The Incredible Hulk (2008)

Director: Louis Leterrier

Whereas Iron Man began with a testosterone shot of military hummers, war torn Afghanistan, and with a soundtrack blaring classic hair metal rock, the second Marvel studio release, The Incredible Hulk begins like an exquisitely beautiful and delicate silent movie. I’d almost call it arty if I wasn’t afraid it would conjure up bad memories from the nearly universally loathed, most recent Hulk incarnation from director Ang Lee. No, the 2008 film opens with a terrifically edited montage—a visual tapestry and feast for the ears as well as Scotish Moulin Rouge! composer Craig Armstrong’s impressive musical score (which has now become one of my favorite of 2008) is synched along with images that brings even those of us unfamiliar with the comic book mythology up to speed, with nary a trace of dialogue. In order to best capture the back-story in an efficient and sweepingly visual way, French director Louis Leterrier (Transporter 2), the talented Australian Die Hard 3 cinematographer Peter Menzies Jr. and Hulk’s three person editing team utilize classic cinematic trickery along with telling newspaper headlines and data from pertinent documents to chronicle the sad tale of brainy scientist Dr. Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) whose experiments with radiation resistance went horribly wrong, not only poisoning Dr. Banner with dangerous levels of gamma rays but also morphing him into a violent, super-sized green Hulk who unleashes fury when angry, leaving bodies and injury in his wake, including accidentally harming his beloved Dr. Betty Ross (Liv Tyler) in the process.

Once the credit sequence ends, our hero vanishes for five years and-- instead of offering a tried, true and admittedly tired superhero paradigm-- the film admirably stays in the mold of great "man on the run" pictures including The Fugitive and The Bourne Identity trilogy. Soon we catch up with Banner hiding in Brazil where-- when he isn’t concentrating on controlling his anger levels with breathing techniques-- works as a lowly factory bottling employee. Now with the sneaking suspicion that he was manipulated by Betty’s shady military general father William Hurt into using the science he assumed was for good for violent ends instead in the General’s quest to harness the Hulk’s capabilities into creating a super soldier where man becomes a weapon for Iron Man hero Tony Stark’s weapons conglomerate Stark Industries, Banner makes strides in contacting a U.S. based scientist to try and reverse the experiment.

Of course, it isn’t too long before the General becomes aware of Banner’s location and sends a team in with enough firepower to take out the entire country, headed up by the ambitious career soldier, Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), who after realizing that Banner is “a whole new level of weird” finagles a deal with the General to be injected with the very same product in order to level off the playing field of an unstoppable Hulk whom bullets nor bombs can penetrate.

Realizing that he has no choice but to face the life he’s been escaping, Banner returns home where he unintentionally reunites with his love Betty Ross, now a professor at Culver University in Virginia. Quickly the two go on the lam to search for a cure, with time running out as the General and Blonsky continually track their whereabouts and with every new annoyance, Banner’s pulse increases dangerously towards the magic number of 200 wherein he turns into an uncontrollable version of himself that he most fears, namely The Incredible Hulk.

Although Norton lacks the easy mischievously sexy, albeit sometimes over-the-top charisma of Iron Man’s Robert Downey Jr., he is the quintessentially earnest everyman and one we instinctively empathize with as a likable scientist who’s trying to right some extraordinarily unfortunate wrongs. Granted some critics have-- similar to their main Iron Man attack-- found legitimate fault with Hulk’s lack of a real worthwhile villain although, as a fan, I enjoyed seeing Roth play evil once again. Despite this, the film works best when it’s understated in its attacks, especially in a phenomenally choreographed battle at the university midway through the film and at its absolute worst when it relies too heavily on frankly lackluster special effects in a damn near deafeningly loud, overwhelmingly cheesy video game styled final battle between Norton and Roth that seems to last longer than watching every installment of both The Thorn Birds and Roots miniseries combined.

However, aside from the overly long confrontation which will wear on the patience of a majority of audience members who aren’t fourteen year old boys, as it stands The Incredible Hulk is a superior film to Iron Man—majestic, beautiful, with a more compelling and richer storyline and of course that fantastic score, although this being said, when held up next to Iron Man, it’s nowhere near as fun. And, even though his cameo seemed to last no longer than two minutes, it was an incredibly lively and welcome sight indeed to see the handsome, impeccably dressed Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) arrive in the concluding moments of the film to set up the Hulk sequel and you could audibly hear the anticipation, gratitude, and amusement of the audience who let out either a chuckle or a small admiring holler at the prospect of the two franchises linking up... (okay, so that last cheer may have come from this reviewer).

Mongol

Director: Sergei Bodrov

If one were to conduct a public opinion poll on Genghis Kahn today, chances are the most frequent descriptions of the man would consist of terrifying leader, murderer, pillager and barbarian. Yet, after viewing Russian director Sergei Bodrov’s Mongol, the first work of a planned trilogy about the controversial leader born with the name Temudgin, my initial reaction was that perhaps all Kahn needed was a good public relations team to turn worldwide frowns upside down. In showing us the softer side of Kahn as a predominant lover who occasionally fights rather than a horrifying fighter who sometimes loves, one encounters a Kahn who wouldn’t be out of place as the lead hero in Gladiator or Braveheart, and even far more surprisingly, incidentally a man one wouldn’t hesitate to bring home to mom.

Kazakhstan’s official selection for the Best Foreign Language Film category of the 2008 Academy Awards where it made the international cut to become one of five prestigious nominees, Bodrov’s film has drawn countless parallels to old fashioned epics with its grandiose scope and wonderful usage of a vast, overwhelming landscape (painstakingly accurate in its cinematography of Kahn’s old stomping grounds in the countries of China, Mongolia and Kazakhstan). While one is instantly aware of the influences of Ridley Scott especially in some of the expressionistic, alternatively fast and slow motion new aged battle scenes wherein the audience is shown the action from the point-of-view of weaponry as though we’re complicit in the attack, I was also struck by Bodrov’s homage to other foreign masters including Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa’s work with Toshiro Mifune and especially fellow Russian director Sergei Eisenstien’s much imitated classic Alexander Nevsky.

While admittedly I’m probably the ideal viewer of Mongol with relatively zero knowledge about Genghis Kahn other than his oft-cited reign of terror and it’s obvious that liberties were taken with the facts for the benefit of the cinematic narrative, Bodrov’s aim is undoubtedly true in capturing the spirit of his source material, which is not only based on “leading scholarly accounts” according to the press release but as cited in a Wikipedia referenced interview, was additionally inspired from an ancient Chinese poem which chronicled-- similar to Mongol-- Kahn’s upbringing and marriage.

Opening in the Tangut Kingdom in 1192’s Year of the Black Rat, the nine year old Kahn, then named Temudgin (played by the charismatic young Odnyam Odsuren) accompanies his father to visit the Merkits with the intention of choosing a bride. Immediately thunderstruck by Borte, a bold ten year old girl who initially chides her new acquaintance with the adage that all “smart people choose us for brides,” later, liking his face and similarly in-tune with the lad, she adds the fortuitous afterthought, “you should choose me.” Ignoring his father’s advice to ensure he find a wife with the right description of facial features and one with what his dad repeatedly states has strong legs to keep a man happiest, Temudgin settles on Borte with the intention to marry her in five years. However, his future becomes dangerously uncertain after the death of his father finds him fighting to stay alive verses his people’s arch enemy Targutai (Amadu Mamadakov) who is not only hell bent on taking over as Kahn but promises that-- while he won’t break Mongol tradition and murder a child-- as soon as Temudgin comes of age, he will kill the rightful heir to the leadership.

With plenty of perilous adventures, near misses, abductions and escapes, Temudgin grows into the beginning of the quick thinking legend he would become as—and now played by the impressive Japanese star of Zatoichi, Tadanobu Asano—he finds he can finally marry his equally rebellious tomboy beloved Borte (likable newcomer Khulan Chuluun). However, unfortunately for the newlyweds, their relationship is continually tried with repeated captures and obstacles, none greater than Temudgin’s battles with his blood brother turned rival Jamukha (Road Home star and Mongol scene-stealer Hanglei Sun).

Although the film stumbles considerably in its second half with plodding pacing and a lack of the same take-no-prisoners emotional investment it slayed us with in its first opening sequences, Bodrov more than redeems himself with his expertly staged Eisenstein inspired battle sequences and the stunning photography from two distinctly different cameramen including Russian cinematographer Sergei Trofimov and Quills and Disturbia Dutch veteran lens-man Rogier Stoffers.

Above all Mongol is surprisingly romantic and thankfully intimate for a large scale epic where oftentimes the individual characters get sidestepped in preference for the impact of the bigger picture and emphasis on carnage and casualties. And while it’s a far more sensitive and charismatic Kahn to which history enthusiasts are accustomed, it’s a terrific achievement by Bodrov and one where, given the impressive footing he found right out of the gate, he’ll undoubtedly be able to build off of like a Kahn worthy war strategist in the next two installments to cross the trilogy's finish line with unsurpassed style.

Legend of the Black Scorpion

Alternate Title:
The Banquet
Director:
Xiaogang Feng

“Something is rotten in the state of…” China? Over the years, the timeless plays of William Shakespeare have been transferred to the screen in countless adaptations both classical and radical from Akira Kurosawa’s versions of Macbeth (Throne of Blood) and King Lear (Ran) to Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins’s Oscar winning interpretation of Romeo and Juliet (West Side Story). The overwhelming influence of the Bard’s comedies and tragedies on not only cinema but popular culture in general is incalculable as his lines echo in the mouths of Quentin Tarantino characters, themes dance throughout our big budget period epics and there have been so many incarnations of legendary villains and heroes such as Lady Macbeth, Iago, and Hamlet that it could cause a graduate student meltdown.

And perhaps even more remarkably every once in awhile a filmmaker is bold enough to admit right from the start that they’re interpreting not just any Shakespeare play but his greatest tragedy Hamlet and bolder still is when the filmmaker’s last name isn’t Branagh. In 1996, Kenneth Branagh, my favorite Shakespearean professor, released what would become to academics the ultimate version of Hamlet in his dazzling masterwork clocking in at 242 riveting minutes that never cease to amaze audiences so much that some film critics have even named it one of the greatest achievements in filmmaking of the entire 1990’s. Needless to say, following in Branagh’s footsteps where Hamlet is concerned took considerable moxie and it was a move best made by a filmmaker willing to take a large departure from the text to offer audiences something remarkably different.

With this in mind, I transport you dear readers to China where master martial arts choreographer Yuen Woo-ping (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, The Matrix, Kill Bill) teamed up with director Xiaogang Feng for their very own adaptation of the Danish prince’s quest for revenge, named the Legend of the Black Scorpion. While admittedly it takes awhile to gain our interest as it annoyingly begins to go into exposition twice orally instead of illustrating things visually, we become quickly aware of the Shakespearean similarities only moments into this visually spectacular award winning film festival favorite, which features the largest set ever constructed in China (IMDb) and was chosen as the official Hong Kong entry for the Best Foreign Language Film category of the Academy Awards.

Obviously inspired by Hamlet, although some critics such as Derek Elley of Variety also drew comparisons to Macbeth, Feng’s film is set during the tumultuous crumbling of the Tang Dynasty in 907 AD as we’re introduced to the film’s version of Hamlet, named Prince Wu Luan (Daniel Wu) in an embarrassingly earnest and awkward opening ballad that’s both as reminiscent and effective of Woody Allen’s usage of a Greek chorus in Mighty Aphrodite. Lovesick and desperately heartbroken, Wu Luan has retreated to study the arts including his love for singing and dancing while still upset that his teacher and emperor father had married his classmate and sweetheart Wan (Memoirs of a Geisha star Ziyi Zhang). When he learns that his father has been killed, all hands seem to point to his power hungry, lustful Uncle Li (You Ge) who soon enough confirms that suspicion by ordering a band of soldiers to execute Wu Luan and planning to first bed and then wed Empress Wan (Ziyi Zhang) to rule by his side. After he predictably escapes the deadly attack, Wu Luan returns to the palace where he’s torn between his affection for his sensuous stepmother who’s even younger than he is, his devoted betrothed the Ophelia like Qing Nu (Xun Zhou) and of course, exact lethal revenge on his murderous uncle, the Emperor Li.

Erroneously advertised as an action picture especially given the martial arts friendly name change from The Banquet as well as Woo-ping’s involvement which finds his jaw-dropping talent given very little opportunity to shine, this gorgeously photographed tragedy shot by award winning cinematographer Li Zhang never manages to draw us in on a level that goes beyond sheer aesthetic appreciation. Partially due to the otherwise excellent Ziyi Zhang who’s far too young for the role that was originally slated for Gong Li or Maggie Cheung (IMDb), even with the part rewritten expressly with this age change in mind, but it’s greatest tragedy isn’t in the film’s scope or in tackling source material from the daunting Shakespeare but in slowing it all to a scorpion’s pace where at roughly half the length of Branagh’s Hamlet, it still feels a good 30 minutes too long. While the Bard’s brainiacs are sure to check it out regardless, honestly it’s time well spent for artists who will undoubtedly find themselves inspired less by the forced, clunky conversation that no doubt suffers in translation and more by the film’s visual poetry in terms of the production design and costuming (both courtesy of Oscar winner Timmy Yip) that’s worthy of Shakespeare himself.

The Mist

Director:
Frank Darabont

Attention market shoppers, we have carnage on aisle four.

In the aftermath following a violent storm that wreaked havoc on a small Maine town, movie poster artist David Drayton (Thomas Jane) notices an ominous mist that has appeared over the lake. Packing up his young son Billy (Nathan Gamble) and offering a ride to his one-time enemy, the New York lawyer Brent Norton (Andre Braugher) with whom he’s begun to tentatively mend fences while evaluating their respective property damage, the three head into town to stock up on supplies for what they predict will be another violent New England storm.

Once inside their local market which, like the town itself, seems to be a place that has escaped time in its quaint 50’s like aura, they share stories with others and are startled when an elderly man runs into the store visibly shaken and bloodied, yelling, “Something in the mist took John Lee! Don’t go out there!"

Something in the man’s tone, not to mention the blood begins to cause a panic and while most feel confident to trust their neighbor, they watch in horror as a disbelieving man exits the store. Shockingly vague violence and screams follow, leaving the man dead and thus begins one of last year’s most chilling sleepers that can only have come from the godfather of suspense himself, Mr. Stephen King.

Adapted by longtime King fan, Shawshank Redemption and Green Mile writer/director Frank Darabont, this moodily haunting horror film sets itself up like a modern episode of The Twilight Zone (and in a DVD feature King notes that he was inspired by the horror classic TV show Panic). With an emphasis on characterization and psychology, we feel as terrified as the townspeople as they barricade themselves inside the market and logically try to deduce not only what’s going on outside the store but also their next steps in how to proceed from there.

Initial worries that the mist was a chemical pollution cloud soon give way to greater fear when the resident town psycho, the (as King said) warden-like Mrs. Carmody (Marcia Gay Harden) pulls out her bible and begins to whip a group of shoppers into a Revelations frenzy saying that the wrath of God has been unleashed on the town heathens and the end is near. After further carnage ensues when additional townspeople are killed by seemingly otherworldly beasts as they test the limits of their imprisonment, soon the store is divided into two groups with Mrs. Carmody gaining momentum on one side and the more proactive, sensible citizens headed up by David Drayton, shopkeeper Ollie Weeks (a terrific Toby Jones) and the town’s new schoolteacher Amanda Dunfrey (star of Darabont’s Majestic, Laurie Holden) becoming the minority banding together in a different aisle.

It’s by this point that the audience, nearly working in tandem with David and his group, try to solve the mystery on their own, although admittedly we realize that the horrifying vagueness of the situation is precisely what is driving most of the fear, as both on and off the screen fingers all seem to point in the direction of the nearby military base long accused of dabbling in the extraterrestrial in a top secret operation called Project Arrowhead.

While we’re never quite sure the mystery itself will be solved, we’re riveted the entire way, although I found myself disappointed when The Mist morphed from a tense, thinking person’s horror film into one obsessed with mutant bird-sized bugs and slimy tentacle creatures as opposed to concentrating on the fear-based psychological breakdown and terrifying "group-think" mentality. Thus, as the running time increases, The Mist becomes an overdone and not terribly satisfying B movie, which may have played better in the black and white photography that director Darabont had intended (and indeed the color and black and white versions will be released in a 2 disc DVD set).

Although granted, Mrs. Carmody’s conversion of the shoppers seems to occur much too quickly, the film’s dual horror show of oversized mutants and bible thumping madmen and women keep us distracted enough to forgive some of the film’s flaws and ultimately its high-speed pace and clever characterization make this a roughly average thriller that’s strengthened considerably by its much discussed, shocking conclusion that, although it wasn’t written in King’s novel, seems to be the only fitting finale. In fact, the conclusion was so vital to the film’s storytelling success that writer/director Darabont received confirmation from the Weinstein Company and Dimension Films that his original script including that unforgettable ending could not be aletered.

Best viewed on a sunny, mist-free day, while Darabont’s The Mist will most likely be overshadowed by superior King adaptations such as Kubrick’s The Shining, Reiner’s Misery and Stand By Me, and Darabont’s own Shawshank Redemption, it’s still a deft chiller and one that, as Darabont noted on the DVD, actually made the legendary King jump “three feet” during a screening of the film. And in the end, box office and reviews aside, scaring King with his own material should be the truest form of evaluation for any King adaptation.

The Forbidden Kingdom

Director: Rob Minkoff

In Michael Mann’s Heat, audiences felt their breaths catch waiting for Al Pacino and Robert De Niro to converse together onscreen in the diner, each sizing the other man up in a way that feels nearly Shakespearean. In the movies of Nora Ephron, we felt a similar thrill when Tom Hanks fell in love with Meg Ryan and the two began their happily ever after in the sunny, flower-filled Central Park conclusion of You’ve Got Mail. And in the first onscreen pairing of legendary action stars Jet Li and Jackie Chan for director Rob Minkoff’s The Forbidden Kingdom, as soon as Chan stumbles into the same scene as Li and utters, “Do you come here often?” the last thing I wanted for the men was the two to chat or fall in love. Instead, like nearly every other audience member and undoubtedly Chan and Li themselves, I wanted to see them fight. And fight they do in this uneven but gorgeous spectacle before their characters end up on the same side in helping a modern day South Boston teen who, via a pawnshop and a magical Bo Staff that’s propelled him back in time to ancient China, return the staff to its rightful owner, the Monkey King (Li in a second role).

Beginning as a near homage to Back to the Future, the movie opens with Kung Fu movie obsessed Jason (Shia LaBeouf look-alike Michael Angarano) being forced to aid in a robbery by a band of dangerous bullies that goes wrong and hurls him into the past where he soon meets Chan’s Drunken Master inspired Lu Yan, a perpetually wine-chugging fighter specializing in Drunken Fist which he explains is the “secret Kung Fu of the south.” To restore the order of the land, Jason and Yan decide to bring the Bo Staff back to the Monkey King, who the evil Jade War Lord (Collin Chou) has frozen in stone for roughly five hundred years “give or take a few decades,” and on their peril filled journey to the Five Elements Mountain, they find their team increasing with the addition of a beautiful vengeance seeking orphan Golden Sparrow (Yifei Liu) along with the monk Lan Cai He (Jet Li). The characters and indeed plot from Young Guns screenwriter John Fusco (who is currently writing the questionable new version of Seven Samurai), were derived mostly from “Chinese mythology and adventure pulps” as well from the “Chinese epic story Journey to the West [which is] one of the four great classic novels of Chinese literature,” according to IMDb.

When the battles with an evil witch with stark white hair and other dangerous allies of the War Lord become far more treacherous, Back to the Future morphs into The Karate Kid as Yan takes it upon himself to teach Jason how to fight. The introduction of this element not only provides the characters with more plot from scripter Fusco who went through, as IMDb reports five rewrites (some during the film’s shoot) but also gives the film’s producer and fight choreographer the legendary Yuen Woo-Ping (Crouching Tiger, The Matrix trilogy, Kill Bill 1 & 2) a chance to style some of the most thrilling and high flying fight scenes we’ve seen in years which, even when the film becomes self-consciously cheesy, are worth the price of admission alone.

Although it’s hard to fault a film with this much sheer entertainment value for its inability to sit side by side with works like House of Flying Daggers or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to which, I believe most of the audience was hoping the first collaboration of Li and Chan would compare, for fans of the actors, especially my personal favorite-- the hilarious and charismatic Chan, it’s definitely a treat. And hopefully it’s also one that will lead to even more pairings and possibly a grander cinematic approach, aside from the film's major standout that comes in the form of the jaw-dropping, majestic cinematography by Oscar winning Peter Pau (Crouching Tiger). However, until we get there, The Forbidden Kingdom is a great place to start.