pdxfilmcast

2 Responses to “Ep. 17: Ang Lee Look – Taking Woodstock / Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon / Hulk”

1. Good show, guys. Sounds like I’ll be skipping Taking Woodstock… although the chance to witness an authentic acid trip is tempting.

   I think you guys nailed it with Ang Lee: he’s diverse and it’s hard to pin down his style exactly. I agree that he has a thing for landscapes, although I never consciously noticed this before. When I think of his films, though, I mostly remember the beauty of them all… even Hulk.

   I absolutely loved Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon back when it came out in, what, 2001? I remember I saw it opening weekend at Cinema 21 and was swept away with it all. I think I saw it three times in theaters (and one of them was even on a date… with a girl!). However, the reason I saw it so many times was because I wanted there to be more to the movie than what was on-screen. I loved the poetic fight scenes and the fantastic story, but I found the characters lacking, as if they were just short of being truly interesting. I kept seeing to experience more of them to see what else was there. Perhaps if I watched it again, I’d pick up on some subtleties my high-school self missed.

   I’ve gone on record saying I’m one of the only people in the world who actually liked the Hulk. What can I say, I’m a sucker for Beauty and the Beast stories. Plus I had a crush on Eric Bana ever since Chopper. Anyway, I agree with the comparison to King Kong, and I think that element of the story made it feel personal to me. I was always struck by the beauty of those scenes in the desert with Hulk jumping through the air, and liked a lot of the transformation scenes — especially the one in the military base when he gets HUGE.

   Hearing you guys dissect it, however, is making me think it’s worse than I remember. I didn’t particularly dig the on-screen comic panels, either, or the white freeze-frame outline that surrounds what’s-his-face as he gets incinerated by that explosion. And, what kept me from truly liking the movie was the terrible, confusing ending, when Hulk battles his lightning-being father in a confusing mass of clouds. What. I don’t know what Ang Lee was thinking with that finale, because it should have been the strongest scene in the movie. Also, hearing that they muddled with the Hulk’s origin kind of leaves a sour taste in my mouth, since I’ve become more familiar with the character since I first saw this movie (does it even include Rick Jones?!?). I hate when a simple origin story is retconned into giving the protagonist some sort of pre-destined, higher purpose, because it makes them less relateable as characters. You no longer see them as someone just like you who got thrust into extraordinary circumstances; instead, they’re people destined and manipulated into greatness… which you weren’t. It’s a common technique in comic books, and I hate it EVERY time. They did this with Cyclops in the X-Men comics and it always bothered me.

   Anyway, in defense of the film, I think Ang Lee was really experimenting with the comic book adaptation here, and he discovered a lot of things that didn’t work. I think he was trying to expand upon the campiness inherent in Sam Raimi’s excellent Spider-Man, and it just didn’t work. A lot of future comic book films undoubtedly learned from the mistakes of Hulk, so the genre owes Lee a debt of gratitude for that, I’d posit. In a way, he has something in common with Gus van Sant in that regard.

   Evan said this on September 11th, 2009 at 8:21 pm

2. best comment ever.

   pdxfilmcast said this on September 11th, 2009 at 8:43 pm