Francis Ford Coppola has spent decades thinking about a movie project now known as “Megalopolis.”
And it shows.
The sprawling drama packs so many consequential themes into its two-plus hours it could have yielded a half-dozen films. Maybe more.
As is, “Megalopolis” is a glorious mess, a clash of tonal styles and belief systems that delivers until it leaves us confused, if not frustrated by its reach.
Star Adam Driver deserves an honorary Oscar for holding all the fascinating pieces together.
Driver stars as Cesar Catalina, a powerful architect hoping to transform New Rome into the city of the future. Powered by his energy invention, the Megalopolis project is like nothing we’ve seen before.
Cesar’s vision won’t come without a fight. He’s countered by Mayor Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito), who has more conventional plans for urban renewal.
Think a massive casino that feeds into the city’s amoral pinnings.
Coppola’s yarn is at its best when it captures the bacchanalia behind New Rome. It’s a freakish combination of old-world appetites and modern cravings, and it speaks to our current times.
Not in any way remotely positive, mind you. That’s part of its narrative heft. The grandiose score and playful costumes add to a chronologically confused tapestry.
Take TV talker Wow Platinum (Aubrey Plaza). She’s as vapid as she is beguiling, a perfect symbol for the moral rot at the city’s core. Naturally, she flocks to billionaire Hamilton Crassus III (Jon Voight, hamming it up), a star in a city where greed and avarice reign supreme.
The Mayor’s daughter Julia (Nathalie Emmanuel) falls for Cesar’s vision but doesn’t want to betray her father.
Which vision will win the day?
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Curious characters revolve around the main players, including the inscrutable Clodio Pulcher (Shia LaBeouf), a cross-dressing joker who could upend Cesar’s plans.
Others aren’t given enough screen time, including a fixer played by the legendary Dustin Hoffman. Yet handing Laurence Fishburne double duties – he plays Cesar’s trusted ally and the film’s narrator – is a masterstroke. His line readings on the latter front make audiences think, “Morgan Freeman who?”
Coppola’s vision is assured and boldly original. This cityscape marries modern architecture with classical themes into a wondrous, unsettling canvas. The auteur may be in his 80s, but much like fellow icon Martin Scorsese he brings a vitality to his vision that belies Father Time.
Bleak humor abounds, but at times its tonal approach occasionally trips up the material. A third-act sequence involving Voight’s character inspires the wrong kind of laughter. Earlier sequences land with more storytelling authority.
It takes a while to absorb the film’s subtitle: “A Fable.” It’s both a warning and a way to excuse the film’s flaws.
Some Coppola tics aren’t followed up with enough insight. Cesar can stop time, a fascinating gambit Coppola and co. fail to fully investigate.
Adam Driver tells us that he was going to take a break from acting until Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘MEGALOPOLIS’ came along.
“Francis himself, he’s one of those directors that almost every actor I know when you get that opportunity it’s going to be interesting” pic.twitter.com/8dJeABJul2
— DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) September 24, 2024
What does it all mean? Coppola is on a quest for optimism, and to get there we’ll have to push past everything that divides us to find a brighter future.
Good luck, at least off screen.
It’s hard to imagine another actor holding “Megalopolis” together like Driver does. He’s the main attraction, the straight man to the insanity swirling around him. His work on the “Star Wars” franchise likely prepared him for such an outsized, unusual gig.
Good.
In “Megalopolis,” the obstacles seem even more daunting than in real life. Yet the story steers us toward a future that may be brighter than we ever thought possible.
For every cringe-worthy exchange or ill-conceived gamble there’s something profound and beautiful to admire. “Megalopolis” is a worthy cinematic mess.
HiT or Miss: “Megalopolis” is bold and cringe-worthy, audacious and ill-advised. How rare and refreshing.
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