To these alternately ravished and glazed-over eyes, then, “Eternals” plays like an extravagant blockbuster riff on “The Tree of Life” - a connection that would feel deliberate even if a giant tree didn’t spring forth in one of the movie’s lovelier CGI epiphanies. (Marvel Studios/Courtesy of Marvel Studios)
As present-day scenes blur into prehistoric flashbacks and the running time swells past two hours, our heroes find themselves in the grip of an existential mystery: What are we doing here? Why did our maker put us here, and why has he fallen silent for so long? The action jumps between centuries and sometimes millennia for reasons that have nothing to do with the quantum realm. Instead there are crystalline images (shot by Ben Davis) of sandy beaches, surreal rock formations and active volcanoes, set against music (composed by Ramin Djawadi) that’s less Alan Silvestri than “Koyaanisqatsi”-era Philip Glass. There are no crash courses in tesseract physics or Asgardian politics. The Avengers are briefly mentioned and never seen. That’s hardly the worst news for those of us who bring a reflexive skepticism to each of this franchise’s offerings, whether good ( “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”), bad ( “Black Widow”) or, in this movie’s case, somewhere wackily in-between. The point is that, in a couple of key and already loudly advertised respects, “Eternals” isn’t entirely Marvel business as usual.
But that discussion will have to wait for another day. To be sure, one PG-13-rated snippet of superhero hanky-panky probably isn’t going to undo the terminal chastity of the Marvel enterprise, which has spent almost 30 films largely squandering the erotic appeal of skin-hugging suits and supernaturally toned abs. Happily, the director Chloé Zhao seems to have resisted the temptation to film them writhing on a beach, perhaps aware that she isn’t making “From Here to Eternals.” We’re in Babylon circa 575 B.C., and Ikaris (Richard Madden) and Sersi (Gemma Chan), immortal beings known as Eternals, are expressing their love not just for each other but also for the planet they will spend the next several thousand years trying to protect. It’s pretty short (the scene, not the movie) and not particularly steamy, which has less to do with the chemistry of the participants than the chilly-looking riverbank they’ve chosen for the occasion. I don’t know if this constitutes a spoiler, but it might just count as news: The latest Marvel movie, “Eternals,” actually features a sex scene. Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines as outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and local health officials. The Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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