Film Forum

MEGALOPOLIS

Francis Ford Coppola · 2024 · U.S. · 138 min

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“MEGALOPOLIS is equal parts STAR WARS prequel and MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA (1929). It’s Dario Argento’s DRACULA 3D (2012) and it’s Fellini’s SATYRICON (1969). More than anything else, it’s SOUTHLAND TALES, Richard Kelly’s 2006 head-scratcher of a follow-up to DONNIE DARKO (2001), but with less of Philip K. Dick’s DNA and more of Ayn Rand’s. It exists in conversation with APOCALYPSE NOW (1979), and it ends with a revised version of the pledge of allegiance being recited by a chorus of children. It’s a challenge to discuss it without bringing up a laundry list of cinematic reference points because, in the cubist tradition, it seems to break apart and rearrange over 100 years of film history into something completely baffling and new.” – Chicago Reader