Jennifer Connelly: 5 Awesome Performances And 5 That Sucked

... And 5 That Sucked

5. Betty Ross - Hulk (2003)

Fans of The Avengers will remember how long it took to reach the rounded, satisfying depiction of the Hulk that Mark Ruffalo provided us. In the 2000s we sat through two very different attempts to nail the character and his story. Before The Avengers, there was The Incredible Hulk, a fun but shallow affair which had good action scenes but very little heart. And before that there was Hulk, which took everything a lot more seriously and featured one of Connelly's weaker performances. Directed by Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain, Life of Pi), Hulk revolves around scientist Bruce Banner (Eric Bana), whose experiments involving nanomeds and gamma radiation bring him to the attention of the US military. Through a glitch in a lab computer, Banner is exposed to both radiation and the nanomeds, which prevent him from being killed and cause his DNA to mutate. Soon he receives a visit from his father (Nick Nolte), who experimented on Banner as a child, and who warns him to control his temper... Critical reception of Hulk was decidedly mixed, with several journalists leaning on groan-worthy variants of "you wouldn't like me when I'm Ang Lee". Connelly has come in for less flack than others over the years, but she's rather flat and uninteresting as Betty. The character has a pivotal role in the story, keeping Bruce's emotions in check while being estranged from both him and her father. But Connelly looks uncertain in the part and struggles to make her emotional developments seem convincing.