“Megalopolis” premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on May 16, 2024, to “predominantly positive” reviews from critics. “Megalopolis” is the brainchild of director Ford Coppola, a project he has been envisioning for over 40 years. The director of the Palme d’Or winner “Apocalypse Now” and the legendary “Godfather” trilogy received a seven-minute long standing ovation for the first premiere, yet after its theatrical release in September, the reviews were overwhelmingly negative. It flopped in the box office over its short-lived tenure, netting $10 million in revenue — not enough to cover its $120 million budget.
Now, with the digital release of the film approaching on Nov. 12, I believe “Megalopolis,” is a must watch, regardless of what the box office and the critics say. Coppola’s four-decade passion project will finally be brought to the comfort of your living room. Even though it’s created by a widely accredited director, “Megalopolis” is not without fault, but you should still give it the fair shot it deserves anyway.
“Megalopolis” is set in a world of science fiction mixed with the classical undertones of Ancient Rome. Its filmmaking is often jaw dropping, creating a genuine sense of wonder with its remarkable cinematography. Coppola’s age and experience shine through as the visionarie’s film borrows from many signatures of his older projects.
“Megalopolis” is set in New Rome, a city reminiscent of New York. In the world of “Megalopolis,” it was Rome that had conquered the Americas. Even so, New Rome is chalk full of similar political and social struggles that the New York of today faces: poverty, houselessness, and inequality.
“Megalopolis” centers around six main characters, each played by legendary actors. Adam Driver plays Cesar Catilina, an almighty architect who created a Nobel-prize winning miracle material, Megalon. Its versatility would be the cornerstone of Catalina’s future.
Catilina is the head of the cities Design Authority, an urban planning organization that has been demolishing old housing projects for their future city, Megalopolis. This comes with controversy however, as they remove residents from their homes, inciting a contentious political rivalry between him and Mayor Franklin Cicero, played by Giancarlo Esposito. A battle between the new visions and the old modus operandi becomes prevalent throughout “Megalopolis”, and becomes even more complex when Catilina falls for the mayor’s daughter, Julia Cicero, played by Nathalie Emmanuel.
Catilina’s relationship with Julia creates friction between him and his cousin Clodio Crassus, played by Shia LaBeou. Clodio is infamous to New Rome’s press for his incestual relations with his sisters. His father, Jon Voigt’s character Hamilton Crassus III, is the richest man in the world and coincidentally Catilina’s uncle. Crassus III marries Catilina’s former mistress, a news reporter named Wow Platinum, played by Aubrey Plaza. Each actor’s performance was worthy of a Coppola film, with their respective characters each displaying the ways in which their broken world has affected their actions and interactions with one another.
“Megalopolis” features many ideas on the politics of change. It’s based off of the Catlinarian coup attempt in Ancient Rome, even going as far to pull from the names of those historical figures involved including Cataline, Cicero, Crassus and Caesar. In Ancient Rome, Catiline failed to make change. Further historical allusions are made in one of the opening scenes where we see Catalina reciting Hamlet, illustrating the character’s connection to the past, and how it drives him to make a future worth living for.
Catilina is often described as a man of the future, too obsessed by the past. “Megalopolis” builds onto this by frequently mentioning classical philosophy and literature in the story, building up the many dramatic storylines sprinkled throughout..
While “Megalopolis” is filled with historical and cultural references, the movie’s main flaw is in its, at times, inconsistent flow. I find it similar to one of Coppola’s greatest films made, The Godfather — a great movie in itself, but made up of, at times, choppy chapters as Al Pacino’s character advances in his family’s ranks.
“Megalopolis” tries a similar way of organization and cut-offs, but it is often lackluster. The transitions often lack unity or are too extreme in length. There were many series of events that seemed to be added into the film, not to drive forward the plot in any meaningful way, but instead merely as entertainment for entertainment’s sake. In fact, they may have just led to more confusion from the audience.
The latter half of the film builds up towards all out riots against Catilina and his Megalopolis, until the city is finally unveiled and the citizens are immediately silenced. Another part of the film that I found confusing was the marriage reception between Crassus III and Wow Platinum, held at an indoor stadium (an allusion to the coliseum) with chariot racing, circus tricks, and even wrestling. Afterwards, there was a fundraiser/concert for the right to marry “New Rome’s Vestal Virgin,” Vesta Sweetwater, played by Grace VanderWaal, which led to a deepfake scandal led by Clodio Crassus. These are just a few examples of random and confusing events that didn’t end up having any significant impact on the plot.
One of my biggest peeves about the film was Catilina’s magical ability to stop time. It is mostly an unexplained power that he’s had since childhood… and that’s all we are told about it. There’s only a small handful of usages of it in the film, and narratively speaking, it only comes into play once. It is used to finally pair Julia Cicero and Cesar Catilina as a power couple, capable of changing New Rome for the better – frankly a successful way of using it – but I would’ve liked to see more development of this ability.
Despite some confusing moments, Coppola still had a few stand-out scenes in his back pocket. After Catilina finishes reviewing some construction plans outside of the future city, he waits in his car for his driver whilst a child walks up to his vehicle. Julia Cicero notices the interaction, and details to a friend how Catilina couldn’t say no to a child. There’s a bit of short dialogue between Catilina and the child, until the child ends the conversation by saying, “Nice to meet you too,” pulling out a handgun and BANG. Blood splatters across the vehicle’s interior. Julia screams in horror. A classic, and very well pulled off Coppola murder. Another great scene in the movie follows Catilina driving through what is implied to be the bad part of New Rome. Around the street lies litter, drunkards. The marble statues that symbolize New Rome’s system of government, lie cracked, slumped on the street corners. While a seemingly small moment, this scene acts as a window into what the state of the city truly is.
Many movies have explored the idea of looking back to the past and recreating a new future. If this film was published by an awards focused distributor, namely A24, it could have been renowned as one of the greatest films of all time. It can be argued that a more compelling story with better flow could easily be made with a fraction of Coppola’s self-funded $120 million budget. In the grand scheme of things, Coppola’s vision from 40 years ago was made into a stunning film, regardless of its lackluster performance in the box office and flaws in consistency. “Megalopolis” is a film that asks a lot of its viewers. While it might not be a crowd pleaser, it will certainly allow viewers to uncover new truths about themselves.
