Ang Lee's Hulk Dared To Smash Traditional Superhero Movie Rules

Ang Lee's Hulk is the Johnny B. Goode of superhero movies.

In Back to the Future, Marty McFly delivers a lively performance of Johnny B. Goode at a 1950s prom. Similarly, Ang Lee unleashed his unapologetically unique Hulk move onto the public in June 2003. The creative ambitions of McFly and Lee were clear. They both knew exactly what they wanted and were executing their creative visions to match those ambitions. Unfortunately, both the teens at that 1950s prom and summer moviegoing audiences in 2003 weren't receptive to what McFly and Lee, respectively, were dishing out. "I guess you guys aren't ready for that, yet," McFly said once his Johnny B. Goode performance went over like a lead balloon, "But your kids are gonna love it!"

The Hunted Has Two Exceptional Leads But A Boilerplate Story

For those two people out there who have been dying for an action movie that pits Tommy Lee Jones against Benicio Del Toro, well, the March 2003 feature The Hunted has got you covered. In this William Friedkin directorial effort, Del Toro plays a decorated U.S. soldier named Aaron Hallam who has had extensive experience taking down enemy forces with excessive gruesomeness. Now he's gone rogue from his handlers and committed a series of grisly kills on American citizens. Such slaughterings have caused local law enforcement to call in the aid of the normally reclusive L.T. Bonham (Tommy Lee Jones).

Memories of Murder Is Crime Thriller Cinema At Its Finest!

Prior to 1986, there had never been a serial killer in South Korea. That all changed once the Hwaseong Serial Murders occurred and sent investigators into a spiral to try and find out who could be behind this unprecedented crime spree. This effort is chronicled in Bong Joon-ho's 2003 movie Memories of Murder, which follows detectives Park Doo-man (Song Kang-ho) and Seo Tae-yoon (Kim Sang-kyung) having to work together in order to track down a killer that proves to be as elusive any ancient diamond. The two of them are like a classic buddy cop duo, Park Doo-man is a confident local detective that always trusts his gut while Seo Tae-yoon is an out-of-town detective whose experiences in the field have left him with a more meditative sense of deduction.

2 Fast 2 Furious Delivers An Average Sequel With A Perfect Title

2 Fast 2 Furious. Just say that title aloud, savor each word in it. 2 Fast 2 Furious. What a perfect sequel title. The actual movie belonging to that title is nowhere near as gloriously perfect in every way, but it's not every summer blockbuster sequel that can say it delivered such a wonderful title. As that title indicates, this is the second entry in the expansive Fast & Furious saga and the lone title in the series that doesn't feature Vin Diesel's Dominic Toretto character. Brian O'Conner (Paul Walker), having been forced by Miami law enforcement to help take down a local criminal kingpin, is sharing leading man duties with Roman Pearce (Tyrese Gibson).

Endlessly Inventive Filmmaking Is One of The Many Ways City of God Impresses

City of God is one of those movies that grabs you, doesn't let go and you hope it never loosens its grip. What an intoxicating portrait of how so many seemingly disparate lives end up becoming intertwined over the course of nearly thirty years. Set in Cidade de Deus, Rio de Janeiro, also known as "the City of God" (hence the title of the film), City of God explores how exactly a massive war between two criminal enterprises began. Turns out, such a feud has humble and unexpected origins in a small neighborhood occupied by a child version of our protagonist Rocket (played as an adult by Alexandre Rodrigues). Rocket guides the viewer through the elaborate story that follows chronicling the rise of eventual big-time criminals like the sadistic Li'l Ze (Leandro Firmino).

Last Flag Flying Is The Newest Thoughtful & Heartfelt Accomplishment From Director Richard Linklater

Some of the most famous movies made by director Richard Linklater tend to center on youthful protagonists, like the High Schoolers in Dazed and Confused, the college-aged fraternity boys of Everybody Wants Some!!! or the lead character who inhabits numerous stages of youth in Boyhood. Linklater has a knack for writing both realistic and dramatically involving younger characters, but Last Flag Flying shows he doesn't lose his talents as a screenwriter when he's dealing with older individuals (fellow entries in Linklater's dynamite 2010's run Before Midnight and Bernie are similar showcases for this), on the contrary, he seems to thrive when given the opportunity to explore more life-experienced human beings.

Kill Bill Slays Thanks To Thoughtfully Realized Characters And Uma Thurman's Formidable Lead Performance

In retrospect, it's nuts that Quentin Tarantino had a whopping six years separating the release of his third film, Jackie Brown, and his fourth film, Kill Bill (which was split into two individual movies upon its initial release). In every part of his career, Tarantino has only taken three or four years maximum in between projects, but then again, he hasn't really done anything as large in scale as the expansive Kill Bill saga in the rest of his filmography, perhaps that extensive break between films was necessary for him to properly prepare for a motion picture of this magnitude. Whether that's true or not, that extensive wait was totally worth it as Kill Bill is a terrific feature that gathers up depth as it goes along like a snowball picking up snow as it travels down a snow-covered mountainside.

The Room Will Tear You Apart With Confusion And Yuks

I've been hearing jokes centered around various lines and situations from The Room on the internet for as long as I can remember. You'd think that would diminish the experience of seeing the actual movie for the first time, but on the contrary, seeing the whole thing in full really is a whole other type of experience unto itself. Tommy Wiseau's attempt to channel the works of Tennesse Williams is thoroughly sincere and 110% committed to itself, but what it's committed to is absolute madness. It's a unique kind of madness though, the kind that could only come from the mind of Tommy Wiseau for better and for worse.

Though Better Than Expected, The 2003 Daredevil Movie Still Finds Itself Not Realizing Its Full Potential

Surprisingly, the 2003 feature film take on Daredevil does rise above a number of the middling or outright bad comic book movies that were being made in the era in which it was released. It's a thousand times better than Catwoman, it's far more interesting than The Punisher, it's less aggravating than the 2005 Fantastic Four film and I'd even go as far as to say it's at least on par with the 2000 X-Men movie in terms of overall quality. The problem here is that's probably the highest praise I can lather Daredevil with because it's still an erratic heavily flawed movie that's kept from being something truly special due to a pretty poor screenplay, though it does have its moments of charm or gusto goofiness, can't deny that.

The Monstrous And Gruesome Effects Of The Cycle Of Abuse Are On Display In The Riveting And Unsettling Monster

Charlize Theron is talented in an abundance of ways but she’s particularly adept at portraying damaged individuals. She’s gone down that route a number of times in her career and whenever she does, she makes sure she’s not repeating herself, she’s examining different facets of a damaged human being. Furiosa in Mad Max: Fury Road, for instance, is a whole different kind of damaged human being, one who has just much physical trauma in her past as she has mental trauma but she has an unfailing determination to her that motivates her sole purpose in life: to help others that are being abused by the ones who had committed awful atrocities to her.

Terminator 3 Is A Derivative Disaster That Ended Up Being The Worst Movie In The Franchise

In the Terminator universe, the end of the world comes in the form of Judgement Day, the day when the machines took over, nuked the planet and sent humanity to near-extinction. But for the Terminator as a movie series, the end basically came when James Cameron left the directors chair and some producers decided to trot out the Terminator brand name for some easy bucks despite the fact that the entire Terminator plotline was obviously wrapped up in a tidy and satisfying bow at the end of the second Terminator movie. Screw concise storytelling though, we've got some pennies we still haven't wrung out of this dead horse!

Elf Finds The Joy In Both Christmas And Humanity

Welcome to 25 Days Of Christmas Pop Culture! From now until Christmas Eve, I'll be tackling one piece of Christmas pop culture! It could be a book, movie, TV special, song....so long as it's festive for this time of the year, it'll be checked out in this daily column!

Elf is a prime example of a movie that shouldn't, under any circumstances, work. A comedian mugging it in a family movie? That always works out well. A sequence where the main character spies on a woman in the ladies locker room? Creep central. A lead character so optimistic and spunky should be aggravating. Instead, it's a treat of film, one of the very best features centered around the holiday of Christmas.

Toby Keiths New Song Brings Together Booze And Patriotism

I kinda owe my whole obsession with country music to Toby Keith, a guy I grew up listening to whose music was a constant fixture in my household. How Do You Like Me Now?!, Courtesy of The Red White And Blue, and especially I Wanna Talk About Me were songs I heard endlessly and adored. What's great is that those songs hold up wonderfully as an adult. They remain not only great to listen to, but also have great lyrics and tackle some nicely realized situations unique to country music.

First Photo of Marvel's New Daredevil Netflix TV Show Released!

The Man Without Fear has spent 11 years away from the world of cinematic media, thanks to a poorly received 2003 feature starring Ben Affleck. But Daredevil is finally back home at Marvel Studios, and the company has big plans for the character in 2015. He'll be the first of five TV shows the media empire will create for Netflix and at the New York Comic-Con today, they revealed a first look at Daredevil, which you can catch below!