Hulk 2003

Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: The Hulk is a seriously repressed movie, and like its hero-victim, Bruce Banner, it doesn't know what it wants to be: serious and thoughtful, or big green money-making machine. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: For all its stylistic energy, The Hulk remains curiously flat and uninvolving whenever the monster is offscreen. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: This is a superhero movie that really captures the essence of comic book pop art. Read more

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune: It's a corker -- big, exciting, opulently designed, gorgeously shot and blessed with a top cast. Read more

A.O. Scott, New York Times: Incredibly long, incredibly tedious, incredibly turgid. Read more

Andrew Sarris, New York Observer: An interesting effort to give one of the staples of mass entertainment something extra in the way of insight and feeling. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: [An] enjoyable summer behemoth. Read more

Bob Longino, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: A sometimes enjoyable, sometimes moving film. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Schamus and his fellow screenwriters have taken the most pompous elements of superhero comics -- the humorless archetypes, the italicized declamations -- and inflated them until they nearly burst with the strain. Read more

Manohla Dargis, Los Angeles Times: [A] likable if tame monster movie. Read more

Bruce Westbrook, Houston Chronicle: A portentous souffle that never truly rises. Read more

Paul Clinton (CNN.com), CNN.com: Fans of the comic book will probably be pleased and thrill seekers in general will get plenty to chew on. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: Hulk is hardly a masterpiece. But it is certainly one of the most psychologically ambitious movies ever unleashed on the summer-movie crowd. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: A big-budget comic-book adaptation has rarely felt so humorless and intellectually defensive about its own pulpy roots. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: Ang has the arty smarts, Stan has the pop wiles -- now if only they could get on the same page. Read more

Philip Wuntch, Dallas Morning News: A dark and serious psychological drama cum sci-fi spectacle, The Hulk is incredible for what it attempts rather than what it achieves. For some viewers, that will be enough. Read more

Ella Taylor, L.A. Weekly: An articulation not only of the struggle between father and sons, but of our most current topical fears. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: Ang Lee's interpretation of the Marvel Comics hero is a sci-fi/action thriller art film that tries valiantly to re-create the graphic- novel experience, but lacks a certain insanity. Read more

Peter Rainer, New York Magazine/Vulture: Despite the profusion of computer-generated effects, which rousingly bring the green guy to life, I often felt, for better and for worse, that I was watching a comic-book movie reconceived as a piece of serious mythmaking. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: This green-eyed monster may be the perfect symbol of an angry time. But he's an impossible hero to cheer. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: The filmmakers said it was going to be smart -- really smart -- like all of Lee's movies. Instead, it's big, dumb and fun. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: Big, dopey and crammed with special effects that take the breath away. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: Lee's vision of Hulk is fresh and exciting, and he has fashioned a motion picture that's a breath of fresh air. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Ang Lee has boldly taken the broad outlines of a comic book story and transformed them to his own purposes; this is a comic book movie for people who wouldn't be caught dead at a comic book movie. Read more

Charles Taylor, Salon.com: Are comic books art? Maybe, but this leaden, pretentious flick about Marvel Comics' big green id, from the overrated Ang Lee, is just schlock art for the NPR set. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: A thinking person's movie with precious little for anyone to think about, except for a green giant smashing things. Read more

David Edelstein, Slate: Unlike your average comic-book blockbuster, The Hulk isn't a bad cartoon. It's a bad modern Greek tragedy. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Hulk is the lumpiest amalgamation of sci-fi and psychological drama since Steven Soderbergh's misfired Solaris. Read more

Geoff Pevere, Toronto Star: A comic book movie as smart and expressive as the medium that spawned it. Read more

Nick Bradshaw, Time Out: Nice as it would be to report that Ang and his co-writer/producer James Schamus had regenerated the summer blockbuster, we gotta poop the party. Read more

Mike Clark, USA Today: Lee tries to spruce it all up with heavy use of split-screen, which is sometimes clever and sometimes distracting. But nothing can distract us from the overriding reality that too much of Hulk is a sulk. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Variety: [An] impeccably crafted piece of megabuck fantasy storytelling. Read more

Michael Atkinson, Village Voice: The upshot is sweetly melodramatic -- at least, you inevitably note, there are nominal humans aboard. Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: A belabored, ostentatious, overlong behemoth. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: Hulk doesn't deliver its summer payload. Read more