News culture “A messianic mess” Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis is one of the worst science fiction films of 2024: the press is clear!
Francis Ford Coppola’s latest film has just been released. If the director of “Apocalypse Now” usually attracts viewers, this was not necessarily the case with this science fiction film.
No surprise for Francis Ford Coppola (Apocalypse now). Megalopolis only grossed $4 million in its opening weekend in the United Statesan economic disaster considering that the 83-year-old director financed his film himself with 120 million. Still, the story is charming. A Roman epic in modern America. The city of New Rome needs to change, but a conflict breaks out between an architect (Adam Driver) who can stop time and a very conservative mayor (Giancarlo Esposito). The mayor’s daughter (Nathalie Emmanuel), in love with the architect, will face the difficult task of discovering what is best for humanity.
The press agrees…
Megalopolis was presented in the official competition of the Cannes Film Festival. Although the director received a standing ovation at the end of the screening, negative reviews quickly followed. The famous media company Télérama headlines: “Coppola’s monumental megalomania” or “Cata Coppola“. For the newspaper it says: “It is difficult to understand its history and when we arrive we fall from a great height“. Le Parisien is of the same opinion and believes that the director will sign “a mega disappointment“, the guilt of a “disjointed story and grotesque scenes“.
The film, which was released in France on September 25, failed to reverse the trend. Worse, the media all seems to be heading toward the same conclusion. For Première magazine, which specializes in cinema news: “Visual and narrative experiments never manage to hide a point of confusing naivety“. The same conclusion from Liberation: “Megalopolis is everywhere and nowhere“. The daily newspaper 20minutes even says: “The result is more of an industrial disaster than an ambitious work”. There is no shortage of adjectives in the French press to describe Coppola’s new film. Particularly noteworthy is the “memorable fiasco“d’Ecran Large, “the swollen opera” by Nouvel Obs or even a “terrible Nanar” by BFMTV.
…and the notes too
Even if the film did not convince the media, it is still far from convincing viewers in France, but also internationally. On Allociné the film received a 3.2/5 from the press, but above all a very low rating of 2.3/5 from viewers. Likewise, Megalopolis only receives 50% recommendations from the trade press on Rotten Tomatoes and a rating of 55/100 from the media on Metacritic. Viewer ratings do not exceed 50% on both sites.
Allegations against Coppola
Even before the film was shown at the Cannes Film Festival, Megalopolis was at the center of a scandal. In an investigation published by The Guardian Francis Ford Coppola’s behavior on set was considered very inappropriate by crew members. More seriously, he allegedly pressured certain women to sit on his lap and even attempted to kiss extras. The film’s co-producer Darren Demter said he “didn’t do that.”I was not aware of any complaints of harassment or bad behavior during the project“. But he mentions filming a nightclub scene where the actor gave nice hugs to set the mood of the scene.
