Gemma Creagh decodes the emperor’s new world in her review of Megalopolis.
This critic’s Roman Empire is that Francis Ford Coppola sold a winery to make this film. After 40 years in development, approximately 300 drafts and some very unfortunate false starts, Megalopolis has finally become a reality for Coppola as he turns 85.
In this world, nothing is accessible and nothing is safe. This is made clear from the opening sequence where Cesar Catilina (Adam Driver) – the Chairman of the Design Authority in New Rome – dangles from the top of an overtly rendered skyscraper. He leans over the edge, hurling himself off, then stopping just before he plummets. Below him, a futuristic interpretation of New York City is frozen in time, completely still because of his actions. Not only can he stop time, but this magician of sorts has discovered a miracle compound that fixes brain damage, can make invisible dresses, and if all goes according to Cesar’s plan, will rebuild the city to become an equitable, sustainable utopia.
Cesar’s altruistic intentions breed resistance among the ruling class. First, Franklyn Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito), the arch-conservative mayor, maintains that Cesar killed his wife. Franklyn insists this magical substance is unsafe, and the city should stick to traditional materials of steel and concrete. Then Cesar’s cousin Clodio Pulcher (embodied by a slithering Shia LaBeouf) becomes jealous that Franklyn’s daughter Julia Cicero (Nathalie Emmanuel) has taken a fancy to Cesar. Clodio hatches a plan involving deepfakes to publicly disgrace Cesar. However, when this fails, he takes the natural next step of becoming a populist leader of a political movement. Finally, Cesar’s former lover and TV presenter Wow Platinum (Aubrey Plaza) marries the ageing Hamilton Crassus III (Jon Voight), the head of Crassus National Bank. Between her raunchy twerking and Jafar-esque hypnotics, she attempts to use her influence over Crassus to control Cesar.
As Cesar and Julia fall in love, he finds new inspiration, and his vision for this perfect world gets closer to becoming a reality. Unfortunately the malevolent forces around him set in place a sequence of events that puts everything he holds dear in jeopardy.
Apparently, despite investing 120 million dollars from his personal finances into this production, Coppola once again brought his trademark chaos to set. Key cast and crew quit at various points. In December 2022, about halfway through the shoot, most of the visual effects and art teams were either fired or quit. This is quite noticeable when it comes to the final rendering of the VFX. Coppola’s “controversial” directing style was explored in his wife’s documentary Hearts of Darkness. Mike Figgis has a behind-the-scenes documentary about the making of Megalopolis, and one can only imagine what he’s caught this time around.
Each element of the writing feels like a contradiction of another. On the page, the characters are flat, the dialogue is unnatural – sometimes theatrical – and frequently punctuated by long, pontificating monologues that rarely reveal an emotional state nor further the plot. Perhaps this was because there was no cohesive story structure. Each narrative element, for instance Cesar’s dead wife, or the political discontent, or the clubbing sequences, aren’t interwoven, rather flung onto the creative frying pan like unruly sausages that occasionally bash off one another. The world building was also unclear. How do the physics of this futuristic world work? How does the politics of the region occur? Also this story contains so many ideas, scientific theories, concepts, questions posed at various points that are never mentioned again. And yet, despite the cerebral and experimental nature of the film, so many of the metaphors are excessively heavy handed. Tonally, the film is both cynical in its depiction of the corruption of society, but naively optimistic that one man’s vision could magically fix the future. Plus, if you played woman character cliche bingo, you’d have a full house: Psychopathic temptress, supportive nurturing muse, dead wife as a plot point. Check. Also the casting of someone as controversial as LaBeouf is a pretty strong statement in itself.
Yet even taking into account the problematic nature of all of the above, there’s a brilliant madness to Megalopolis too; this mushroom-induced Baz Luhrmann fever dream does have something to offer. This is a top tier cast delivering superb performers. Driver, Esposito and in a supporting role, Fishburne, all bring this varied flavour of complexity. And to call Plaza fearless, as a grotesque supervillain, would be an understatement. She’s almost unrecognisable at times.
In cinema, expectation can carry a lot of weight; and with a catalogue as varied as Coppola’s, anyone expecting the weird magic of Apocalypse Now, or the more cohesive themes of The Godfather will be disappointed. Taken completely in isolation, Megalopolis is a brave independent exploration of creativity that can be more easily enjoyed when accepted for what it is.
Megalopolis is available to stream online now.
