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What happens when you hire a poet to direct a comic book action movie? You get The Hulk, the most introspective and literary comic book movie to date. Audiences expecting to turn off their brains and sit back for another blast of mere eye candy may stagger out of this 138-minute epic wondering what hit them.

It sounds like an unlikely project to begin with: "From the director of Sense and Sensibility and The Ice Storm comes the story of a man transformed by anger into a raging green monster!" But Ang Lee's films have always had something to do with the difference between self-control and repression. Thus it is no surprise that The Hulk is more interested in the inner struggles of its characters than Spider-man, Daredevil, or even Tim Burton's tormented Batman films.

What is surprising about the film is Lee's inventive use of comic book framing devices. Instead of going for simplified imagery or an emphasis on primary colors, he turns the screen into a series of shifting frames that show us scenes from multiple perspectives. One scene leads to another with screen wipes that feel like turning a page. It's a wonderful, dizzying style, most of the time. But occasionally it becomes distracting, and later in the film it seems to disappear altogether.

But that is the only thing "comic" about the film. Lee asks us to take his characters seriously. His cast members convince us of the extraordinary things happening to them.

Eric Bana turns the temperamental Bruce Banner into a troubled adult who is afraid to unearth frightful repressed memories. But those memories hold the key to the secret of the monstrous transformation that comes over him when he gets angry. And what a transformation. The effects are sometimes awe-inspiring as Banner lets loose his angry inner child and suddenly resembles a green, overgrown toddler throwing a tantrum in his terrible twos. We may not understand how he got these abilities from a few "gamma rays" and some starfish genes, but hey, who wants to quibble about scientific gobbledygook when the Hulk puts on such a show!

When this happens, Bana portrays both fear at what is happening to him and a wicked glint of exhilaration at realizing what he can do. Thus the story asks us to admit the thrill we all can know in wielding power over others, and then to consider the consequences of such power and the need for responsibility. As the beautiful and brainy Betty Ross, Jennifer Connelly basically repeats her Oscar-winning performance from A Beautiful Mind—but you can't blame her. Once again she is cast as the only one who cares enough to see past a gruff exterior to the great mind and the beautiful heart within. She gives us a powerful image of the way that love and compassion can quiet rage.

In contrast to Betty's peaceful solution, her frowning father, the decorated General Ross (Sam Elliott), has been sent by the U.S. Government to apprehend the Hulk so the military can get its hands on his genetic secrets for weapons development. If Hulk proves too much trouble, though, Ross will have to destroy him. Elliott steers Ross away from being a stock villain, making him a complicated officer with good intentions and a grudge. The lesson here: military action is not an effective anger management technique. It's a timely and effective metaphor.

But the story's central lesson comes from the struggle between the Banners. Bruce's father (Nick Nolte) is a mad scientist with a warped desire for power, and his genetic meddlings have had a hand in Bruce's strange development. When Bruce finally uncovers the truth about his origins, he marches toward a spectacular confrontation in which the full consequences of his father's sins will threaten to consume them both.

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June (Web-only) 2003, Vol. 47