Avengers: Infinity War’s VFX supervisor: “Star Wars: The Phantom Menace was in the back of our minds”

From CinemaBlend:

“Generally speaking, you won’t often hear conversations comparing this year’s biggest film, Avengers: Infinity War, with 1999’s Star Wars: Episode I-The Phantom Menace. However, the climax of both films bear one big similarity that you may not have noticed upon first viewing: Infinity War and The Phantom Menace each feature huge battles in their third acts between an invading force and the indigenous inhabitants. And in both films the heroes first endure an assault under the protection of a massive shield before engaging with infantry forces. Dan DeLeeuw, the visual effects supervisor on Infinity War, addressed this parallel and how the MCU blockbuster stands apart from the prequel film, saying:

It was in the back of our minds, for sure. I think it was something that… you get into the idea of a shield around a city, and you even go back to Thor: The Dark World which had the same idea of a shield around a city. It was just, with is, there’s much more of a ground assault, which does kinda liken it a bit more to The Phantom Menace. It was kind of, taking those, the idea of the shield and putting the Russo brother’s touch on it. So it was much more of a grounded way of shooting it and much more of war film way of shooting it and keeping it dirtier and a little bit more violent in a sense – the heroes were being taken down by the Outriders. And keeping it balanced with the jokes between Cap and Thor and the viciousness of the villains that hopefully set it apart. But it was definitely at the edge of our… we all remember The Phantom Menace. The best thing about Marvel is that you’ve got a lot of movie nerds here, so they can call out movies from way back in the day, and say ‘oh, it’s like this, it’s like that, it’s like this.’

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