‘Eternals’ Isn’t Just A Blockbuster, It’s Marvel’s First Cult Classic

It’s also one of my favorites, sorry

Some of my favorite movies were either critically-reviled or box-office flops or both when they first came out. These flicks were subversive, weird, gross, sly. Some of them were low-budget horror and some big-budget fantasies. Where should I start? Harold & Maude? Donnie Darko? Starship Troopers? So I just want to be clear — I don’t want to be misunderstood — that when I call Marvel’s new superhero movie Eternals a soon-to-be cult classic, it is a compliment.

It may take a few years for me to be proved right but I’m comfortable waiting. Don’t worry, I’ll remember. I’m patient. Until then, I guess I have to defend a movie that, more or less, answers the ancient question “What’s the meaning of life?”

Spoiler alert.

Well, the answer is: life needs to flourish because planets are like eggs with four-eyed behemoths inside of them and one day those behemoths destroy the planets that gestated them or something like that. That’s the meaning of life. Got it?

Eternals received the lowest audience score of any Marvel movie by research firm CinemaScore, and I have no idea the science behind their ratings but it’s already fueling the belief that Eternals is some kind of bomb, which it isn’t.

The doomsayers were wrong: Eternals had a strong opening weekend. This box-office success is a testament to the loyalty of Marvel’s fanbase even though the movie was savaged by critics who, mostly, loathed it. There were also very vocal, very hostile, online dudes who hated Eternals before it even premiered because it featured a diverse cast, and director, including the first deaf and openly gay characters in a superhero movie.

And then there were the conservative-leaning clickpinion sites that were hoping for Eternals to fail spectacularly so they could somehow work the word ‘woke’ into their stories. (They don’t really need an excuse to do that, really.)

It is, however, one of the most divisive movies in the MCU’s 26 film history. This is why I think it’s destined to be one of the only movies from this series to endure. I think future college students will do drugs and watch Eternals. I don’t know about you, but I’m going to re-watch Eternals the same way I re-watch The Fifth Element or David Lynch’s Dune. Which is semi-annually. Eternals is ahead of its time, both in its casting and content. It has its feet on the ground and its head in the cosmos.

Directed by Academy-award winning Chloé Zhao, Eternals is a two-and-a-half-hour-long epic poem about cosmic immortals who have walked the Earth, and struck noble poses, for thousands of years while fighting evil monsters called Deviants on behalf of giant gods. What are Deviants? I’m not 100% sure but imagine a ferocious demon panther made out of suspension bridge cables. Now give a couple of those wings. Boom. The Deviants.

This movie could also be called 2001: Justice League or Passion Of The Dude With Laser Beam Eyes. It’s not the usual tidy story of a man in a high-tech suit of armor or a blonde hunk with a magical hammer. I guess Marvel is confident enough, after a decade or so of making billions, to invest in a story invented by a brilliant misfit with an explosive imagination during New York’s dirty cocaine-fueled late 70s.

I think it helps that Zhao both respects the material, and the paycheck, but she also doesn’t really care about superhero movies. It’s a fun genre but there’s just not much you can do with it. Like sandwiches. Sandwiches are great but at the end of the day, it’s just stuff between two pieces of bread.

Instead, she tells a story of myths made flesh. I mean, when was the last time you saw a Hollywood movie that creates its own entire theology? Eternals is a very strange movie, beautiful, cold, hopeful, and Angelina Jolie is a fearsome statue that can conjure glowing swords and shields from nothing. It’s wild.

I love movies that aren’t perfect. That surprise audiences and defy expectations. A Hollywood blockbuster is an expensive bet, hundreds of millions of dollars spent, an army of workers giving up years of their lives, all on the chance that it will be a hit. It’s risky. But it’s the movies that don’t care about the gamble that I find myself watching, again and again, because those movies don’t care if I like them or not. They don’t exist for my approval.

Marvel movies are like Faberge Big Macs, intricately crafted masterworks for the masses. They’re great. I’m a fan. I know exactly what I’m going to get with one of these superhero movies and I always leave the theater satiated. That is the goal. The deal. Eternals is not a sloppy product. The special effects are as good as in any other Marvel movie. The fights are well choreographed and actually look a bit more realistic than similar fights in other franchises, which sometimes look like video games. But Eternals isn’t a typical power fantasy about charming person X getting powers from Y and saving the world from Z. Eternals is an apocalyptic Bible story starring sexy angels. It’s serene, it’s serious, it’s absolutely bananas.

The movie takes some big swings, and a few of them do not work. There’s one flashback where we see charismatic Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, whose power is the creation of advanced technology, standing in the wreckage of Hiroshima and sobbing. He regrets giving humanity technology and then retreats from Eternals-business to raise a family. It’s an awkward moment because, honestly, humans don’t need divine help with destroying each other. The reason the U.S. decided to wipe out hundreds of thousands of civilians was that one of the all-powerful servants of a Celestial accidentally taught Robert Oppenheimer how to split the atom? What? See? It doesn’t work at all, but Zhao tries and I can’t wait to squirm through that scene again during every subsequent viewing.

The most difficult challenge Eternals faced was having to introduce ten new characters with unique powers, and make the audience care about them, which I did. I owe that to Zhao’s talent for coaxing quietly powerful performances out of her actors, which she did in her celebrated drama Nomadland, a movie I like to think is an unofficial part of the MCU. As the leader of the Eternals, Salma Hayek’s Ajak is wise and warm. Gemma Chan’s Sersi can control molecules, and she’s the center of the story. Chan pulls off a complicated trick, playing a human who is also a secret robot powered by stars.

Don Lee’s superstrong Gilgamesh has real, tender chemistry with Jolie and then, of course, there’s Kumail Nanjiani’s Kingo, who is armed with laser fingers and snarky punchlines. Nanjiani is a wonderfully gentle, and quick-witted, comic actor and it’s a treat to discover those qualities make him a great action star, too. The rest of the cast is fantastic, including Lia McHugh’s Sprite, a 7,000-year-old woman trapped in a little girl's body. As Ikarus, Richard Madden is a perfectly stoic Superman-ish character with a powerful jaw.

Thanks to Zhao and Eternals, the valuable Marvel Cinematic Universe is a little bigger and trippier. It makes room for more kinds of stories featuring all kinds of people. There is plenty of punching in Eternals, as well as thoughtful moments of connection between super-powered aliens who watch over us all.

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• Here’s my review of ‘Nomadland,’ a movie I still think about.