“Megalopolis”, by Francis Ford Coppola: daring the artistic gesture

The New York Times publishes a column by Sam Wasson : he rubbed shoulders with the master, wrote a book about him and he looks back on the four decades and the 120 million dollars that Coppola committed from his own pocket so that the film could see the light of day.

Because this man is an artist, underlines Wasson

And even at the start of his career, “he never had the means not to spend money” on his films. Coppola never made a film to win money, including Apocalypse Now which earned him, in addition, the reputation of having a disturbed ego and of being a madman lost in his jungle. Coppola responded at the time that the people of Hollywood who put millions and millions into a film like Superman 2were not considered frosty! Which film has remained in the history of cinema? Apocalypse Now obviously and this is the heart of the subject according to Wasson: cinema is about taking your time, it’s also about wasting time, not necessarily knowing where you’re going otherwise there’s a good chance that you’re on the way to remake a film that has already been made.

So we can love or hate the latest Coppola but Megalopolis pushes Hollywood to its limits, holds it up a mirror and reminds it of its growing aversion to risk. Without a Coppola, there would remain the ease of large franchises and the impossibility for cinema to fight against streaming, TikTok and YouTube.