Megalopolis

Marcus Unrealius

or

Utopias Turn to Dystopias

 

"Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future too."

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

More than a decade ago, at a second-hand book store, I picked up a tome called "The Greatest Movies Never Made,"* which detailed a lot of films that had been proposed, had gotten to the script stage or pre-production and then for whatever reason, it was never made—films like Jodorowsky's conception of Dune, Hitchcock's Kaleidoscope, Philip Kaufman's Star Trek film: Planet of the Titans...

 

...and Francis Ford Coppola's Megalopolis.

 

Now, that book was written a couple decades ago, but the sound of it was intriguing, although a little vague about the details.** It sounded like Fritz Lang meets Ayn Rand in a sci-fi setting. But, Coppola was determined to get it made.

A concept drawing of Megalopolis that I remember from that book.

 

And now, using his own money, he has, at the age of 84. 

 

"A man's worth is no greater than the worth of his ambitions."

 Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

 

Based very loosely on events known as the Catilerian Conspiracy, Coppola's film tells the story of Cesar Catilina (Adam Driver), nephew of the rich and powerful Hamilton Crassus III (Jon Voight) and head of the Design Authority of New Rome in the "Third Millennia, 21st Century," a city divided between the extremely rich and the poor. Catalina has access to a wonderful substance called Megalon—another wonder-element along the lines of adamantium or unobtainium—the purpose of which is simultaneously vague and omni-versatile. With it, Catilina intends to build a "perfect school-city for the future" in the heart of New Rome, while the Mayor of New Rome, Francis Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito) would rather build a new casino, another pleasure-dome for the rich and idle. At a televised unveiling for the proposed gambling complex, Catilina interrupts by reciting Hamlet's soliloquy (almost all of it) and accusing Cicero of being nothing more than a slum-lord.

But, before one gets any further into the plot, there is one curious thing to mention: In the preliminary sequence of the film, it's shown that Cesar seems to have the ability to stop time. Walking precariously to the edge of the Chrysler Building, he leans over and stops time—the fleeting clouds halt and the traffic below comes to a standstill with nary a honk. And in that gap, Cesar rights himself, defying gravity and moves back away from the edge. That would seem to be a really big story-point, but except for another sequence where he does it and some business about losing the ability later in the script, not much is done with it. Is it a fantasy (could be)? A vision (there is evidence of such in Megalopolis)? A delusion (there, too)? As a thesis statement for a movie, it's a powerful one, but rather than hammer it home, it's a neglected conceit. 

 

The movie will have a lot of those.

"The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing, because an artful life requires being prepared to meet and withstand sudden and unexpected attacks."

 Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

 

If Cesar was just in conflict with Mayor Cicero, things would be easy, despite the considerable clout the Mayor commands (aided and abetted by characters played by Jason Schwartzman, Dustin Hoffman, and others). But, there's others including his cousin Clodio Pulcher (Shia LaBeouf), heir to the Crassus fortune, who despises Cesar and seems to live for outliving his uncle to gain his inheritance, a deep-seated attraction to debauchery and finding any means to thwart Cesar at any cost. Then there's Wow Platinum (Aubrey Plaza), a tele-"journalist" with a ravenously ambitious streak attracted to power, starting first as Cesar's mistress and then marrying Crassus with the aim of becoming a rich and powerful widow. 

All of these characters are, to say the least, self-obsessed, but, then, so is Cesar, even if his devotion is to seeing the creation of his Megalopolis and done to his precise vision of what could be possible with Megalon. Aiding him in his quest are his chauffeur/historian Fundi Romaine (Laurence Fishburne), and a fascinated acolyte, former good-time girl Julia Cicero (Nathalie Emmanuel), daughter of the Mayor, who begins to become fascinated with Cesar after witnessing him stop time during the demolition on the Megalopolis site (how come she isn't frozen and does anybody else notice that...?...let's not quibble as you're not going to get any answers).

The film follows the burgeoning relationship between Julia and Cesar and the various machinations to discredit our hero and his ambitions, even as we're led through the decadence and the moral lassitude of the upper-crust of New Rome, living like there's no tomorrow while the vast majority of New Rome can only gawp at them through chain-link barriers. Oh...and there's one other complication—A Russian space station has become de-stabilized in orbit and will probably land square on New Rome causing mass destruction on a convenient scale.

Coppola has been working on this project since Apocalypse Now, actually starting filming it in 2000—that's where he's getting the city-spires reflecting golden hour magic on a grand scale—but financial ruin, studio cold-feet, 9-11, and his fortune-making wine business all delayed progress, while he dabbled in small films with smaller budgets to see how he could make things more economically. All the time events in the press influenced the script, concept-artists came and went, and Coppola tinkered, re-wrote and tinkered again, the idea always in the back of his mind.

"It is the responsibility of leadership to work intelligently with what is given, and not waste time fantasizing about a world of flawless people and perfect choices."

 Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

So, how is it? A bit of a mess, really. But, a glorious mess. Not unlike his movie Twixt, and not unlike the Redux cut of Apocalypse Now—with the pace-killing French plantation scene which the under-the-gun Coppola finally cut completely, making a tighter more-focused film. One should always be wary of Directors' so-called "dream projects"—sometimes they're just too close to the things to be rigorous about it and lose the sense of the audience's dispassionate perspective. It's nice to have complete control, as long as you don't Ayn Rand the thing to death with the "purity" of your vision. There are whole little bits where the actors are encouraged to improvise (I'm thinking of a scene in Cesar's office where he's supervising co-workers in forming an odd human pyramid to create a geometric shape that—although it might have been fun to do on-set at the time—seems completely nonsensical and...unnecessary to advancing the story) that might have been better left on the cutting-room floor.

Though this be madness, yet there is method in't. 

 Hamlet (Polonius, Act 2 Scene 2)

William Shakespeare

 

But...but...there are moments where the imagery is just too exquisite to ignore. Coppola has always had a great eye, whether as a consumer or as a producer of movies, and there are odes to Fritz Lang (especially his Metropolis which is a spiritual cousin to this), German expressionism in general—even an ending nabbed from The Great Dictator—and his own experiments with practical effects in Bram Stoker's Dracula, Apocalypse Now, and techniques of the silent era—so many irises, split screens, and layered images (his way of showing the satellite's destruction of New York is far more interesting than just another CGI shock-wave and he had one act of violence that propelled me out of my seat) that you can't help but be dazzled.

But maybe not seduced. For all the luxuriousness of the visuals, the story is a little threadbare, lacking some connecting tissue that might have propelled the story along, little details (something Coppola is so good at) that might have prevented some thought-stuttering that wrenches you out of the flow of  experience that a more assured story-narrative would ensure. There are just too many leaps of faith that make the watching less comfortable and more precarious.

It also might have something to do with Coppola being much more versed in the Catilerian Conspiracy than your average movie-goer. Although there's nothing wrong with aspiring to connect with the lowest common demoninating audience, I doubt that many folks will recognize his references—"Oh, yeah, that 'vestal virgin' thing!"—and be merely puzzled as they go over your head like so much satellite debris.

"Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth."

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

 

So, what do we have in Megalopolis?  Let's call it a tentative failure. One should always be cautious with first impressions, even though one should trust their instincts. But, the shock of the new may blind-side you—it happened with Apocalypse Now, after all—and I'm always a bit cautious with late-era directorial efforts, like the casual dismissals of Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut or John Ford's 7 Women, both of which get better with every viewing. And one should always give extra credit to a director swinging for the fences even if they never get out of the infield. 

One might go forward by looking back. Coppola has made a wide variety of films, some of which have connected with audiences and some that haven't. With very few exceptions—I'm thinking The Conversation—they have dealt with interconnectedness, of people relating to each other despite differing perspectives, and different personal agendas.

And they're about family, whether it's a formalized family or not, nuclear or not—of the stoic and disciplined against the passionate and unprincipled. And they're about ambition and how it can inspire...or destroy. Those conflicts can exist in any person, but most obviously in artists. It's like Coppola has been making autobiographies about his own conflicting artistic instincts in the same way Howard Hawks' "teamwork" movies were inherently metaphors for making movies. A much younger Coppola would have made Megalopolis end as a cautionary tale. The older, wiser, more hopeful Coppola ends this one with positive reconciliation.

 

Perhaps reappraisals can start with that.

“The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.” 

 Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

 

* Or something like that. I lent it to someone and, as I'd read it cover to cover, I didn't care if I got it back. Since it's publication, there've been a couple of other books with similar titles about the same subject. 

 

** Coppola always played things tight to the vest. I read an interview with Coppola in Andrew Sarris' "Interviews with Film Directors" where he was asked about what his next movie was (this was around the time of The Rain People) and he answered "I've written a script called "The Conversation". It's about a guy on his 50th birthday." Technically true, but he left a lot of it out.

Poor Things

Candy'd

or

"I Have Found This World To Be Full of Sugar and Violence"

 

Yorgos Lanthimos' film of Poor Things immediately grabs you by the "hairy business" and never lets go. Even the titles starting the movie refuse to be conventional, emerging like stitching around a baby blanket. Then, the film starts proper with a low-res black-and-white sequence shot with a distorting wide-angle lens of Bella Baxter (Emma Stone) waddling around the ornate interior of the work-home of Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe), eccentric scientist and anatomist, whom Bella calls "God."

And so he is, scarred and etched by much surgery-presumably self-inflicted-he teaches anatomy at a London University, where he regularly dissects corpses for the education of his students and puts them back together for his. "What's the purpose of putting the organs back in?" asks one of his audience. "My amusement!" He bellows, and one dare not question him.

Evidently. His estate is populated by hybrid creatures constructed and tended by him: pug-ducks and pig-chickens (with their heads swapped out), all experiments to test the limits of what can be done. Speaking of predecessors, he says they "pushed the boundaries of what was known. And paid the price."

But, Bella is the most important one, an opportunity that arose by accident, and Dr. Baxter made the most of it...uh, her. Now, he tracks Bella's development, her growing vocabulary, her skill-sets, all in an environment meant to keep her safe, despite her abundant curiosity. Bella wants to learn, most particularly about the world outside the Baxter flat, and that, as he notes, is a problem: "So many things in the world can kill you, Bella."

Still, she seeks to learn. Baxter recruits one of his more sensitive students, Max McCandles (Ramy Youssef) to do the research work that his busy schedule can't accommodate, and, given Bella's combined increasing abilities and interests, someone has to keep an eye on her so she doesn't get in trouble. Dr. Godwin allows a brief foray into the park, but even that doesn't go smoothly, and it's only through the use of chloroform that he and Max are able to get her home.

But, things start to go south when Bella becomes sexually aware, and Godwin suggests that Max marry her as there is obvious affection between the two of them. A marriage contract is proposed and Godwin brings in lawyer Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) to draw it up. But, Wedderburn is unscrupulous and a cad and his interest in who would inspire such a contract makes him seek out Bella and propose that, instead of marrying Max, that she go off with him on a "grand adventure" traveling the world. To Bella, this seems the best of all possible ideas and she insists that she travel with Wedderburn and will marry Max when she returns. Dr. Godwin objects and tries to warn her, but, ultimately lets her go, realizing that Bella is "a being of free will" and can make up her own mind.

Of course, Wedderburn's intentions are the worst, indulging Bella in what she describes as "furious jumping" and acting a man of the world when all he really wants is control over her. Plus, being sheltered for all her time at Baxter's flat, Bella is unused to the "polite society" that Wedderburn loathes, and still has instinctual issues ("I must go punch that baby!") to the point where he commands her that she is to say only three things at dinner conversation: "Delightful" "How marvelous" and "How do they get the pastry so crisp." She starts to assert herself, slapping Duncan and making her own friends, while he drinks and gambles and begins a downward spiral of self-pity.

It's a coming-of-age story of the innocent learning about the world and the hardships and disillusionments that are learned along the way as her travels teach her in ways being cloistered in the doctor's care could not. Experience is the best teacher, whether you're "Candide" or "Candy" and Bella's travels, the people she meets, the hardships she endures, the sacrifices she makes are all in the benefit of her becoming a complete human being by the time she makes her way back to London.

You might think you've heard this one before, but you've certainly never seen anything like Poor Things. As anyone who's seen his The Favourite can attest, Lanthimos does things differently, using different film formats, lenses, distortions, and with no regard to realism or verisimilitude. His extreme world-building is not unlike Wes Anderson's or Tim Burton's, or Terry Gilliam's, but with a free-wheeling scatter-shot explosion of any expectations or any sort in a delirious mash-up of Dali and Magritte surrealism that ignore the laws of physics and architectural rigor while staying true to the possibilities of psychology and motivation. Think of the films of Tarsem Singh and tilt them another 90° and you'll be closer to Lanthimos' wheel-house.

Even while you're mind is reeling and your eyes are agog at what he presents, one can't help but be amazed at the performances he gets. As creepy as the visage of Willem Dafoe is in this film, his performance as a mad scientist is still heart-felt and, as bizarre as it is, just a little wise. Mark Ruffalo hasn't been this funny...ever. 

But, the miracle of this movie is Emma Stone. One doesn't want to reveal too much of the movie...or the "why" of it...but her Bella Baxter starts out as a fully-formed child and progresses to a cerebral philosophical mind while taking every idiosyncrasy and playing it with a crack comic timing that makes you shake your head in wonder at the inventiveness and sheer "go-for-broke" ingenuity of it. For all the special effect wizardry going on in the thing, she is the glue that holds the thing together for a solid 2½ hours. And her transformation from wobbling infant to sophisticated lady is a triumph. It's all pretty astounding.

And the movie will make an excellent double bill with Barbie.

The Tragedy of Macbeth

A Murder of Crows

or

"...Black, Deep Desires"

 

Joel Coen steps away from "The Coen Brothers" partnership to present his own version of Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Macbeth (or "The Scottish Play" if you expect a sandbag to fall from the rafters). There's nothing to fear here: brother Ethan usually writes their stuff and Joel directs with some intersection of duties between the two. But, here, brother Joel already has a collaborator and the material has been proven time and time again (and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow), despite the superstitions that have hovered like crows over every stage production.

 

There have been so many filmed presentations of "Macbeth" and re-imagined scenarios in which it takes place that one wonders what Coen, taking the text, would do with it. He doesn't try to anachronise the story, moving it to Haiti or setting it in Nazi Germany, but keeps it in 16th century Inverness. Presentation of that historical "Macbeth" recalls the way Orson Welles did it in 1948—stage-bound, Academy ratio, black and white, with an eye towards German Expressionism.

It begins with a shot straight up into the sky, the wind blowing, smoke and clouds combining and birds gyrating into the sky. Nature is on alert and moving because man is up to something unnatural—a battle has just been fought. Meanwhile a lone figure (Kathryn Hunter) scuttles—there is no other word for it—across a dirt path in the fog, muttering to itself and to others. This is Coen's interpretation of Shakespeare's witches, one being, recalling Andy Serkis' Gollum from The Lord of the Rings, but not a CGI creation, but one of theatricality, with twisted limbs like a bird's and a hoarse croak of a voice that feels like nails on a file. The performance is weird without being traditionally spooky and sets you on edge for what is to come.

What is to come is a professional interpretation without too much weirdness. Hunter is a tough act to follow, and she is the highlight in a film that should be full of them. I say that, but it needs to be said with some context. "Macbeth" is a much performed play, both in theater and the cinema (every decade has one film of it, it seems), and, like a symphony—or other piece of music—it can be played in differing manners even if maintaining the ascribed tempo. I might have a "perfect" rendition of the piece (and other listeners another idea of what that might entail) and notice the change of "attack" or emphasis in certain sections. It comes down to interpretation, and "Macbeth" is just as susceptible to those variations.

Like the 1948 Welles version, this one depends on less being more (although Coen cites Carl Theodor Dreyer more than Welles), the backdrops shadowed or cloaked in mist and blocks of perfectly proportioned masonry with less emphasis on grit—as, say, Polanski's version—and the figures walking through them are like mice in a maze. Predestination has created their paths and their choice is to simply follow through or not. It's a curiously unpopulated world, the only crowds being the line of soldiers set to attack Macbeth's castle, hemmed in by the "Birnam wood" of the witches' prophecy, the rest being stark spaces shadowed by the blackest blacks.

Through these spaces, the characters pace, for the most part sheltered from the wild outside that knows no geometry of straight lines, but intrudes—once the Macbeths screw their courage to the sticking place by regicide—not only by physical presences, but by the sound of that nature booming (not just knocking) to be let in, like consciences made tactile.

The acting is great throughout, with Brendan Gleeson, Alex Hassell, Stephen Root (!!), Moses Ingram, and Frances McDormand all breathing new life into the texts, bridging that Elizabethan gap of Shakespearean prose by the sheer force of performance. Denzel Washington does well (as well), bringing a maturity to the role rather than—as in some versions—as a walking personification of overweening ambition. It is only in his interpretation of the "Out, brief candle" speech that leaves a little something to be desired at that critical junction of the play. 

Up until then, Washington's Macbeth is a pragmatist, slightly world-weary and seems beaten down—he has just come from a war, after all. What is most interesting is that both Macbeths in this iteration are older, childless (so no chances of succession), and obviously have seen chances for advancement taken away from them in the past, and that, now, with this hope given thought by a supernatural origin, are almost desperate to take advantage of it, lest it pass from them one last time. Once he is king, and things start to fall apart, one would think there would be more shock, more realization that he might have been duped by the very forces that emboldened him. But, that's not there. Instead, it seems he's returned to the world-weariness at the beginning of the film—which is inconvenient as he still has much to fight. It feels false, and is missing a sense of bitter desperation that will carry him through the inevitable end.

Still, it's a beautiful, often mystical film to watch and listen to. And it's always a welcome break to just take in Shakespeare to relieve oneself of the mundane nature of everyday-speak, and glory in the poetry and precision of his story-telling.