The Eternals (Chloé Zhao, November 5, 2021) Movie • Page 16

The post credit scenes were so good. Pip the Troll played by Paton Oswald is perfection.

 

Top 10 for me, I think. I’ll have to watch it a few more times and let the hype of it fade away.

 

I rather him be MODOK in the actual movies but we can’t have nice things

 

I’m legit shocked by how much I LOVED this.

 

Just came out of a second viewing and enjoyed it more now that I knew what to expect in terms of flashbacks. Despite the length, this is easily rewatchable.

 

Extremely good to hear if true

 

I really, really would like to see Zhao return, but I 100% would understand if she decides not.

 

yeah I would not blame her one bit for not wanting to deal with all this again, even though she made a movie that I very much enjoyed

 

Wanted to start dabbling with putting my dumb thoughts on things somewhere besides Chorus and Twitter, lol, so I made a Medium and started with this movie:

Marvel Studios’ Eternals, featuring Chloé Zhao

I didn’t get into too many specifics, but it did feel nice digging a little into my central take on this film.

 

I just read that apparently there were originally going to be 12 Eternals per Zhao, but she and the production team cut two out because it was too much to juggle. Wild stuff.

 

Didn’t Marvel Studios have an edit ready to go until Chloe won an academy award so then they decided to let Chloe have her way and allow the edited version she desired to be the Final Cut? If so this seems like it would be more Chloe and less Marvel interference.

 

Yeah I mean this was unmistakably a Chloe Zhao film. Just because it also happened to be a Marvel movie doesn't change that.

 

I don't see this until Tuesday, and I'm really anxious to do so just so I can talk about this film without feeling like I'm talking out of my ass.

 

I don’t believe that the film had “Marvel interference.” I believe that it’s just fundamentally a Marvel film.

Chloé Zhao certainly had a lot of influence on the film, particularly in how it was shot but also in script rewrites and editing. And, as I’ve said a couple times, I don't absolve her of every baffling choice in the film. But, no matter how much space they gave her to make her version of the movie, it’s still unshakably, at its foundation and core, the 26th entry in Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe.

If Zhao is offered and accepts another Marvel movie, I’ll watch it (especially if it costars Harry Styles!), but I’ll do so with adjusted expectations and the hopes that less of the story feels obligatory.

 

Some other examples, to hopefully better illustrate my point:

Spider-Man 2 was a Sam Raimi film. Spider-Man 3 was a Spider-Man 3 film with heavy Sony interference. I fully expect Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness to be first and foremost a Marvel Studios film, with some Raimi sprinkled in, even if its production process is more positive than Spider-Man 3’s.

Also, the Ant-Man Edgar Wright was developing starting before Iron Man’s release was surely an Edgar Wright film (in the same way Scott Pilgrim was). When he left, his comments point to the reason being that it had become primarily a Marvel Studios film.

 

this was the first time they’ve given final
cut to a filmmaker since the incredible hulk. chloe absolutely bad decision making say over this film that most mcu filmmakers did not. she deserves a fair chunk of the blame for this being a mess.

 

Editing can save or ruin a movie, but it’s just one part of the process. And, a final cut doesn’t exactly happen first in that process.

Also, as much as I’m on record as really loving Zhao’s work, it’s not like “Marvel film” vs “Zhao film” is in and of itself a statement on the quality or enjoyability of a final film. As I said the other day, how she handled Amazon in Nomadland wasn’t great. And, Zack Snyder’s Justice League (2021) was pretty indisputably a Zack Snyder film, but results vary on how “good” that was, lol.

 

I really enjoyed this. Not gonna be bothering my MCU top 10 or anything, but still a lot of fun.

 

The best explanation of this I ever had was Dan Olson's Suicide Squad video where he talks about Fant4stic and how a "Trank cut" probably exists, and it might well be "better" in the sense that it's more coherent, but it still doesn't solve the fundamental issues with the film, which are why Fox took it out of his hands and edited it themselves.

 

https://variety.com/2021/film/columns/chloe-zhaos-eternals-worst-mcu-movie-why-1235106850/amp/

I found this article an interesting take on the ratings debacle.

 

I shared this elsewhere but it’s a good read

The Narrative Around the ‘Eternals’ Reviews Is Doing More Harm than Good

 

I can’t wait for the articles that will be about how there are too many articles about the reasons why the film did badly critically and whether they’re right or not.

 

Articles about articles??? *cue obnoxiously loud Inception noise*