Megalopolis Review: More Like Mega-Flopolis

★☆☆☆☆

Megalopolis is the worst film I’ve ever seen at the cinema. 

Usually, I like to dedicate the first paragraph or two of my movie reviews to some background on the film at hand. Maybe a quick summary of the production, a brief synopsis of the director and their past works. But this is Francis Ford Coppola. We don’t need to do all that; this is the mind behind Godfather 1, 2, and 3, behind Apocalypse Now. We know who he is; we all know he’s “good at what he does”. 

I thought of potentially writing this review in a goofy, tongue-in-cheek way to mirror the shortcomings of Megalopolis. Since Megalopolis loves telling a fragmented, messy, bullshit story, maybe I could write the review in a non-linear fashion and let the reader interpret my thoughts that way? Maybe I could present a collage of clip art, GIFs, and memes instead of written text, as some deranged form of reviewer Pictionary?

But that would be just as pretentious and boring as this drek, and I can’t be asked to figure out a funny, creative way of skewering the absolute hack slop that is Megalopolis. I said it at the beginning of this review, and I’ll say it again: Megalopolis is the worst film I’ve ever seen at the movies. And no, it’s not “funny bad” either. It’s not “so bad that it’s good”. It’s joyless; more of an ordeal than a night out. It’s categorically a waste of time. The nerve of Francis Ford Coppola to put this thing out into the world and charge an admission fee. 

And the worst part? I paid money for it. I said, “Thank you, Francis”, and then allowed him to do this to me. No one made me watch Megalopolis; this is on me. I saw the trailers, I saw the other reviews that were out. I just…I thought it would be funny. Am I being a little dramatic? Sure. What do you want me to do? Treat this seriously? These reviews take time, and technically, are supposed to be “fun”. I lost two and a half actual hours of human life to this drivel. I was very close to not writing anything about this film, to be honest. As an SEO Freelancer, these blogs give me a bit of a looser, more creative outlet for writing about a topic that I’m pretty passionate about. I’m stalling and trying my best to be remotely funny, engaging, or entertaining. I don’t know what to say about this film. I mean don’t get me wrong, it’s shit, but how so? How do the component parts of this motion picture come together into such an unappealing piece of art? 

I’ll give it a go, but I’m not giving you a blow-by-blow plot summary of this casserole of nonsense. If you want that, just read the Wikipedia plot summary. Actually, you know what, do that. I want you to click this link and read the Wikipedia plot summary. I’ll wait. 

If you actually came back, well, there it is. That’s what happens in Megalopolis. You might be wondering what all the whining and complaining is about? Maybe it sounds like a fairly high-concept, entertaining, and abstract story with colourful characters in a futuristic setting? That doesn’t sound too bad. 

Well, why don’t you watch it then? Why don’t you take some of your money, and purchase a ticket to Megalopolis? 

See, it’s not even about the money. It’s more about the principle. Sure, it’s annoying, but I can always make more money. I’m not going to get those hours of my life back though; they’re gone forever. I must sit down and marinate with the thought that I chose to spend my money on this. I’ve had some ups and downs as a freelancer. I’ve had some dead periods where my income was stagnant. The sheer naivety to use even a fraction of this precious commodity on “seeing Megalopolis at the cinema”. What a heavy load to bear. 

It wasn’t all bad, though, to be fair. I’m something of a foodie and admittedly have the palette of a toddler. My friend and I rushed to see the beginning of Megalopolis and were running a little bit late (we wouldn’t want to miss a valuable scene and have the film not make sense at all; that would have been a real bummer). In doing so, we chose to eat at “Slim Chickens”, a kind of American-style fast food diner. For £12, I got a 5-piece fried chicken meal with chips, a bottomless drink, garlic bread, and a couple of fun dipping sauces. Pretty good value for money, to be fair, and the quality wasn’t bad at all. 

The problem with going to the cinema nowadays is the overall cost. The more fun way to go about it is to have a meal out before or after, especially if you’re going with friends. A Nando’s or something similar, throw in some popcorn if you’re feeling cheeky and the price of admission too, and you’re looking at…£50? And that’s being generous. But if you can have a nice meal, hey, at least you’re feeling well-fed and satisfied in some way! 

If you’ve actually stuck around and committed to reading this blog, you will have some idea of how it felt to sit through Megalopolis. Hoping, praying, that the storyteller you’ve dedicated some time to will reach a point. Any kind of point. My point was something about fried chicken being tasty: you didn’t have to pay English Sterling for that nugget of wisdom. What was Francis Ford Coppola’s point? Why did he do all this? 

Since I’m not a heartless, sadomasochistic bastard like Francis, I’ll try to give you what you came here for. Speaking incredibly broadly, Megalopolis is a story about a leading architect called Caesar. Tasked with rebuilding a vast portion of “New Rome” (New York) with a revolutionary new element, Caesar has to manoeuvre through politics, personal demons, complicated relationships, and threats of violence to complete his vision: Megalopolis, a city that will stand the tests of time. 

Everything about Megalopolis is gaudy, garish, untamed, overly-complicated, and unpleasant to look at. A-list actors like Adam Driver, Jon Voigt, and Dustin Hoffman, emerging talents like Nathalie Emanuel, talented character actors like Kathryn Hunter and Giancarlo Esposito, and also Shia LaBeouf is here. As a fan of many of these actors, I have to be honest and say that the entire cast puts in some of the worst performances of the year. There is no doubt in my mind that this is primarily down to the directing; for better or worse, the acting matches the vision. 

The actors are all odd, emotionally confusing, pantomime-esque, and shrill in their performances; they are entirely unconvincing and borderline irritating to watch. The only actor who doesn’t get completely embarrassed is Aubrey Plaza, who is modestly captivating as the ridiculously-named TV Presenter “Wow Platinum”. I wouldn’t say she’s “good” in the role, but she does a fine enough job. Some of these performances though…seriously. Nathalie Emmanuel has the opposite of a star-making performance here. I haven’t seen a more convincing performance as “plank of wood” since Sofia Coppola artfully brought that character to life in her father’s The Godfather 3. Her flat, vacuous performance as Caesar’s muse is so painfully unengaging that it only serves to highlight how poor the material is. Shia LaBeouf, as Mark Kermode so eloquently stated in his review, puts in “his most slappable performance” yet. LaBeouf can be a great actor, but he puts in a truly torrid showing here as this Panem-of-Hunger-Games style baby Donald Trump stand-in. Ugh.

The film very obviously is presented as a kind of fable or parable, but I have no idea what the actual message of this film is outside of maybe being about how genius artists with transcendent ideas about the future ought to be listened to? Or something? I don’t know. Justin Chang in his review commented that:

"What is inescapably moving about Megalopolis...is the degree to which it has evolved into an allegory of its own making. Coppola has made a defense of the beautiful and the impractical ... as art-sustaining forces in the cinema itself...The mere fact that it exists, in its breathtaking and sometimes exasperating singularity, feels like an expression of hope".

That is a very charitable way of looking at Megalopolis. I agree that it is astounding that this movie exists, but I don’t think it speaks to the immoveable, beautiful thrust of one man’s vision. I think it speaks more to the fact that Coppola is a household Hollywood name and has a lot of connections and liquid assets that he can use to self-finance any project, even one as incoherent and stupid as Megalopolis. I would hardly call this movie an expression of hope…Coppola hasn’t made a good film since the 90s, and this is his worst one yet. What exactly is the hope being expressed? I hope he doesn’t do this again? I hope he’s run out of vineyards to sell? If this was some underground artist toiling away for decades to get his vision made, sure, but Coppola is cinema royalty. It’s hardly some underdog story that Coppola sharted Megalopolis onto our screens, and this idea that Megalopolis is some metatextual triumph that showcases the self-sustaining power of art is just word salad. 

This film has been in development hell since the 80s apparently, and maybe at some point there was the bones of something good here. What we were served up is a slop mess of themes and ideas clumsily crammed into a modern retelling of an actual piece of Roman history alongside some really odd shit. Development Hell might be hot, but it’s not hot enough to cook through this flabby, bland, unseasoned slab of movie meat. It feels like a joke movie; not a comedy, but a parody of films. This film is so stupid and weird and loud and annoying, and some of it is on purpose, but most of it isn’t. It’s such a perplexing watch. I’ll bet there are some hipster film dudes calling this film “the first post-movie movie” or something. I’m happy to play the role of Giancarlo Esposito’s character here; personally, I liked movies the way they were before Megalopolis. I like the status quo, thank you very much, and I have no wish to see anything more like this. 

Then there’s the mechanical aspects of a movie; things like the screenplay and dialogue, the pacing, the cinematography etc. Outside of a few cool shots and some nice transitory scenes, I would argue that the film completely flops in all of these areas too. The dialogue, without having many clear-cut examples that spring to mind, is unbearably cringey and amateurish in a way that was actually quite shocking to see. There are a number of scenes that exist only to sound intelligent without actually being so (one example being a drawn-out scene with Adam Driver and Nathalie Emanuele blandly quoting philosophers to each other for no particular reason; because philosophy equals deep, you see). The film itself just looks cheap and gaudy, as previously stated. It looks as though someone smeared all the lenses with vaseline. And Christ does the film just drag on and on and on. If you’ve seen the film Cats, that is probably the closest thing I can compare this film to in terms of the level of enjoyment I got out of it. Megalopolis is better than Cats, but the bar set by Cats is in hell somewhere, or deep inside the mantle of the Earth. It’s not a ringing endorsement. But if you have seen Cats, and remember how unsettling, strange, and shit it was, that’s the kind of experience we’re talking about here. I invite you to go see Megalopolis if that sounds interesting to you, but to quote Jeremy from Peep Show (punchline here).

Talking about Megalopolis isn’t fun, this review is a complete mess, and I’m running out of energy and things to say. It really is just a shitty movie. Megalopolis is a movie that is somehow incredibly boring, aggravating, and completely devoid of restraint all at once. There are some people that are already saying that this film is either a misunderstood masterpiece, ahead of its time, a bold and brave disaster that admirably falls on its face because it’s so ambitious and daring, and lots of other stupid shit. This is no 2001: A Space Odyssey. Maybe I’m wrong, and in thirty years time we’ll be looking back on the knuckle-draggers that panned this movie with consternation and rolled-eyes. I genuinely think if it wasn’t Francis Ford Coppola behind this trainwreck, everyone and their mothers would be calling this film just that. This is an unmitigated disaster. I’m mortified for the actors; for people like Giancarlo Esposito, who I adore. I was getting second hand embarrassment watching Shia LaBeouf flailing about with his seedy, black-hole charisma. 

Entirely self-financed and self-produced by Francis, Megalopolis serves as a cautionary tale. No matter how talented you are in your field, how much credit you have in your bank, or how many Godfathers you have in your back pocket, there’s a Megalopolis inside us all. Don’t be like Francis: be better.

One star, fuck you.