Review | Eternals movie review: Marvel superhero epic with Chloé Zhao, Oscar winner, directing is a middling effort that struggles to accommodate its all-star cast

Chloé Zhao, who won a best director Oscar for Nomadland, takes on a Marvel film that struggles under the weight of too many central characters

The fight action is fun, but the movie lacks the usual irreverent Marvel humour – and the human touch Zhao put into the Academy Award winner

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Richard Madden and Gemma Chan in a still from Eternals (category IIA), directed by Chloé Zhao. Kumail Nanjiani co-stars. Photo: Sophie Mutevelian/Marvel Studios

Published: 2:00am, 25 Oct 2021

3/5 stars

Chloé Zhao, fresh from directing the Oscar-winning Nomadland, returns with Eternals, her first dip into the Marvel Cinematic Universe and, in truth, it’s a tough ask.

With this film, set five years after Avengers: Infinity War, she must introduce a dozen or so new characters into the MCU. The Eternals are the world’s oldest superheroes, immortal beings with magical powers of strength, flight and more who were put on Earth 7,000 years ago to defend us against the Deviants.

Although these carnivorous aliens were seemingly defeated 500 years ago, the Eternals remained on the planet. Now, in present-day London after an earthquake, these beasts are back.

It first comes to the attention of Sersi (Gemma Chan) and Sprite (Lia McHugh), who soon team up with Sersi’s former flame Ikaris (Richard Madden). Gradually, they seek out fellow Eternals across the world, including the fractured Thena (Angelina Jolie), hiding in the Australian Outback with Gilgamesh (Ma Dong-seok).

Zhao revels in the script’s globe-trotting nature, which takes the team from South Dakota to Iraq and the Amazon, where they find Barry Keoghan’s Druig living as a godlike figure in the jungles.

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