  The pursuit of exotic phases of matter outside of the extreme conditions of a
quantizing magnetic field has been a long standing quest of solid state
physics. Recent experiments have observed spontaneous valley polarization and
fractional Chern insulators (FCIs) in zero magnetic field in twisted bilayers
of MoTe$_2$, at partial filling of the topological valence band ($\nu=-2/3$ and
$-3/5$). We study the topological valence band at $\textit{half}$ filling,
using exact diagonalization and density matrix renormalization group
calculations. We discover a composite Fermi liquid (CFL) phase even at zero
magnetic field that covers a large portion of the phase diagram centered around
twist angle ${\sim}3.6^\circ$. The CFL is a non-Fermi liquid phase that shows
metallic behavior despite the absence of Landau quasiparticles. We discuss
experimental implications including the competition between the CFL and a Fermi
liquid, which can be tuned with a displacement field. The topological valence
band has excellent quantum geometry over a wide range of twist angles and a
small bandwidth that is, remarkably, reduced by interactions for a range of
angles. These key properties are responsible for stabilizing the exotic quantum
Hall phases we find at zero field. Finally, we present an optical signature
involving "extinguished" optical responses as a means to identify Chern bands
with ideal quantum geometry.
