Hulk tear car apart!


provided by Ferrigno) rattled the windows, but the dialogue tended to get drowned out during the action scenes, and so we found ourselves turning on the subtitles during those sequences. Universal’s Blu-ray issue of THE INCREDIBLE


HULK comes with a second disc consisting of a digital copy of the film for play on portable de- vices, hence the supplements are all included on the disc containing the feature. Happily, most of the supplementary materials are presented in full HD, available with the same subtitle options as the feature. Given the well-publicized controversy between Edward Norton and Marvel Studios con- cerning the length of the final cut (which purport- edly would have run well over two hours), perhaps the two supplements included on the Blu-ray fans were most eager for were the alternate opening sequence (3m) and the extended and deleted scenes (totaling 43m). We found no profound rev- elations in the deleted material, although the al- ternate opening, in which Banner travels to the frozen north in order to commit suicide, is the most interesting. The deleted material ranges from the banal (additional exposition during several of the extended scenes) to the unexpected (Banner work- ing as a pizza delivery man once he returns to Culver University). There is, however, some additional foot- age after Banner’s return that explores his rela- tionship with Betty Ross and her new boyfriend, Leonard, that’s worth screening. Suffice it to say that the portion of the film set at Culver University is the most truncated in the released version. Those interested in the rumored extended cut might do well to listen to the audio commentary, in which garrulous director Louis Leterrier, accom- panied by Tim Roth, candidly discusses the mat- ter of the cut footage. Neither of them, however,


make any mention of their working relationship with the legendarily difficult Edward Norton. Al- though it would have been a nice addition to the disc for Norton to have had an audio commentary of his own, it is an understandable omission given his rift with Marvel, but in his absence we found Leterrier more than informative about the film, from its conception to the actual filming. The HD featurette, titled “The Making of THE INCREDIBLE HULK” (roughly 30m), also neglects the Norton- Marvel controversy, although it does have the vir- tue of explaining why the Hulk franchise was reinvented so quickly after the Ang Lee version. The requisite “Behind-the-Scenes” footage con- tained in the short shows the shooting of some key scenes. Brief mention of the CGI Hulk is also included, but two additional featurettes, totaling 19m 38s, both explore the CGI effects, “Becom- ing the Hulk” and “Becoming the Abomination.” Each featurette contains footage of concept de- signs, animatics, and early CGI footage. The HD featurette, “Anatomy of a Hulk-Out” (28m), con- tains behind-the-scenes footage and short inter- views with both Edward Norton and Tim Roth as well as brief interviews with the action coordina- tors and camera operators. A short animated comic, “From Comic Book to Screen” (7m), also in HD, completes the disc’s supplements. Play- back options enabled by Universal’s “U-Control” includes the “Thunderbolt Files” (graphics and text pop-up windows), “Comic Book Gallery” (picture- in-picture information), and “Scene Explorer,” which allows the viewer to watch portions of the film with storyboard-to-screen comparisons of unprocessed footage, and production information that appears in pop-up windows. The disc also includes the “BD-Live” internet connection that


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