Trailer Park
By Rob Allstetter

Ang Lee not only directed The Hulk, he WAS The Hulk.

The Taiwanese director, coming off the sensation of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, actually donned a motion-sensor suit and acted out The Hulk's movements for the special effects wizards at Industrial Light and Magic.

"I was desperate to show them what it should be," Lee says. "Usually animators do that without direction. Basically, they're doing creatures, not a human who you're supposed to identify as human, like an actor. So usually they photograph themselves, but that won't work for me. I have to show them what it meant to be there.

"By the time they started animating it, the film is already cut with the backgrounds and the rhythms and how things are worked out in my head. So eventually the best way, the quickest way, is me showing them out to do it.

"Facially, they captured it quickly with media references. But the Hulk physics, they still need some realistic reference to begin with. Then there's attitude, too, the body performance, the body language. So eventually I put on the suit and I started to do all the Hulk shots. Other than the three-mile jump, I would do everything. I do the father and the water and I would indicate what I mean by this and that. And it would really help them visualize what it's supposed to."

Lee says acting out The Hulk helped him personally in making the film.

" It's like psycho-therapy. I was so stressed out in doing it," he says. "I got a chance to be the Hulk, it really helped me feel the Hulk. Making the whole movie was a Hulk out experience for me.

"I hope viewers who watch the movie, they see the whole movie as the Hulk, not just a CG character. So that's the whole pursuit. That's how I talked to every actor. They're dealing with their inner Hulk. They're dealing with the Hulk subject. They're dealing with their subconscious and how to cover them up, how to reveal them, how to interact with the Hulk within that. That's the innocence and reasonable impulse in us to take the form of aggression.

"So that's the Hulk. It's pretty intense. As a filmmaker, I also experienced it. It's like a Hulk out experience, too. So doing that helped me get aggression out and have a physical feeling for what it's like. It can be inspiring. Took a big toll on my body. But it's a very special experience for a director, to actually act out and get a taste of it and go back and forth."

Talk to anyone involved in The Hulk - which opened No. 1 at the box office last weekend with $62.6 million - and they tell you about Lee's passion for the project.

"I had fortunate success of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, a mixture of pop art - in a Chinese way - and drama. To me, this is my new Hidden Dragon, an American Hidden Dragon, and I get a bigger canvas," Lee says. "And I get to do pyschodrama. And without a leading movie star to open it big because it's a franchise movie. And there's abundant visual inspiration from the original back stories. I see it as my big chance to make a big movie. So that's how I started it.

"But then to bring it to life, to come to terms with the audience and the market, which is still yet to be proven, what people are making of it . yeah, that's pretty nerve-wracking. If I think about it, which I had to the last three months or so . and before that, I was very excited. It feels like I got everything and everybody, although they don't understand what I mean by this and that . it seems like I knew, but I was guessing, too. I was experiencing that too. It seems like an interesting process, but I was nervous, too. On a given day, I feel like I'm very brave and courageous but at night, I feel like, 'What have I done? I'm going to kill myself. This is the biggest mess I've made. How will I put it together?'

" I said to myself when I decided to do a big movie, 'Unless I can make it feel personal, I'm not good enough to take the project.' It's not the size, it's the ambition. Unless I personally attend every element, which is the way I always make movies, I'm not worthy to taking this particular project.

Lee was also offered Terminator 3 before taking The Hulk.

"Well, I was attracted, but I couldn't find a way to break the material that was established," he says. "At the end of day, I would rather create original material, and this one was never put on screen yet. I felt like there was a lot more freedom than the other one. The other one has too many obligations to the fans, to the worldwide lovers of that project, including myself. It was too much pressure for me."

One of the more interesting aspects of The Hulk is Lee's extensive use of multi-screens and varying transition techniques.

"At the very beginning. Before I wrote the script, I started testing it with my editor Tim Sqwires, and we always worked together," Lee says. "I didn't carry it out as much as I want. Tim kept telling me at this point, people might not used to it yet. It could be distracting. So I didn't go as far as I wanted to, but we did do a lot.

"I don't want to call it split-screen. It's more like multi-image, choreographed multi-panels, imitating comic books. When you open it up, there's a structure. There's definite art design to it, and you pick and choose in your own ways.

"The movie is ongoing; it has a linear structure of its own. So I have to choreograph it, unlike the comic book, for your cinematic eyes."

Rob Allstetter, Deputy Sports Editor for the Detroit News, has been a comics journalist for the past decade, having written for numerous publications. He currently publishes The Comics Contiuum. He can be reached at: RobAlls@aol.com.

The Trailer Park Archive

July 2 2003 - Hellboy June 25, 2003 - Ang Lee June 18, 2003 - Eric Bana June 11, 2003 - Spider-Man Animation June 4 , 2003 - Lou Ferrigno May 27 , 2003 - Teen Titans May 20 , 2003 - Bryan Singer May 14 , 2003 - Al Gough May 8 , 2003 - Kelly Hu April 22, 2003 - Aaron Stanford April 18, 2003 - James Marsden April 15, 2003 - Jaime King April 8, 2003 - Halle Berry April 2, 2003 - Anna Paquin March 26 , 2003 - Scott McNeil March 21 , 2003 - Alan Cumming March 18 , 2003 - Michael Rosenbaum March 14 , 2003 - Ted Raimi: The "Other" Raimi Is Coming Back March 11 , 2003 - Maria Canals likes the call of the wild March 7 , 2003 - John Shea - Welcome to Mutant X March 4 , 2003 - Anthony Cistaro - Witchblade February 27 , 2003 - David Kaye - Professor X February 18 , 2003 - Victor Webster February 14 , 2003 - Ben Affleck February 11 , 2003 - Colin Farrell February 7 , 2003 - Comic Controversy? January 31 , 2003 - Static Shock January 24 , 2003 - Jennifer Garner