Iron Man/Incredible Hulk Movie News
Posted by dailypop on January 21, 2008
William Hurt (A History of Violence) was recently interviewed by MTV and spilled a can-load of beans about the upcoming Hulk/Iron Man crossover filming. Hurt will be playing the part of General ‘Thunderbolt’ Ross who in the comic book series was a continual source of disapproval for both Banner and his jade-colored alter-ego. The part was played by the human mustache Sam Eliot in the Ang Lee film.
In his interview, Hurt talked at length about the crossover scene with Robert Downey, Jr., but the piece itself goes on about how this new film be such a radical departure from the previous film.
“There’s a scene, and during that scene there are a number of things happening. [Hulk] has beaten Abomination, and then there’s a crowd that gathers around, and they realize that he’s beaten Abomination. That Abomination was the one who was killing for just the joy of killing; Hulk is not the one.
“It’s the moment of turn,” Hurt added, “when society’s relationship with Hulk stops being so stupid.”
Unlike Ang Lee, director Louis Leterrier (the “Transporter” films) is intent on laying off the “Hulk as misunderstood monster” angle, thereby making him more heroic. “I want to see the relationship between Hulk and a world that realizes he’s not the villain,” Hurt said. “Hulk and [Tyler's Betty Ross] have their moment, and the crowd realizes he’s not the bad guy.”
While Edward Norton has perfected his portrayal of such good-guy/bad-guy conflict in films from “Fight Club” to “American History X,” Hurt can’t comment on his co-star’s performance. “I don’t know. I only have two scenes with him,” he sighed, sounding a bit disappointed. “That’s not enough to get a whole taste of it.”
He is convinced, however, that the reboot flick is fully unrelated to Lee’s initial installment. “I saw that film. This is, stylistically, a completely different film. They just don’t relate,” Hurt insisted.
Hurt said Norton worked hard behind the camera to keep the new flick from either becoming too cerebral or falling back on a “Hulk! Smash!” mentality. “[Norton did] a lot of writing, and came up with a lot of ideas. I can’t relate them now, because there’s not enough time, but he had a lot of ideas.”
While the while Hulk as hero thing is a viable part of the comic book mythology, I really think that the misunderstood monster angle is where the heart of this movie franchise is at. I understand that the Ang Lee film was a disappointment to the studio, but making the Hulk movie into an action/adventure film sounds too much like a major knee-jerk reaction to me.
