Film Review - Megalopolis

 

The reviews have been savage. “the worst film ever made”, “The worst film I’ve ever seen”, “I beg you not to see this movie” are just some of the reactions to Francis Ford Coppola’s first film in twelve years. Can it really be that bad? Only one way to find out. Well, it is not the worst film I’ve ever seen – believe me I’ve seen far worse- rather it’s an ambitious if flawed work that feels like it is still in progress despite the time spent on it. Maybe that’s the issue; perhaps too much time was spent on it? If we see it as a movie that attempts to comment on the US and more widely the use and abuse of power then it works to some extent. It is more in the delivery of that message that it becomes an uneven watch.

You can still see plenty of the fire of the man who made The Godfather and Apocalypse Now but over fifty years later those storytelling and visual choices seems less focussed. Coppola invested a large amount of his personal fortune into this production and its hard not to see a lot of that ambition mirrored in its main character who is similarly determined to pursue a personal vision perhaps against common sense. It is essentially a story of how powerful empires are ultimately sabotaged by the indulgences, greed and excesses of the people who run them. It is both a tale for our times  but one that also resonates through history so Coppola attempts to parallel ancient Rome with modern day America. Its in the presentation of this narrative that Megalopolis becomes mired with conflicting ambition. Its political allegory works reasonably well, you can hear parallels with both leaders of the past and those of the present. Some of the dialogue spoken might have come directly from the mouth or keyboard of current world figures.

That Coppola chooses to wrap this around the tale of an ambitious architect whose utopian ideals clash with the political climate and society’s ills tilts the story off balance.  Cesar Catalina is an inventor who wants to roll out his pioneering adaptive building material which he has named Megalon into a technological playground with moving pavements, sweeping buildings and a look lifted from the Fifties vision of  an aspirational future. Ordinary people, rightly, are less than welcoming and its this firmament of discontent that both Cesar and the city’s Mayor, Franklin Cicero, must satisfy somehow. The latter is an avowed populist who will say what he thinks he needs to say to keep the population in his side. He sees advantages in opposing Cesar’s grand vision with a personal angle added in that his daughter Julia and the architect are together.

Not that we really see much from the street level point of view, an absence that makes for a lop sided narrative. Or is the film saying that all most people are good for is fodder for the great and the good to influence?  In theory this is actually a gripping narrative that could be a powerful indictment of society’s preference for expensive indulgence above social needs. Rather than get to the point though Coppola chooses a strange manner in which to put the story across.

Present day, an alternative contemporary America and ancient Rome are spliced together in an ill defined amalgam. We’re never sure where exactly we are supposed to be, if indeed anywhere. Is this just a parable? Everyone has Roman names while the clothing is a designer version of that centuries’ fashion. Reporters have those vintage cameras that go off with a flash yet we also see technology far more advanced than our own. The cityscape is contemporary with additions, some of them fanciful callbacks to iconic images like the scene where two characters talk on top of scaffolding blocks dangling over the city below. Everyone calls it New Rome but the camera lingers on well known New York landmarks.

There are allusions to reputation shredding social media scandals yet here they play out through word of mouth and old fashioned newspapers. Segments are bookended portentously with quotes carved in stone as if we have to be constantly helped to understand what we’re seeing.  Its an odd mash up, almost like a pop video at times in its mix and match style. Its also uncertain who our sympathies are supposed to lie with, maybe deliberately so. At times its as if Coppola is out to besmirch everyone in public office yet the movie ends with an optimistic glean in which Cesar seems to have won yet we have seen him be just as despicable as anyone else.

In this busy atmosphere, it seems like the actors feel they have to give large performances to make their mark especially with a script that isn’t exactly replete with sparkling dialogue. Adam Driver manages to maintain an even keel so we can see Cesar’s zeal for his project and his frustration at what is happening around him. His character though is lumbered with too much and the story often loses his thread. That’s is particularly the case with the film’s most peculiar idea – that Cesar can stop time. Sometimes. Why, how and to what end is not aired and it seems like a concept from another movie. It does give the film an ending I suppose and there's something amusing about the fact everything just stops at the finish.

Nathalie Emmanuel plays the Mayor’s daughter Julia with a restraint other performers might borrow from albeit in an underwritten role. Aubrey Plaza gets some laughs as the absurdly named reporter Wow Platinum.  Giancarlo Esposito fares well as the beleaguered Mayor. Elsewhere the cast let loose with variable results; some will probably look back with mixed feelings on this project.

I do think Coppola is out to make valid points even in a flawed film and I wonder if the extraordinary critical reaction is partly because he is challenging the very heart of American society. Viewed from over here, the US can seem harsh on its disadvantaged and poor, ruthless in its belief that their `democracy` is right when it can seem like a closed shop to change. If we see Cesar’s Megalopolis as an allegorical place, a wish for a more enlightened United States then the film works more effectively than it seems. Perhaps it plays better in the UK as that is likely to be a message a lot of Americans simply do not wish to hear. It’s no Godfather for sure but amidst the noise raises some interesting ideas.