Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Actors: Adam Driver, Nathalie Emmanuel, Giancarlo Esposito, Aubrey Plaza
Genre: Drama / Sci-Fi
Rating: M
‘Megalopolis’ is from Francis Ford Coppola (now 85), the
director of ‘Apocalypse Now’ and ‘The Godfather’, where he tries to craft this epic
mixture of Roman politics and near-future New York. The film mostly follows
Cesar (Driver) & rival Cicero (Esposito). Besides the names, the only
slightly Ancient Rome thing about the film is that there’s some inter-family
politics – Cicero’s daughter Julia (Emmanuel) falls in love with Cesar and
Cesar’s ex, Wow (Plaza) marries his uncle, Crassus (Voight).
The cast is stacked – as well as the main five above, there’s
Dustin Hoffman, Laurence Fishburne, Shia LeBeouf & Jason Schwartzman. While
all are OK, no-one shines and some of the dialogue is a bit wooden. I sometimes
got the impression this should’ve been a play, not a film. I think the main
issue is that Coppola’s had this in his mind for 45 years and clearly hasn’t
refined or updated anything, so there’s about 5 different, mostly-unrelated, storylines
trying to be crammed in.
While 2 hours 15min isn’t crazy-long, it still feels like a slog
at times. Sometimes it’s closer to ‘The Fountain’, but the editing (split
screen is annoying and there’s way too many cuts) mean no characters get a
chance to stand out or cement themselves and the ending doesn’t reward. Driver
tries, but it feels like half the film has been cut, so you’re not quite sure
what’s happening. The whole Madison Square Garden part seems so unnecessary. Not
terrible, but very messy.
Overall: Confused architect needs less time
Gav's Rating: 2 stars