There is little doubt that Francis Ford Coppola is one of the greatest filmmakers ever. When you make The Godfather and Apocalypse Now, you get to carry that distinction. However, it is also a fact that Coppola’s work no longer has the immense draw it once did. Every film he has released since 1997’s The Rainmaker has either been critically panned or a box office bomb. Combine the two and you get 2024’s Megalopolis, Coppola’s first film in 13 years, and also one he has supposedly been working on since the early 1980’s.
So what is the culmination of the esteemed director’s near 40-year journey that included multiple studio rejections, self funding ventures and years of table reads? Frankly it’s a confusing, misdirected, yellow-hued mess. I understand why studios were consistently passing on production of the film. I also understand how, after it’s screening at film festivals, many studios were hesitant to pick it up for release until Lionsgate snatched it up a month after it’s Cannes debut.
The basic premise of Megalopolis – if you can even call it basic – follows the story of Cesar Catilina (Adam Driver), a patrician architect of the city of New Rome. New Rome, located in an alternate version of the United States, blends modern day societal elements with classic Roman language and styles. Cesar wins the Nobel Prize for inventing “Megalon”, a building material that revolutionizes the world. But, while Cesar wants to use the materials to create the utopia “Megalopolis”, his rival Mayor Franklyn Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito) is focused on present day gains, wanting it to open a Casino in New Rome.
It’s a fairly interesting premise muddied by literally every other facet of the film. The story simply becomes far too confusing as the Megalopolis progresses. By the end of the 138 minute runtime, I honestly had little following of the story’s structure. And the film ends so abruptly that, after over 2 hours, I thought “that was it?”.
It’s obvious though that some elements of the film seemed to have just been made up and tossed in over the long years Coppola spent with the script. Aspects like Cesar’s ability to freeze time, Aubrey Plaza’s Wow Platinum marrying the bank owner to control Cesar’s funds with little narrative consequence, and the way each character flies in and out of Roman dialect at will are just entirely too confusing and feel out of place.
What really hurts Megalopolis though are the absolutely bizarre directing choices being made. There are line reads that are just so bizarre and cadences that have no business working in a film. Normally, this would be an issue with the actors, but not here. The issue is so widespread across every character and with so many talented actors in the cast, there’s just no other common denominator other than direction. Moments like Adam Driver and Nathalie Emmanuel’s “Go Back To The Club” scene are just rampant and take you out of the experience entirely.
The fact that the film looks putrid also doesn’t help. Visual effects feel completely unfinished and there’s a disgusting yellow/gold hue to everything that looks disgusting. I get the symbolic nature of everything shining in gold to represent the prosperous city contrasted with the ugly nature under the surface. But none of that symbolism matters when the film is ugly to look at.
Final Thoughts
Megalopolis is just a mess. It’s obvious why Francis Ford Coppola struggled for years to get this made and honestly, it should just be left to die on the vine of his rich history. Maybe it’s time for the esteemed director to hang up the hat and settle into retirement on his vineyards. But until he makes a movie this century that works, it’s merely his reputation that precedes him.
