Monster smash

For someone who's about to become a major Hollywood star, Eric Bana is remarkably tranquil. The only thing that makes him angry, aside from the turbulent performance of his Aussie Rules team St Kildare this season, is the role that's about to make him famous --that of gamma-soaked scientist Bruce Banner, alter-ego to the havocwreaking Incredible Hulk.

Bana is about to join the elite band of Antipodean actors that includes Russell Crowe, Hugh Jackman and Guy Pearce, who are regularly invited to crack open a tinny or two in Tinseltown. By the time Hulk has stampeded through cinemas, 34-yearold Bana's fame will eclipse that of the 15ft, computer-generated monster.

Hot on the heels of other recent Marvel Comics adaptations like Spider-Man and Daredevil, Hulk has already recouped over half its $120 million budget on its opening weekend in the US. At the helm is Taiwanese director Ang Lee, the man who made martial arts artistic in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

The film dispenses with the camped-up theatrics of the long-running TV show to deliver a complex character study true to the original Stan Lee-created superhero. 'He's more of a monster than a superhero,' Bana corrects, 'but from my point of view, he's an emotionally incomplete human being, which I guess, in a sense, is a monster.'

Bana, a comic turned actor, knows all about monsters. He chillingly played one in Chopper, the story of notorious real-life psychopath Mark 'Chopper' Reid. Bana prepared for over two years to play the part, even putting on 30lbs. As transformations go, it was on a par with Robert De Niro in Raging Bull and led him to his Hollywood debut in Ridley Scott's noisy ensemble Black Hawk Down.

Minus the tattoos, beer-belly and foot-long scars he sported in Chopper, as the philosophising maverick Delta Force soldier, Bana was the only actor to stand out from the shellfire, offering a performance comparable to Robert Duvall's turn in Apocalypse Now. 'I love the transformation involved in acting,' he enthuses, 'that's what it's about for me.'

Not unlike his fellow Aussie stars - think Pearce in Memento or Crowe in The Insider - Bana's sunny exterior masks the fact that he hankers after playing loners. He was intrigued by the Bruce Banner/Hulk character's destructive Jekyll and Hyde complex, and is pleased that the film offers an antidote to the usual Hollywood fare. 'We don't see Bruce enjoying himself at any point in time - he's going through a lot mentally and emotionally,' he says. 'Most blockbusters succeed in being entertaining, but they don't always attempt to be as dramatically complete as this film.'

Today, he looks lean and fit in a shortsleeved navy shirt, jeans and boots. His dark eyes shining, he sports a sprawling beard and shaggy crop of hair - part of the costume for his role in the forthcoming Troy, an epic spin on The Iliad. He plays Hector, leading the Trojans against Brad Pitt's Achilles.

With the production based in Malta, Bana relocated with his family in tow: children Klaus, four, and Sophia, one - and his wife, Rebecca, a former publicist whom Bana met while he was performing sketch-comedy for Australian television in the mid-Nineties. 'She's a travelling mum, which - with two kids - is a lot harder than what I do,' he adds.

Unwilling to be an absent father, Bana says he won't work back-toback on films, because he wants to spend time with his kids. Quite how long these good intentions last remains to be seen. There's already talk of a sequel to Hulk, but Bana seems remarkably calm about his fast track to Hollywood's A-List. 'I try and take it in my stride, and try not to think about it too much because I think that will do your head in.' Proud of his roots, he has no wish to dismiss his early days on the Australian stand-up comedy scene.