IN A SINGLE BOUND
Chloé Zhao has directed four feature films. The first two, the Native American drama Songs My Brothers Taught Me and rodeo cowboy tale The Rider, did okay at film festivals and got her noticed – mainly for the films’ naturalistic style and the performances of the nonactors she put in front of her camera.
The third, the remarkable quasi-documentary Nomadland, won this year’s Oscars for best picture, best director for Zhao and best actress for Frances McDormand.
The fourth, which arrives less than a year later, isn’t another cinéma vérité excursion into the modern American West. No,, the latest superhero assemblage to spring from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Its US$200 million budget is about 40 times that of . It has more actors on its poster than Zhao ever directed in her first three movies. The posters probably cost more, too. Its cast includes Angelina Jolie, Salma Hayek, former siblings Richard Madden and Kit Harington and a cameo by Harry Styles.
