Megalopolis: what was Coppola thinking?

The overall conclusion from watching Francis Ford Coppola’s swan song Megalopolis is “what was he thinking?” Yes, we’ve all read that this $120 million (of his own money) flop on a grand scale is a mess of direction and plot, to say the least. But it’s more than that. The whole thing is ridiculous, way over the top. Obviously Coppola, who’d dreamt of this film for decades, wanted to make an epic film in the tradition of  Intolerance (D.W. Griffith, 1916), Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941) or Ben Hur (Billy Wyler, 1959). There is a stentorian narrator in the style of Citizen Kane and ridiculous carved tablets with supposed profound messages to punctuate various sections of the movie, like in ancient Rome. Of course, the movie is set in an updated Rome, New Rome, which is very obviously New York City. The protagonist Cesar (get it?) Catilina’s (Adam Driver) office is in the iconic art deco Chrysler Building, for Pete’s sake. And there are numerous visuals of what is assuredly Manhattan. But the atmosphere has a slightly otherworldly or time warped look, sort of what you see when watching a movie like Joker (Todd Phillips, 2019) and the soon to be released Joker: Folie à Deux by the same director. Partly it looks like the present, at other times the future and still at others the past, like it’s the 1950s, evidenced by men wearing fedoras and photographers with flash bulbs. But there’s no doubt this is a hedonistic “Roman” world as evidenced by the orgy-like parties and so many of the women dressed in togas. In fact, the film most made me think of a real classic, The Fountainhead (King Vidor, 1949). The themes are similar. Based on the Ayn Rand novel an architect with grand visions and uncompromised principles is stymied by the corrupt political class. I prefer that movie, starring Gary Cooper as Howard Roark. But the $120 million paid for something because the sets are lavish indeed. One critic called the movie a “beautiful mess.” But what’s the point? It’s an over-the-top affair that provokes guffaws when it’s so obviously meant to be taken seriously. The characters speak ridiculously, if even unintelligently, the plot is indeed all over the place, and there’s the on again, off again stentorian voice.