Producers: Tara Li-An, James Mockoski   Director: Mike Figgis   Distributor: Utopia

Grade: B

Francis Ford Coppola’s epic-sized passion project “Megalopolis,” which he’d hoped to make for decades and finally did on his own dime and in his own way, was a financial disaster, reportedly returning only a tenth of its estimated $140-million dollar budget in theatrical receipts.  And though some notable critics found it an impressive piece of work, most (including this reviewer) responded with bewilderment mixed with admiration for the ambition of the octogenarian director, who self-financed and distributed it at enormous personal risk, selling off a portion of his California winery to raise the necessary funds.

It isn’t necessary to go into detail about the plot of “Megalopolis.”  One can consult reviews of it for that.  Suffice it to say that it attempts to say something about genius versus pragmatism within the context of a political struggle over the future of a troubled city called New Rome, and that allusions to the closing days of the ancient Roman Republic provide a sort of historical window dressing for a tale of intrigue which has romantic as well as socio-political elements.

Coppola’s decision to put his own fortune on the line to finally make the film he’d dreamt of for years piqued the interest of British director Mike Figgis, probably best known for “Leaving Las Vegas.”  He sought the filmmaker’s permission to do a behind-the-scenes look at the shoot, and Coppola gave it.  While some of the stars—Adam Driver most notably—preferred to talk only after filming was done, most of the cast, along with members of the crew, participated while it was ongoing.  What emerges is an insightful portrait of Coppola at work, though inevitably Heisenberg’s principle about observation affecting what’s being observed applies.  And occasional inserts of Figgis commenting on his own reactions add to the layers of ambiguity.

This isn’t, of course, the first time that one of the director’s magna opera has been scrutinized cinematically after the fact.  His 1979 Vietnam War epic “Apocalypse Now” was later the subject of “Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse” (1991).  But there are significant differences.  The earlier film, despite its troubled production, emerged as a success both critical and financial, and one of the documentary’s directors was his wife Eleanor, whose viewpoint was sympathetic.  Figgis is too, of course, but unlike “Apocalypse,” “Megalopolis” did not overcome the odds against it.

What do we learn from “Megadoc”?  Well, it certainly demonstrates that Coppola has been determined to make “Megalopolis” for years.  There’s fascinating footage of a table read of the script from years ago, with a different cast (Robert De Niro wryly notes that he’d read the script and still doesn’t know what it’s about), along with some test footage featuring performers like Ryan Gosling.

In direct conversation with Figgis (who acts as his own cameraman; Joe Beshenkovsky is credited as editor), Coppola expresses nonchalance about ultimately self-financing the project.  As a model he cites Jacques Tati, who was forced into bankruptcy when “Playtime,” in which he’d invested his personal fortune as well as nine years of effort, proved a commercial failure in 1967.  “Who cares if you die broke if you made something you think is beautiful?” Coppola says.     

And the documentary depicts Coppola’s personal directorial style, with rehearsals based on techniques derived from experimental theatre and a loose, improvisatory style during production that invites experimentation while insisting on the realization of the film he sees in his mind.  Coppola insists repeatedly that what he’s aiming for is having fun, telling Figgis that moviemaking is play, not work.  (He’s expressing in his twilight years the same idea that Orson Welles did while starting his first film at twenty-four, when he called the RKO Studio, where he would make “Citizen Kane,” “the biggest electric train set any boy ever had.”)

And much of the time Coppola does appear to be enjoying himself—to a point.  There are occasional dustups with actors that irritate him—the worst offender is Shia LaBeouf, who’s interviewed at length and, while admitting that he was virtually unemployable when Coppola tapped him and worries that he might be fired anytime, nonetheless presses his ideas on the director with a bit too much intensity.  And with members of the crew (Figgis pointedly has a running caption list of the amounts budgeted to each department).  The production designer left in mid-filming, and there’s a momentary lapse in civility when Coppola remonstrates with his cinematographer (who didn’t) about lighting shots as he wants them done, rather than worrying about how they’ll  be edited together (not the cameraman’s job, the director emphasizes).  And there are times when Coppola fumes, waiting as an experimental method he’d hoped would work doesn’t and delays ensue. 

So what Figgis offers is a revealing warts-and-all behind-the-scenes view of a massive production that represented one man’s drive and the things that went right (most of the cast, like Driver, end up appreciating Coppola) and those that didn’t.  Figgis closes with the premiere of the finished film at Cannes, but doesn’t go into the deeply mixed reaction to it there, and ignores completely its fate in theatres.

What remains is simply a tribute to one man’s dream and his determination to realize it, whatever the personal cost.  Whether you find that inspiring or foolhardy will tell you something about yourself.