Hulk Smashes, Happening Crashes

Out in theaters this week: marvelous fights (The Incredible Hulk, starring Edward Norton and Liv Tyler) and suicide-a-go-gos (The Happening, starring Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel). What say ye, critics?

What’s Happening? M. Night Shyamalan hitting new Tomatometer lows, that’s what. The director once bestowed as the next Spielberg stumbles in rehabilitating his post-Lady in the Water reputation: The Happening, starring Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel on the run from an airborne toxin that causes people to spontaneously off themselves, is getting the worst reviews of Shyamalan’s career. Critics claim the interesting premise gives way to stilted performances and line readings, bombastic moralizing, and scant plot development past the first act. At 13 percent on the Tomatometer, The Happening is a non-event.Trading the emotional theatrics of Ang Lee’s Hulk for Louis Leterrier’s vision of a streamlined chase movie was the right move for Marvel. Taking over the role from Eric Bana, Edward Norton stars are Dr. Bruce Banner, who’s forced to go on the run when warmongers desire to exploit his transformative powers. The pacing of The Incredible Hulk never flags, critics say, and there’s no shortage of action scenes. But dissenters wonder if the smarts of Lee’s Hulk and the visceral matter of Leterrier’s had to be mutually exclusive. At 70 percent on the Tomatometer, for an Incredible time, look up Hulk.

- from RT