It's beautiful, isn't it?
The Eternals is definitely a very ambitious film.
You've got 10 new characters.
It spans 7,000 years.
You're on Earth, but you're also in space.
You're all over the planet.
Yeah, the scope and the scale of it is huge.
I mean, it's, I would argue, our most ambitious film ever,
and that's in a MCU that has Endgame.
Almost anything you can think of.
There are monsters, there are giant space gods.
There's also a love story.
It's part of why it got us excited as filmmakers.
We've made 25 plus movies at Marvel Studios,
but this does feel distinctly different than anything we've done before.
This is a new world.
I think that's the thing that's incredible about Marvel,
it's an incredibly complex universe.
I really think Eternals is the most epic movie
that Marvel's done.
It's literally the highest stakes
that any MCU superhero has had to deal with so far.
By the end of this film,
how we look at the MCU and the Earth itself will change.
The impact the Eternals will have on the MCU
will be nothing less than redefining the Cinematic Universe entirely.
My initial vision for the film
can be summed up in the William Blake poem.
"To see the World
"in a Grain of Sand
"And a Heaven in a Wild Flower.
"Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
"And Eternity in an hour."
When I went in to pitch without saying anything,
that's what I did.
The vision for the film is how can we capture something so epic
and intimate at the same time,
something as epic as the creation of the sun
and as intimate as the soft whispers of a lover?
And how to have these moments coexist in the film?
And that was the challenge.
I'm not quite sure how it happened.
I had just made The Rider at the time.
So, when I got a call to come in to meet Nate Moore,
I was very surprised and happy about Eternals.
We always look for directors that inspire us
and who get great performances.
And I had seen Chloé's first film,
and then I saw The Rider and thought it was amazing.
The very first conversation I had with Nate
was very much about, obviously, the stories and characters,
but also what I can contribute.
Right away we dive into, one is, what are we doing,
but also how we're doing it.
Because how we're making this film
is going to define what this film's gonna become.
Chloé has a very specific vision for the movie.
Because of the way she shoots, it feels extra personal.
So, you get the sensation that you're making
almost like an independent film that is huge.
When I heard she's doin' a Marvel movie, I was like,
"Oh, God, I'd love to be a part of that."
And see how she gets in behind this superhero world and makes it her own.
Chloé Zhao, who comes out of a more naturalistic style of filmmaking,
really pressed us to figure out
how to shoot more of this on practical location,
which, again, is challenging just from a logistical standpoint
of getting your crew to different places.
Finding places that you can shoot outside, battling rain and the elements,
it's challenging.
It's hard on your crew, it's hard on your cast,
it's hard on our VFX team.
But it's all in service of an aesthetic that's totally different.
That's a challenge we wanted to take on.
It's definitely a challenge, but it's a challenge I love.
Because I came in both as a filmmaker who wants to tell a story
but also as a fan.
For me, the MCU is a place with great characters and great adventures.
And it's very obvious it is made by a team of people
who really love the genre and love their fans.
It is time.
Marvel Studios and the Marvel Cinematic Universe
is now past their 10th anniversary.
And with the release of the final Avengers movie,
we finally completed a 22-movie Infinity saga.
Where do we go from there? Where do we start?
And what we really wanted to do was two things.
Start fresh with whole new characters, new storylines,
but actually go back to some of the deepest, richest mythology
in all of Marvel Comics.
And when you look at the myth-builders of Marvel,
Jack Kirby, he's called King Kirby for a reason,
and he created The Eternals many years ago,
which is one of the most mythologically rich storylines in the history of Marvel.
It really gives us a rich canvas to play with,
not just the Marvel canvas,
but the actual historical mythologies of our world.
The Eternals in the comics were created by Jack Kirby in the late 1970s.
It was his second stint at Marvel,
and he was looking to do something cosmic and completely new.
And in the comics, much like our film,
their job was to protect humanity long enough
for the Celestials to come back and judge
whether humanity was worthy of joining them in the stars.
In our film, I think they share a very similar origin.
In the comics, the Celestials came to Earth, found early man,
and did an experiment. They created the Deviants,
which were a failed experiment.
And then seeing that they sort of failed,
they created the Eternals as a counterpoint.
Kirby created a world that was so exciting and interesting,
but it was grounded in human history
and treated like it could live in our world.
I do love the mythology behind it,
and I love that he was able to bring space mythology
with human mythology of the planet Earth
and that he combined that together and created characters
that experienced that.
And gave us an opportunity to be able to re-learn about our own history.
We're really excited to explore the origins
of the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe in our film.
We're looking at, for the first time, meeting the Celestials face to face,
And you've sort of seen glimpses of them in other films.
The Celestials we have hinted at in earlier films,
Guardians of the Galaxy, Knowhere, the base of operations for the Collector,
is in fact a Celestial head.
The Celestials are such a cornerstone of Marvel storytelling in publishing
and we wanna make them equally important to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
At its heart, Eternals is an epic.
It's about immortality. It's about identity, it's about duty.
And we're exploring all these things
that so many amazing superheroes have done before.
But specifically we're looking at it over the course of the entirety of
mankind's history here on Earth.
To talk a little about the process, we were given 800 pages of research.
All the comics, every graphic novel, everything about this universe,
"Here you go. Go make up a movie."
And we spent four weeks, five weeks really just thinking
and bashing our heads against the wall and coming up with this world.
The Eternals has had three runs in comics spanning over the last 30 or 40 years.
I mean, we're endlessly inspired by all of King Kirby's works
and Neil Gaiman's run with The Eternals.
The expectation, I think, by our fans,
is that we're really going to mine from the Neil Gaiman early 2000s run.
And that, to a lot of degrees, is the most popular of The Eternals runs,
but for us, the true inspiration was from Jack Kirby's original 1976 run.
And that is partially because he really did steep that in our world history,
the history of the Aztecs.
A lot of his design language, a lot of his, even narrative inspiration
was from the history of the world.
I have seen them fight and lie and kill...
but I have also seen them...
laugh and love.
What I like about the story of Eternals
is that we're going back to the beginning of our civilization
to see that actually, they've been among us,
and they've been helping us for all this time.
We're able to look at real historical events.
We're able to look at the tragedies and our greatest moments
and look at it through the lens of what it means to be here on this planet.
This planet...
and these people...
have changed me.
And that afforded us an opportunity to go back in time
and see things we haven't seen before.
Not only in the Marvel Universe, but as filmmakers,
things that we don't get to see a lot in film, frankly.
Ancient Mesopotamia at the very dawn of civilization
and ancient Babylon, which is to most historians the cradle of civilization.
The Gupta Empire at 200 AD.
It's a time period that we felt we hadn't seen before a lot in cinema,
but was very rich with a lot of historical facts
that even us as filmmakers didn't know about.
Why didn't you guys help fight Thanos?
Or any war? Or all the other terrible things throughout history?
We were instructed not to interfere in any human conflicts
unless Deviants were involved.
Initially, trying to define what these Deviants were,
we started looking at ancient monsters from old stories.
You know, from the Greeks and the Egyptians.
Chloé wanted something very unique.
We wanted to have something that was alien,
but also add shapes that we could kinda recognize.
Like, at the beginning of the film, in Mesopotamia,
they're much bigger, they're like dinosaurs.
They're huge monsters.
And as they evolve and as the time passes,
they become more like animals that we see nowadays.
So, there was all that kind of storytelling aspect of it
and that was informing the design of the Deviants.
Even though The Eternals takes place over 10,000 years
and there's these different elements
at the same time, Kevin and Nate, through the whole process
have just constantly promoted character.
It's important to know the tone
and the genre of the movie you're trying to make.
And the action to some degree, I think, and I think our fans would agree...
Run!
...is secondary to the storytelling,
to what is the emotional core of this movie, and why is that special
and why is that moving.
Because if the emotional core and the characters aren't there,
then there's no attachment to whatever happens to Iron Man or Thor.
In this case, the Eternals.
We're very much focusing on the family dynamic of this group of Eternals.
There's layers to this movie. There's a great sci-fi adventure
that spans through time.
And then underneath that, there's a very complex family drama.
And then underneath that is a love story.
And then at the core of it actually, I think, is the journey of self-discovery.
Our film is really led by Sersi, this complex and flawed female hero
who really is, I think, our most human hero in the MCU that we've ever seen.
Ethereal.
Observant.
Sweetness.
The future.
Sersi is an empath, and she can manipulate matter.
She can turn things into other things,
she also doesn't quite understand the extent of her powers.
She is a very creative person. I think, what excites me about her character is
she doesn't really punch anybody.
You know, her power comes from her curiosity.
Therefore, she's an artist.
And she has a deep connection to nature.
You know, she's curious about humanity, the way other Eternals might not be.
Sersi in the comics, she has this lust for life
that often isn't seen in stories about immortality.
She finds the beauty in having been alive for so long
because she pulls upon her experiences and her memories
and thinks of them fondly.
So that positive take is what drew us to her as our protagonist.
Conflicted.
Passion.
Mysterious.
Amazing.
Ikaris carries the weight of the world on his shoulders.
He is the loyal soldier.
He wrestles with what's right for him as a being
and what's right for the greater good.
So...
Ikaris.
Sersi and Ikaris have been on and off for about 5,000 years
so, yes, pretty long-term.
I guess you can call that long-term.
I think they look at humanity very differently.
One analogy I really like is that
when Sersi sees a desert, she sees grains of sand
and she finds beauty in every grain of sand.
But Ikaris doesn't really see that.
He's looking at, "Okay, now there's danger in the desert.
"We need to go." Then they fall in love with each other
because they love seeing the world through each other's eyes.
You know, they've hurt each other in the past.
5,000 years, they've been through everything together,
and there's real love there and a lot of history.
I think like all great love stories,
films like Casablanca, there are ups and downs.
And the kind of burden they carry for the film,
the evolution of humanity have affected how they feel about who they are.
Technology.
Inventor.
Smart.
Protective.
Phastos is basically the technopath,
which means I can use my mind and my energy
to literally assemble anything out of any technology.
Everything he does, he wants... It's for the advancement of humankind.
He has so much faith in humanity. He's so passionate
and, unfortunately as humans, we don't always live up to his expectations.
At some point in his life, he really changed his view of humankind
and just shut down.
And what I do love about his arc is that you watch him care again.
For Phastos, who is that person who moves from his heart and moves from his soul,
he's trying to restore that in himself and restore it in others around him.
He's very much a emotional core for many, many of the moments in the film.
There were more Deviants than you said.
Well, I'm sure that was a lot of fun for you.
It was.
Fight.
Erratic.
Warrior.
Fragile.
Thena is a warrior and fights so fearlessly,
and that's all she loves to do.
She's the goddess of war.
She can manifest different weapons in her hands,
which is complicated when you're preparing or training.
I kept asking what my weapon was gonna be so I could practice with it.
And I would just get weapons sent to me.
But I kept getting so many weapons until I realized
it was gonna be a combination of all of them.
When she's not fighting, she doesn't know where she belongs and how to be.
She's quiet and very observant.
And I would say has to go through one of, if not the biggest obstacle,
in this film.
Strong.
Provider.
Special brew.
*y, maybe.
Gilgamesh is the strongest of the Eternals.
He is a protector. His specialties are punch, strong punch.
I should say big punch. Yeah.
Gilgamesh has got the biggest heart.
He's very loyal. He always puts his friends first.
It's a fun-loving, entertaining character.
I feel like I'm a big brother for my family.
He's the lovable teddy bear.
He doesn't take things too seriously. He takes time to stop and enjoy life.
Gilgamesh asked Druig to put me to sleep once.
So I could take a vacation to Fiji, you know?
He's also the best cook. If there is a holiday or a party,
you wanna want to go to Gilgamesh's house.
Sarcasm.
So cute.
Tragic.
Sprite can create illusions. She's really fiery.
A little bit of a temper.
- Right? - You abandoned me in Macedonia.
Sprite is someone who's lived forever, stuck in a child's body.
And that's not easy. She is actually the most mature of all the Eternals.
One of the most interesting things about the Gaiman run of the comics
is the way he handles Sprite.
He gave it a new level of tragedy and nuance,
and I think that caused us to wanna make her an important character in our film.
All she's ever wanted is to be able to experience a beautiful life
and be able to be a child and go through that experience.
For Sprite, it's a very emotional journey for her
to find her place.
Oh, no, you didn't.
Yearning.
Passion.
Jerk.
Druig *s.
He does, sir.
Druig. He's mind control.
He stands for what he believes in.
And if that decision puts him in a division with the others,
he's not afraid of that.
He's very idealistic and he's very philosophical.
He is someone that if he likes you, great.
If he doesn't like you, you better watch out.
Walking down the steps of the Aztec,
the set itself was unreal.
Very, very tricky because the steps were very, very steep, you know,
and I had to look at the camera when I'm walking down.
Just hoped that I get the next step and, you know, play it cool.
Then everyone in costume and then to be standin' up,
and everyone drops. It's like...
That was a superhero moment, that.
Showboat.
Show-off.
Charisma.
Funny dude.
Joy.
Kingo. Kingo loves life.
So, Kingo is this guy who's always been pretty flashy.
He's always wanted people to know he's a superhero,
but he can't reveal that.
Superhero, movie star.
Well, I am. But I am also...
an Eternal.
Fast.
Super-fast.
Makkari is the fastest woman in the universe.
She uses her cosmic energy to run at accelerated rates.
But she can also break the sound barrier
so she can create these amazing concussive blasts of sound,
which makes her very powerful in battle.
Anyone who's met Lauren has seen her energy.
She really pushed us to use sign language in the film.
And her husband, Doug, ended up being a sign language interpreter for us as well
and helped the other actors learn to sign.
She gave us rules by which we could run a set
that would be friendly for someone who is deaf.
She brought a lot of that knowledge into our production
so that we could do things the right way.
Leader.
- Maternal. - Mother.
Mama.
Love.
Ajak is kind of the leader of the Eternals.
The way she approaches this leadership is from the perspective of motherhood.
So, she has a special relationship with each one of them.
She's both the mother and a teacher.
She's both loving, but also tough.
And she has some big, big decisions to make in the film.
I had a very important moment for me in this film, personally.
I have a scene where you have to ride a horse.
And I had an accident with a horse many, many years ago.
So, I didn't get on horses.
And I freed myself from my past, from my fear.
And I was able to just gallop with the horse and feel...
And I really didn't know if I was gonna be able to do it.
But I wanted to do it.
And I think it even helped me with the character.
For the character, it was a freeing experience for me.
I think, for me, each of these characters and the journey,
the emotional journey they go through,
represents an aspect of human nature.
And a exploration of the duality in each of us.
So, in a way, what they picked up from us, that they love or hate,
say a lot about who they are, but also say a lot about who we are.
- And action. - And action!
I think it was very cleverly cast, this movie.
Every single one of us is bizarrely right for the role.
Everybody is unique and special and loving and giving.
When I cast, you know, in all the films I've made before,
I'm trying to see how much of this character that's already in this person.
That excites me the most. As much as possible.
So then, they're going to bring an aspect of who they are on screen.
There's a camera.
It will capture something that I can never plan
and I can never write, and that process excites me.
There was definitely some unexpected relationships and dynamics
that came about that I would never have thought
just from reading the script off the pages,
once you get the actors together.
I really loved having one-on-one scenes with each of the actors in the cast,
and we really discovered unexpected things.
I think we're very fortunate.
The first time they got in the room together,
the sparks were just flying. I was like, "Okay," you know?
You never expect to see these people in the same room in the real world.
They come from different backgrounds,
and they come from different life experiences.
But there is something about each of my cast.
There's just a bit of a misfit about them.
They carry something quite special.
And that, I think, unites them as a family
because the Eternals lives on the periphery.
A group of immortals who have been on Earth for 35,000 years.
They've been there amongst the MCU. We haven't met them before.
Do you guys have any interest in meeting some of the Eternals?
- CROWD: Yes! - All right.
I know the cast all met for the same time, save Gemma, at Comic-Con in July.
Ladies and gentlemen, as Ikaris, Richard Madden.
Kumail Nanjiani.
Lauren Ridloff.
What excites me the most, selfishly, is the world-building, and the designs.
The foundation, Jack Kirby's comics, and also the Neil Gaiman run as well,
are great inspirations.
We also done a lot of research with historians,
language experts, anthropologists, scientists.
And it was very important for Eternals to do that
you want to really feel like they were actually there, visually.
So, as a production designer,
you're actually responsible for every single thing that you see on camera,
whether someone's eatin' a sandwich, to whether someone's driving a car
or a spaceship, or every single location.
When you have to build over 130 sets,
it's a huge endeavor. And the scope is enormous.
We're traveling 'round the world, through space, through time.
It's been extraordinary,
the breadth and width of everything that we've had to achieve.
My starting point on this film was obviously the Kirby comics.
I really looked at those, and one of the great things is
how much it linked in with the script in certain ways.
One of the sets in particular really inspired me to delve further into it.
And this set was the Aztec temple of Teotihuacán.
It was believed to have been set up by gods or aliens.
It's in human folklore everywhere.
So, I really started to investigate this,
and then it worked out that there's over 100,000 people lived there.
It was nowhere near a river. It was nowhere near anything.
And the myth and the legend is
that some gods had come and built this for the people.
And so, that started a real train of thought
that I took through to the rest of the production.
Then I started to really get into what influence that they think
the alien peoples have come to this planet
and had an influence on our technology, on everything.
And what was amazing is then going back to the comics,
and within that, there were illustrations of all the temples
and his own take on it with the Eternals and the Celestials
drawn within the decoration on the temples.
So we took that forward and lifted that decoration
and then had that emblazoned on our build.
When they're in the interior, the top of the temple, it's very much that Kirby nod.
Our production design led by Eve Stewart,
really did their homework creating a language
that then we could employ on the costumes and on walls of the starship
and have an aesthetic that felt unified.
We wanted it to feel ancient and technologically advanced all at once,
that was a challenge from a design standpoint.
How do you make these aliens feel like they've been here for 7,000 years
and also feel like the inspiration for things
humans built throughout history?
Well, this was a real challenge 'cause when I started,
I read that the Eternals had been created by the Celestials.
It was a million years ago, so it can't be a spaceship like all the ones
you love in the Ridley Scott films.
And then this spaceship has been lying dormant, theoretically, on Earth
for the last 7,000 years.
I felt it couldn't have any proper reference to human technology.
Also, on top of that, I just felt that it was such a spiritual place
for these people and it'd been set up, theoretically,
by the Celestials, which are gods.
So, I started to look at sacred geometry,
the way shapes worked throughout all the religions across the world.
So, I was trying to put those together.
So the exterior of the ship became triangular quite quickly
just because of aerodynamics.
But also, Chloé and I discussed a lot how triangles and circles fit together,
both in Christianity and Islamism and also in Asian culture.
So, it became a very global thing that we went for.
So, we started with loads of triangles.
And then I went to see some scientists,
and they said this was very good
because triangular planes can also create a vertical lift
if you've got enough energy around all the points.
So, this is where we started.
I was really, really surprised when I walked into our ship.
Because how many ships have you seen? They all look the same. Futuristic.
This one is completely out of the ordinary, unimaginable,
every object, every little detail in it.
It's really new and exciting.
I really love the spaceship because it's so unusual,
and I think it is to do with the circular nature of it with the domed ceilings,
and that it's almost cathedral-like or temple-like.
And the textures of it, we worked really hard getting it
so that it looked like the inside of a meteor.
Like, it was really, truly ancient.
We looked at ancient Babylonian cuneiforms.
We actually made our own.
These say things like, star, moon, travel, man, Earth, and god.
These correspond exactly to the costumes.
When they stand against this wall, the power from Arishem creates the costumes.
All the shapes in the costumes are based in the world of Jack Kirby.
One thing that Chloé discussed a lot was the circles with the lines
that run through all his imagery.
Because they had been on Earth for 7,000 years,
could the symbols, the shapes on their bodies have influenced some designs
in religion and in cultures all around the world?
So that all went into the design.
I can honestly say that these costumes
are the most difficult superhero costumes I've ever made.
This room is our exhibition of the superhero costumes
and some of the other epochs within the film.
When I first read the script, I was like, "Wow! This has got everythin'."
It's got all different periods. It's got future, past, everything.
So, from a costume design perspective, there's a lot there to play with.
And on top of that, you know you're gonna design 10 new superheroes.
One of the things that was asked
was that they didn't look like just superhero armor-clad uniforms,
that they look like a second skin.
And we had to incorporate the cosmos.
So we started off looking at minerals and nature,
and started experimenting with fabrics.
I remember Kevin visited our production.
He was like, "This is like a science experiment."
Because when you see the film, you see it isn't just blue.
We used different type of black, different type of blue,
and oil paint, and then put them together on a sheet.
And then you have to wait for a few days
to naturally see what kind of texture you get.
Each of these costumes are unique.
It takes many, many experiments, because on a big screen,
you can really see all the textures.
There's so many layers on each costume
and they're all done by hand.
It's a big undertaking,
and the smallest amount of pieces on a character was five or six.
Going up to, like, Sprite, who had 18 pieces on her.
And each one of those pieces has to be drawn up in the computer,
molded, cast, cleaned up, edited, paint work.
All of our pieces are incredibly labor intensive.
So, at times, I had seven or eight people in the work room
just painting these pieces.
And for each of these 10 characters, we had at least six repeats of costumes.
So, it's really difficult to imagine just how much work there was in there.
Ajak loves nature and she is also the leader,
and has the link to the Celestials.
So she has this amazing headdress,
and there's a lot of flowing lines upwards with her.
Very gold and blue.
And we've got this amazing cape, which is all hand-painted.
And I was lucky to work with Sammy,
who put a lot of symbolic stuff into my costume.
There's a mixture of empowerment and also pride
of being able to wear this costume that means something important.
Sersi loves humanity, she's a very giving person.
The color that we gave her was basically green and silver.
So, she has flowing areas to make it feminine and soft.
It's not super-structured. It's a bit more ethereal, really.
And then we've got Ikaris, who is very much a fighter.
We wanted to get away from the idea that you've just got a superhero jumpsuit.
And so for him, it's done in a segmented armor way.
Sprite, she's a thinker. And it's slightly alabastery,
and a bit of jade going on with hers.
What we decided to do with her was have a bit of fun with her modern look
and kinda show her as someone
who actually desperately wants to be more grown up.
So she wears quite quirky but serious clothes.
Like she was trying to find an identity.
And then, we have Druig. He's very monastic.
He goes through a very big turning point.
As we go through time with him, he gets darker and darker.
so his costume is very dark.
It's quite long. It's very strong in the center.
Thena is a warrior, but equally, there's also
a fragility about her.
She starts off as this amazing gold goddess,
and then slowly through time,
she becomes this fragile, lacey, very soft,
damaged butterfly in a way.
Gilgamesh is the strongest warrior, so he's very heavily armored,
and this is quite hard, for him.
And he goes on the journey with Thena, so he gets stuck in time with her.
So, they don't change their clothes to the modern world.
So, we had them living in a place
where they sort of stopped in about 1900.
And so, he has very old-looking clothes.
What I love about my costume is
that there is no other costume in the MCU that looks like this one.
It moves really well. It fits really well.
And it's purple, which has been my favorite color my whole life.
And I'm sure everybody tells you that they got teary-eyed when they put it on.
And I certainly did.
My favorite moment on this film has been Brian.
His final fitting was just absolutely my favorite moment.
So I go in for my final fitting.
You see the drawings... It still doesn't really hit you
'cause every time they showed me the drawings,
I was like, "Is that me? That's not me. Is that really me?"
We put the costume on him and he wouldn't look in the mirror.
I just battled with a lot of things
when it came to how I thought the MCU should look,
and I was really nervous about how I'd be portrayed.
He was starting to breathe really heavily.
Every time a zipper went up, or a button went on,
or like I've put my boots on,
I was just like, "Okay!"
They're like, "Brian, you have to turn and look."
I'm, "I'm really not ready."
I was worried for him, he said, "No, I'm fine."
So when they finally zipped up the back,
they're, "Okay, you have to look at yourself."
So I turned around.
And then when he did turn around, he just screamed.
"Oh, my God! This is incredible."
I just screamed, "Everybody come in here.
"Everybody who had anything to do with this suit, come in here."
And so, they all came in. And I just... And I'm...
I'm crying, I am weeping.
"You don't understand how you just made this little Black boy
"from North Carolina who never thought in a million years
"that he could stand here and believe that he was a superhero."
I have to say this from the bottom of my heart,
every single person that had anything to do with making this movie,
they're the real heroes, like honestly.
We couldn't be the heroes we are without them,
and I just want people to know that when they watch these movies
that there are so many people that give their time and their effort
to make me feel like a superhero.
My favorite part was seeing everyone in costume
and all of us just standing in a line.
It just was so exciting to see everybody in their costumes.
We were all screaming and getting teary-eyed all day.
I was like, "Oh, my God! Look!"
When we did all come together, we were quite moved.
It was really amazing.
It was very windy, it was very dramatic.
Everyone's capes were flying.
There are times in a production where you get to feel almost like a fan.
And that's really special.
Thank you. Thank you, Eternals!
When I signed up for this movie, I thought,
"I'll be in a big green box in the studio somewhere,
"and that's just what this is."
I was wrong. I think I've been in the studio one day
out of all my days of being here.
Chloé really wanted to use as much practical settings, sets, as we could,
so we've been on location a lot.
The locations and the geography is a huge part of the film.
It's entwined with it, because it's really the story of the growth of civilization,
combined with nature and the way humanity and nature
have evolved alongside each other.
So, we shot a lot around London,
and London was a Swiss Army knife location for us.
It allowed us to be in North Dakota, then in Alaska.
It allowed us to be in the Amazon, surprisingly.
It allowed us to be in different periods of history.
It was the night shoots where they'd shut down Camden.
I kind of went, "Wow, this is... They can do this?
"They can shut down one of the busiest parts of London for us to film here?"
That's a lot of ambition.
But we also shot a good deal of the film in Fuerteventura and Lanzarote,
in the Canary Islands,
which is a Spanish-owned island chain off the coast of Africa.
That gave us a lot of looks that we hadn't had
in any of our other movies.
And allowed us to double again, historically,
for places that no longer exist or are hard to get to.
Yeah, we went to the Canary Islands,
and then we were shooting Babylon and Mesopotamia,
and we felt like we are in Mesopotamia.
It looked so real and that is so great.
It was great to be able to actually shoot on locations and forests and woods
on these black sand beaches, on volcanic islands.
When you are actually on a location,
it helps you get into the reality of things,
as bizarre as they are.
You've never seen places like these.
This is absolutely magical. Magical.
It's spectacular, this landscape.
I've never been around the world like this on a movie.
This movie is by no means easy.
I don't know if you've been to Fuerteventura, but there is nothing there.
No diss, but, like, it is an island.
And then we show up at this location, and it's like rocks,
there used to be volcanoes here.
And then you're on a cliff. Did I mention that?
There were cliffs on this place, and you're doing major fight scenes.
And you're climbing over things and you're doing wire work.
And then there's the beach.
The wind of Fuerteventura is no joke, you're like in dust.
And black sand does not come off your body that easily.
It was unbelievable 'cause when I tell you that we had to band together,
we had to band together, and I think we got incredibly close at Fuerteventura.
It was fun to all be in the same hotel 'cause we were all having dinner
and seeing each other and hanging out.
I think being on location really helps you feel it more
and just be more in the moment.
-Cut. All right. - Dave?
-Beautiful. That's it. Got it. -Yeah. We got it.
For us, going to shoot on location allowed us to be able to capture
the light and capture the place.
You want the audience to not only to see the character,
you wanna see the character in relationship to the world behind them.
It's very difficult to make that feel real on a stage.
So, going to a location was a very natural progression.
And it's exciting for our visual effect supervisor, Steph Ceretti.
He always wanted to capture
as many real and natural elements as possible.
Actually, for us, it's more interesting to have to deal with real material
that comes with all the things you can't control, really.
And that makes the film a bit more real in that sense.
We really wanted to push the idea
that everything has to be shot, as much as possible, in a real place.
And Chloé really wanted that. For example, the Amazon Forest scene...
Ikaris!
We were talking about shooting it in a studio
and talking with Chloé, and the two of us were like,
"No, I mean, we can't do that. There's never going to be enough room.
"We gotta shoot that on location."
Even though it was really difficult, in England, getting into the winter,
lots of rain, as you can imagine.
But it made total sense to actually go on location and feel the environment.
And have the actors in the environment and feeling the elements.
And also having that freedom with the camera
to shoot anywhere and not be constrained.
So, it was much more organic in that way,
shooting it this way and much more visceral
which, you know, Chloé really wanted to capture as much as possible.
And it's difficult, a big challenge for him.
How he can make his visual effects element blend into the real world
because when you hit that sweet spot,
then you can achieve the kind of realism that Eternals really needs.
The action scene on the beach...
Beautiful environment, amazing location.
We wanted to shoot there so we could capture as much as possible
from the real light, the environment, the wind.
There was challenges in bringing stunt rigs
and special effects rigs on the beach because it was so remote.
And there was a lot of the action we could not actually shoot,
so we ended up building the environment as a CG environment
so that we could have it and also design some shots
that we couldn't get on location,
with full CG characters fighting, flying, hitting each other at full speed.
But the thing that we tried to keep is the cinematography aspect of it.
Trying to make our CG shots to match the style of shooting
that Chloé wanted to retain, to keep it natural.
When you do a sequence on a set,
you usually have full control of the light.
The light doesn't change, the sky doesn't change,
because it's the same sky we use for all the shots.
Here it's not the way it is.
Every shot had a different sky, a different wind, a different cloud,
so it's something that we tried to fight a little bit,
but then Chloé told us, "Don't fight it, don't fight it.
"Make it look natural.
"We went there to shoot it and things change.
"Do the same in your CG shots.
"Just make it as it would be natural.
"Embrace the natural light and the natural elements."
So that was very, very interesting for us.
It was a really cool symbiotic relationship.
To some degree, it was a learning curve for her to work with
because she had never been on a movie this size,
she'd never had the same resources that we have on our films.
But we'd never tried to tell a story the way that she does.
We'd never moved the camera in the way that she wants to.
I come from an Indie world.
To be able to let your imagination just be set free
and then to have people who are so experienced and open-minded
to be able to take your ideas and elevate it
and just go crazy with it is an incredible process.
-He's holding the white bag. -Yeah, that is good.
Chloé likes to shoot at what she would call "magic hour,"
when the sun is just about to dip below the horizon.
You've all these heroes in their amazing costumes,
and the ocean is this giant wave, and the wind is blowing,
and it's the perfect environment
that you would hope that you could recreate digitally but very rarely could.
And the actors and actresses would say that moment was special
'cause it was the end of the movie.
So, even though you're shooting out of sequence,
you feel it from an energy and a dramatic standpoint.
But that was a moment that really felt special.
We knew this film has to heavily rely on themes.
You have 11 characters, right?
And you have 7,000 years human history.
And you have space, you have Earth, all these elements.
It's important to repeat themes.
And that's something Ramin does so beautifully in Game of Thrones.
Ramin created these beautiful, beautiful themes.
And when the theme starts, he evoke a emotion.
Instead of giving themes to each characters,
we thought about it, thematically,
"What do those characters go through throughout history?
"Love, mission, memories, just all these aspects.
"And let's create themes for their emotional state."
That way, yeah, actually, the themes help us connect this massive story.
So every time that memory theme shows up,
it doesn't matter whether you're in present-day Amazon,
or you're in Ancient Babylon,
you understand how far these characters has journeyed,
and yet they still are dealing with the same struggles, which is humanity.
- Eternals assemble. -Thank you.
-Eternals assemble. -Okay.
There is a family atmosphere,
but there's something very profound about the way she approaches the characters,
and how she works with the actors.
And she really draws you into a character.
- So good.
I think the character moments are hugely important,
and those are the real moments that people remember from the MCU movies.
The little moment, the Avengers sitting around eating shawarma.
That's the stuff that really people connect with.
And Chloé Zhao, our director,
has been very good about finding those little moments.
Obviously, the fighting, the aliens, all that stuff, very exciting.
But we've been a family for 7,000 years. There's a lot of baggage there,
and exploring that has been the most satisfying part of this movie.
Chloé is so perceptive in every single little moment of the film,
and she's always thinking of what she can do better,
and she just wants to make it the best that it can be.
She's involved in every single aspect of the film,
she's doing 100 things at once.
I don't know how she does it, but it's amazing.
She's a kamikaze agent, man.
There's nothing greater than watching your director
see you do something and get excited,
when she jumps from behind the camera and runs up.
She makes you wanna try stuff. She makes you believe
the vision includes you and how you craft it
and how you mold it, so there's a lot of improv,
there's a lot of discoveries that we're finding amongst each other.
I knew she'd get the character stuff.
I knew she'd get the relationship stuff,
but her stuff with the action...
There'll be an action scene we shoot,
she's like, "You wanna see it?" I'll look,
and it just looks like no other action scene I've seen,
in an MCU movie or otherwise.
Chloé uses our personalities and our diversity
in a seamless way in the film that it's unifying,
and it makes you feel part of something really special.
I never imagined that I would ever be part of the MCU,
especially, as like a superhero.
I had some friends who got to be in 'em in different parts
and I was like, "Oh, man, I just wanna be a guy who
"fixes Captain America's computer or something."
And now to actually be in this, it's pretty great.
To be able to be a part of a film by Marvel
that has the most diversity that we've ever seen
in any superhero movie of all time.
I think it's exciting. I think it really shows the scope of the film,
and it's global.
You see this great mix of people
from lots of different backgrounds and cultures.
I think it really enriches the story that we're telling
because it really is an epic global story.
And really, it's the first time we've ever been here on Earth,
where we've had a team of superheroes that really are as diverse as Earth is.
You know, as our planet is, as humanity is.
This ensemble, truly, I'm getting chills thinking about it.
Everybody looks different, sounds different.
Everybody has a completely different energy.
I've literally never seen an ensemble like this,
and the fact that we get to do it for Marvel
as superheroes, what a special thing.
It's interesting because I never in a million years thought
I'd be a part of the MCU.
What I like about what Chloé did is that she really took us as is.
I know that I'm not the standard Marvel aesthetic,
but Chloé, she was like, "No, that is the point.
"Like, you are that.
"We need these people to reflect everyday people,
"'cause anyone can be a superhero."
I love that because people going into this
have their own concept of what they think Marvel should be,
and how Marvel should look like, should sound.
And, what we're doin' is, we're gonna smash all that
and just give people a sense to know that they can see themselves up there.
One thing that I really cherish
is that I really feel that I've created a special personal relationship
with each one of the characters and each one of the actors
and some really beautiful friendships.
I think everyone found their roles pretty quickly.
Not only in the film, but outside too.
We have come to feel like a family together.
It felt like we'd known each other.
We felt like... I don't know what it was, but we were very quickly...
We were friends.
I love them all, honestly, every single one of my cast members.
I mean, we're absolutely family.
It's unbelievable how that kinship came along.
I really feel like embracing them and keeping them together.
I know it's part of my character,
but it's really rubbed off on me. I feel responsible.
So it was very easy to become a family.
We became a family very, very fast.
-Cut. -Beautiful.
For a movie that's about 10 immortal aliens from the planet Olympia,
it's very much about humanity and what it means to be human,
and what it means to be of this Earth.
And are we stewards of this Earth,
or is this Earth just a stepping stone to something greater?
I think as a society, both as a U.S. society and a global society,
we're starting to tackle what our relationship is to this Earth,
what our relationship is to each other.
I think that's an important theme to explore
because that's the things we're facing on a day to day.
You do not turn against your family.
The film actually becomes very much a celebration of planet Earth,
and a celebration of humanity.
We are learning about what it means to be mortal,
what it means to be a human being
that has a very limited amount of time in this universe.
And I think that's a beautiful way to celebrate humanity.
It is important to stress that we are all very powerful,
but we are the most powerful when we come together towards helping this planet.
It's a beautiful message. When we all come together, we're all stronger,
and that's when we can actually make an impact.
This film is going to have a big effect on the future of the MCU
to a point where it makes me geek out so much as a fan,
that I was able to make a film that could ripple through the MCU like this.
I feel like, for me, throughout the journey,
Kevin, Nate, and the whole team, they catch me when I fall.
When I'm spreading my wings and going crazy, they're letting me loose.
I learned so much from them.
I'm just so grateful they gave me this opportunity
to not only pay tribute and respect of the past of MCU,
but also extend the MCU into the future.
And that, for me, is an honor.