{"id":155527,"date":"2021-10-30T16:21:02","date_gmt":"2021-10-30T22:21:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=155527"},"modified":"2021-10-30T16:21:02","modified_gmt":"2021-10-30T22:21:02","slug":"soooooo-many-people-want-eternals-to-be-a-disaster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2021\/10\/30\/soooooo-many-people-want-eternals-to-be-a-disaster.html","title":{"rendered":"Soooooo many people want “Eternals” to be a “disaster”"},"content":{"rendered":"

I haven’t read more than a paragraph (spoilers, sweetie!) of this article<\/a>\u00a0 lamenting the “Disaster” of Marvel’s new Eternals <\/em>, but I really didn’t have to, not with this headline:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There are soooooo many Serious Critics who want Marvel (and Disney) to suffer a serious failure. It’s evident here from the very beginning of the piece.<\/p>\n

However you may feel about the place superhero blockbusters have occupied in the cultural landscape for the past dozen-plus years …<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But you know how you\u00a0<\/em>should feel.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

… there is something ineluctably sad about the way directing one has become the primary marker of success for a gifted emerging filmmaker. Distinguish yourself in your field, as Chlo\u00e9 Zhao did when she won the Best Director and Best Picture Oscars last year for her contemplative indie road movie Nomadland<\/em>, and you are ceremoniously handed the keys to the Marvel car\u2014a gigantic CGI-enhanced vehicle that can navigate black holes and shoot rays of plasma out of its headlights, but that always moves in the same direction to arrive at the same predetermined spot.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Or, to sum up the underlying sentiment, “It’s ineluctably (!) sad that brilliant indie movie creators aren’t allowed to endlessly create brilliant indie movies for the brilliant indie movie lovers. Then everyone would become a brilliant (or at least moderately intelligent) indie movie lover like we are. O tempora! O mores!”<\/em><\/p>\n

O filmcrit snobbery. Because when you start a movie review, not with observations about the film itself, but with bewailing that a great director has been somehow lost to the Inhuman Unartistic Evil Hollywood Marvel Movie-Making Track, you’re not here to criticize the movie — you’re here to criticize the entire genre and its leading production house. For reasons.<\/p>\n

\"Marvel<\/a>
Yes, it’s time for another screed about Everything That’s Wrong In The Movie Industry Today.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The idea that a director is only being pure and true to the Muse if they produce brilliant, thoughtful, low-budget, award-winning cinematic masterpieces is … well, yeah, snobbery. It makes assumptions about what is worthwhile, what is pure, what is\u00a0right.<\/em><\/p>\n

If a great, award-winning chef is offered the opportunity to make a lot of money creating a family-friendly tuna casserole — no tuna eyeballs floating in sauce, no molecular gastronomic crystalline noodle essence, just tuna casserole using what’s in the pantry — I’m betting it’s going to be a kick-ass meal regardless. Maybe not a once-in-a-lifetime culinary masterpiece that people will weep that they missed in the decades that follow, but something filling and enjoyable and probably with a bit of unexpected dazzle.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Mmmm. Tuna casserole.<\/figcaption><\/figure>Is Eternals<\/em> any good? Is it a tasty tuna casserole? A hearty and multi-faceted stew? Macaroni and Processed Cheez Whiz ?\u00a0 I dunno. I tend to enjoy MCU movies despite the chorus from one side (as above), or the chorus from the other side (“Zack Snyder would have made it even better!”). I have tickets for next Saturday, so I’ll let you know then.<\/p>\n

I do have reasonably good expectations, based on the MCU track record, the source material, and what I’ve seen so far. Heck, that the director won Best Director and Best Picture for her “contemplative indie road movie” seems like a good<\/em> sign that it could be something really good.<\/p>\n

As I said, I have not read the full review by Dana Stevens (I’ll save that for after seeing the film). But I suspect, just from that first paragraph, that she fundamentally dislikes the entire genre, and its conventions, and its style of story-telling, especially as packaged within a corporate franchise that isn’t going to do anything too radical or profit-endangering in its various outings. And so Zhao’s outing in\u00a0Eternals<\/em> gets framed as a tremendous waste of time and talent when we could have had Nomadland 2<\/em> or something.<\/p>\n

(Stevens admits<\/a> she has a bad “record” on “comic book blockbusters,” and that she really doesn’t understand the appeal of the genre, though the original\u00a0Wonder Woman<\/em> movie made her cry. She also brags<\/a>, re Wonder Woman 1984, <\/em>“Look at me over here, liking a comic book movie! Never let it be said every film on my Top 10 list is a harsh Eastern European documentary!”)<\/p>\n

Stevens is not the only person who has expressed literary eye-rolling at the hoi polloi<\/em> popularity of super-hero flicks in general, or Marvel’s installments specifically. It’s been standard fare since the earliest MCU movies came out, and went into overdrive when Marvel was bought by that other cultural bugbear, Disney — especially as such movies showed an inexplicable tendency to attract lots and lots of viewers and make lots and lots of money. That’s like red meat to some film \/ book \/ cultural critics.<\/p>\n

\"Nomadland\"<\/a>
“Eternals” is not “Nomadland.” There I said it. Wait, should it have been?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Of course, all this begs the issue of what a “good” movie is. I don’t expect Eternals<\/em> to be a brilliant “contemplative indie road movie.” In fact, that’s not the entertainment I’m looking for from it. And I can say that without maligning those who enjoyed Nomadland<\/em> as out-of-touch pointy-headed intellectuals who want to tempt up-and-coming directors with low-budget, contemplative film-making.<\/p>\n

Aside from enjoying the genre, I’m intrigued with Eternals<\/em> because of some of the creative challenges it has to face, with its out-of-nowhere large cast that it has to introduce and get the audience engaged with, let alone the mythos behind it.\u00a0 In some ways, it’s the most ambitious MCU film yet, bypassing the slow build-up of solo films before group gatherings for a much bigger chunk of story-telling. Some few bits of feedback I’ve heard from early viewings are mixed as to whether the film pulls that off.<\/p>\n

Beyond that, as a dyed-in-wool Marvel comics fan, I’m at least as interested in the bigger picture of how the movie, and the characters, fit into the larger MCU and the future. And I’m sure there are other folk who just want a pew-pew blow-em-up spandex Saturnalia of good-looking people fighting CGI baddies. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.<\/p>\n

\"Hamlet<\/a>
Just like that hack Shakespeare and his inevitable crowd-pandering sword fights.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Rise the chorus of folk like Stevens, who cry out, “But it’s such a waste of talent! Chlo\u00e9 Zhao! And money! Millions of dollars of money that could have gone to something much more important and memorable and artistic!”<\/p>\n

But, honestly, would not have.\u00a0Nomadland\u00a0<\/em>won Best Picture, but if every movie produced was another\u00a0Nomadland,<\/em> would we have a movie industry as we know it? Would Disney (would anybody) have created forty Nomadlands<\/em> for the price of Eternals? <\/em>It seems unlikely.\u00a0Nomadland<\/em> had a box office of $39M in the US, very respectable for a $5M budget.\u00a0 But Shang-Chi\u00a0<\/em>made $90M in the US in just its first weekend; Black Widow<\/em> made $80M (plus another $60M streaming).<\/p>\n

There’s more to the cinema than money, and there should be. But there’s very little without<\/em> money.<\/p>\n

\"Chloe<\/a>
Do we need to issue an amber alert for Chloe Zhao?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And it’s not like Disney kidnapped Chlo\u00e9 Zhao and locked her in a room and forced<\/em> her to make Eternals.<\/em> Or is the implication that she was unfairly (and “ineluctably sadly”) tempted by filthy lucre to sell out her Muse by directing such a thing?\u00a0Hey, little girl — climb into the Mickey Mouse van. We have candy!<\/em><\/p>\n

That’s actually kind of insulting to Zhao.<\/p>\n

Not that I think she’s not at least partially into movie-making for the money, but I can’t imagine that there wasn’t something<\/em> about this project that intrigued her beyond the paycheck, just as other Marvel projects have intrigued folk like Brannagh or the Russo Brothers or Coogler or Waititi.<\/p>\n

I did flip forward to the last paragraph<\/a> of the review:<\/p>\n

Eternals\u2019<\/em> cinematography incorporates a little more natural light and open landscape than your average Marvel joint, but the demands of a $200 million corporate enterprise ultimately prevail over any aspirations to auteurship. That\u2019s OK\u2014a filmmaker of Zhao\u2019s gifts has earned the right to try her hand at what, like it or not, is one of the dominant genres of the 21st century.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yes, “like it or not,” but also we’ve somehow flipped from Zhao being sucked into an ineluctably sad Hollywood money-making machine to her having the “right” to try her hand at it. I guess that’s … progress.<\/p>\n

For myself, I’m going to engage with Eternals<\/em> as a contemporary super-hero movie, a genre I<\/em> generally enjoy, rather than demanding it to be something hitting the 2050 Top 100 Bestest Films of All Time list. Indeed, I’ll see it, not as a stand-alone one-off art film, but as a chapter in a longer (if open-ended) saga. I expect I’ll enjoy it, too, even if it’s just “predetermined” to be tuna casserole.<\/p>\n

Sometimes tuna casserole can be pretty good.<\/p>\n

\"Eternals<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Too many critics find the MCU not to their taste, and just can’t wait for it to fail.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155534,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[525,15,41],"tags":[2215,1954,1234],"class_list":["post-155527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-marvel-cinematic-universe","category-media","category-media-movies","tag-criticism","tag-eternals","tag-mcu"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/Eternals-teaser-sheet.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":155550,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2021\/11\/07\/movie-review-eternals-2021.html","url_meta":{"origin":155527,"position":0},"title":"Movie 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DCU)","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/dc-cinematic-univese"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/movie%2Btheater.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/movie%2Btheater.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/movie%2Btheater.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":155563,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2021\/11\/07\/trailers-before-eternals.html","url_meta":{"origin":155527,"position":3},"title":"Trailers before “Eternals”","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 7-Nov-21 1:06am","format":false,"excerpt":"A couple of things I'm interested in, plus an annoying non-movie advert.","rel":"","context":"In "Animation \/ 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book action and self-mockery, but never really finding it's spot.","rel":"","context":"In "Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)"","block_context":{"text":"Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/marvel-cinematic-universe"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/She-Hulk-attorney-at-law-poster.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/She-Hulk-attorney-at-law-poster.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/She-Hulk-attorney-at-law-poster.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/She-Hulk-attorney-at-law-poster.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, 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Bravo to the creators (as well as to the MCU and Barns Courtney).\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)"","block_context":{"text":"Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/marvel-cinematic-universe"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/a-nicely-done-music-vid-to-various-marvel-movies-aHUrAvKNF8s.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/a-nicely-done-music-vid-to-various-marvel-movies-aHUrAvKNF8s.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/a-nicely-done-music-vid-to-various-marvel-movies-aHUrAvKNF8s.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/a-nicely-done-music-vid-to-various-marvel-movies-aHUrAvKNF8s.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/a-nicely-done-music-vid-to-various-marvel-movies-aHUrAvKNF8s.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155527"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155527\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":155537,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155527\/revisions\/155537"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}