Josh Lucas from the 2003 film HULK discusses Ang Lee’s brilliance and technological limitations

Ang Leeit’s 2003 Hulk the movie completely blew my mind when i first saw it. I thought that movie was damn awesome and after all these years I still think it’s a great Hulk movie! I loved the way he told the story and the wild comic visual style! When I think back to that movie, I think it might actually be one of my favorite comics.

Lee just did a great job and presents one of the best portrayals of the Hulk, regardless of the CGI limitations the director was working with at the time. I also thought Eric Bana he was amazing as Bruce Banner in the movie.

Josh Lucas (Yellow stone) played Talbot in the film, a character who was trying to bring down Bruce Banner, and in a recent interview with The Playlist, he discussed Lee’s brilliance and the technological limitations they were working with at the time. The actor said:

“If people ask me who my favorite directors are, I’ll almost invariably tell you my number one is Ang. I don’t use that word genius, but I think he’s really up there as a brilliant, if not brilliant director. As you say, he was swinging for the beams [Hulk]. I don’t think the technology was where his brain was. And if you look at what he did with Life of Pi, he was able to knock it out of the park.”

He went on to expand on his thoughts, saying that Lee was frustrated that the film’s CGI technology wasn’t where he wanted it to be when he made the Hulk:

“I think the technology evolved, and he’s one of the people who pushed the technology to evolve. I know he was pushing the team of people who were at the Hulk CGI to do something that, technically, maybe he wasn’t able to to be at the level where he still wanted it. And so I think he was very frustrated with that movie because he wasn’t able to get what he wanted and what he had in mind.”

When this movie was being made, Lee didn’t have a successful formula for superhero movies to follow, so he set out to tell the best story possible, and did some impressive, unique, and creative things along the way. He has an ambitious vision for this film, and speaking of what Lee has brought us, Lucas said:

“But I also agree with you, the way he was transforming, the way the pages were turning. I mean, he was creating a visual comic, and I haven’t seen anyone doing it the same way he was doing it — think about it, it’s been 20 years, right? So, there’s an incredible auteur director under this monster, one of the first Marvel movies. I have nothing but respect for that.”

Exactly! If you haven’t seen Ang Lee’s Hulk in a while you should revisit him, because he’s so damn good!