the Hulk doesn't need Ang Lee and it is apparent from watching the film that Ang Lee doesn't entirely know what to do with the Hulk. He's got two hours to fill, but you can't have a big angry guy breaking things for two hours. There has to be something else going on especially if you have a world renowned director with an eye for the simple human dramas that drive our daily lives. The result: A barely involving psycho-drama about a young man dealing with the fact that he is adopted and his girlfriend's rejection of him because of her own hang-ups regarding father figures. Also, Bruce Banner's father is a megalomaniac who experimented on his son in utero resulting in some genetic complications that make him susceptible to Hulking out giving the proper Gamma Radiation stimulus. Also, there maybe be some abandonment issues at play for all involved. Sound like a rocking Hulk movie? It shouldn't.

Here's a quick formula for crappy superhero movies. If the appearance the titular hero does not occur in any meaningful way until you are well passed the 30 minute mark, you're movie has missed the point. The only exception to this rule is the original 1978 Superman. That movie rocks right up until the introduction of the villain, but that's a different post altogether.

So, instead of the Jade Giant crushing all who oppose him we have 45 minutes of will they/won't they from Bruce Banner and Betty Ross and the occasional cameo by David Banner who got a job cleaning toilets at a science lab after having been locked away by the military for his crazy science experiments. I don't know who his parole officer was, but he should be fired.

Problem the Second: The Script. Ang Lee did not write this movie even though he was the driving force behind the human foible aspects of the story. No, about 15 different people worked on this script at different times. The end result is a hodge-podge of dramatic scenes, inexplicable motivations, witty dialogue, flashes of brilliance and lots of talking. Lots and lots of talking. We have a need as a species to explore our feelings, I get that. We also have a need as movie viewers to escape from reality sometimes. We pay our eight bucks so that we don't have to explore our feelings. The Hulk is about rage. He's just got the one feeling. Go with that. But, I guess Hollywood pays by the page. A simple script about an angry monster wouldn't be very thick and that's not impressive at all. Think about the embarrassed studio exec who has to carry about the Hulk pamphlet while the guy down the hall hefts his copy of Benjamin Button. How could he show his face at Spago again? The solution is simple, fill the script with lots of nothing. Conversation about exploding frogs? Check. Conversation about corporate takeovers of publicly funded projects at state universities? Check. Conversation about the unfairness of the military industrial complex and the impact of religion on modern society. Check and Check. This script has it all, except for the Hulk. Oh, he shows up eventually, but just for a quick visit.

Allow me a quick comparison, if you will. In 1978's Superman we are treated to the birth, arrival and rearing of Clark Kent. This serves to explain how he came to be not just a Super-human, but a good man. Tension builds and we know that soon the big red S will be revealed and the day will be saved. Once Clark makes it to Metropolis it is only a matter of time before there are those in peril that only he can save and in that moment the camera pushes in on his chest as he tears his shirt open to reveal that symbol known around the world. The audience is silent, waiting for that second when the Man of Steel will be revealed in his totality. He bursts from the revolving doors in full costume and leaps into the sky. He catches the falling helicopter in one hand and Lois Lane in the other, the music swells, the people on screen cheer and the audience does along with them. It's stirring, moving and other -ings. In Hulk we are robbed of that moment. It takes forever to piss off Bruce Banner sufficiently to make him Hulk-out. When that change does occur, it happens in the dark and only lasts about two minutes. The Hulk throws a big gamma-sphere contraption at a car, growls at Nick Nolte and then leaps into the night where he is seen by nobody, because giant screaming monsters are common in the Bay Area. No swelling music, no saving the day, no jive-talking pimp to comment on his attire. He just gets angry and leaves.

Final Gripe: The Actors. You can not tell me that Nick Nolte, Sam Elliot and Juggsy McGee didn't drive this story from its roots into the mishmash of kooky ideas that it became. All of these people fancy themselves "Real Actors" and I guess that means making damn sure that a fun escapist tale becomes bogged down in angst and pathos. I read an interview where Juggsy was praising Ang Lee for not wanting to tell an exciting action story, but instead wanted to plumb the depths of the dark human mind. Dude, you signed on for a movie called HULK. Its protagonist turns green and punches tanks. That's the movie. That should be the entire movie.

Okay, now for the good. Tank Punching 101: This is the heart of the film and the reason I like it so much despite the efforts of all involved to make it suck. When the Hulk is finally on the scene and smashing as is his wont, he rules with a mighty green fist. He crushes tanks, leaps onto helicopters and jet fighters, he crushes cars like Bigfoot and Gravedigger got into a redneckin' contest and he looks awesome. You'll read a lot of snarky reviews talking about how much Hulk looks like Shrek. Really? I think the folks at ILM delivered in a way that hasn't been matched yet. Even the new Hulk in Louis Leterrie's movie doesn't look as good. There is a level of realism present on screen with Hulk that blows me away every time I see it. Sure, there are some shots that aren't as good as they could be, but the majority of what is on screen is amazing. When he busts out of the Military Stronghold and into the bright daylight of the desert, he looks as real as any actor. He moves like a person, he emotes like a person and he even sneezes like a person. Hulk is at his visual best in this film.

Clearly there is enough talent and will here to make the greatest Superhero movie ever filmed. Unfortunately, nobody wanted to actually do that. The director wanted to make a hybrid art film / action adventure, the actors wanted to show their emotional chops and the mass of writers were just trying to cram everything they could into one movie all while meeting the artistic vision of the director and actors. Not to be left out is the studio. The Dark Knight and Iron Man proved to us, this past year, that you can make a big budget action Superhero movie and make it well. Both films were perfect examples of their form. Maybe they succeeded because they had Hulk as a road map for what not to do, but more likely they did so because they had all the pieces and parts that Hulk did in addition to a studio that was involved and excited about the project. It's a fine line, I know. Too much involvement and the director's vision is compromised. Too little and the movie goes off the rails. But a good manager knows the difference and I guess Hulk didn't have one.

I will always have a soft spot for this movie, but it (like all the others) is stupid. The plot makes no sense, the actors are overwrought and there are occasional directorial flourishes that just boggle the mind. A ten second close up of moss growing on a rock does not serve the story. There are also just too many unanswered questions about the storyline. How does Nick Nolte get all that scientific equipment? If you get busted for hacking the DOJ makes sure you can't handle a computer in any form for years, but if you blow up a military base they clearly don't track you when you start building a Dr. Frankenstein lab in your living room. Also, if you get blasted with Gamma Radiation, they let you go home from the hospital after only a day. How does that happen? His HMO must suck. Although, I suppose one could argue that being the Hulk is a preexisting condition. But still, one day? How does the Hulk know where his girlfriend went to stay after his arrest? Why did they think putting a gigantic powerful monster in a confined space would be good idea? It's silly moments like that that destroy the story. In the end, it is a lack of focus that destroyed the movie.