Every once in a while a movie comes along which is truly baffling. Baffling that someone invested money in it, baffling the actors signed up to appear in it, and baffling that it exists.
But when it comes to Megalopolis, a movie which stars Adam Driver, Giancarlo Esposito, Nathalie Emmanuel, Aubrey Plaza, Laurence Fishburne, Jon Voight, Shia LaBeouf, and Dustin Hoffman, things take a very odd turn indeed. Megalopolis isn’t just baffling it’s also a steaming turd of a movie.
You can see the shit on screen, and boy, can you smell it! This film from writer/director Francis Ford Coppola, is without doubt the biggest stinker of 2024 and I spent my time watching this utter tripe so you sure as hell don’t need to.
In terms of the story, I could sit here for aeons attempting to explain the picture, and the idea that Megalopolis is some kind of fable, but I’m not sure I could do it justice or I’d even get it completely right. This film is working from a dog’s dinner of a script, with the narrative all over the place, and little makes sense.
Either way, the film is set in a new Roman version of the US and Adam Driver plays architect Cesar Catilina. Catilina is the inventor of a new building material which he believes can change the world.
Using this new material, Catilina has plans to construct a utopian city named Megalopolis. However, he finds himself at odds with corrupt mayor, Franklyn Cicero, as played by Giancarlo Esposito.
Throw in Nathalie Emmanuel as Cesar’s love interest and Cicero’s daughter; Aubrey Plaza as a TV reporter; and Jon Voight as a wealthy uncle who looks like he’s about to die, and you have a story about stuff and things. Oh, and everyone talks b*llocks and acts like this is Shakespeare… which of course, it is not.
Megalopolis is two hours (and a bit) of actors dicking about on screen while director Francis Ford Coppola attempts to convince his audience and his investors this is art. But Megalopolis is not art, this is a dreadful vanity project and nothing more.
The director first conceived this film back in 1977 and has been actively trying to get it onto screens since 1983. In order to do this he has spent $120 million spaffing money up the wall with careless abandon.
He has then gathered together a bunch of well-known actors and made them look various degrees of terrible on screen.
Adam Driver? Wasted.
Aubrey Plaza? Awful.
Jon Voight? Dire.
Dustin Hoffman? DUSTIN HOFFMAN!!! Just plain bad.
And it’s a similar story for Fishburne, Emmanuel, Esposito, LaBeouf et al. No one comes out of this film looking good.
Megalopolis is cack, it is trash, and it is a complete and utter dumpster fire and then some! The film is an example of what happens when a notable director has a bag of cash and free rein and he just shovels something onto the screen with no one holding him back.
If you watch this movie I guarantee you’ll experience a range of emotions and not one of them will bring you happiness All this film can offer is anger and disappointment, as well as the general feeling you’ve wasted precious moments of your life that you can never regain.
It is shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.
If for any reason you’ve made it this far into the review and you’re still not sure about my feelings on Megalopolis then let me make it clear: Megalopolis is an embarrassing clusterf*ck of a film. All footage should be tossed into a landfill, set on fire, and Francis Ford Coppola should apologise to anyone unfortunate enough to have seen it.
It looks piss poor, and it is piss poor. The film has no redeemable qualities.
Oh, wait, it does! Midway through the film Adam Driver’s character has a breakdown. This is a redeemable quality as for me it was the only relatable moment in the entire picture because at this point I too felt like I was having a breakdown watching this tosh.
Anyway… for what it’s worth (which isn’t much) Megalopolis is now playing in cinemas. But please save your time and money and avoid it because IT IS TERRIBLE!
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