The Foibles of Francis Ford Coppola’s Failed Fable and Philosophical Fiction (feat. Ayn Rand)
More Thoughts on Megalopolis
I Can’t Escape Megalopolis
*Note: This mid-week morsel contains spoilers for Megalopolis. Should you wish to avoid spoilers, check out last Sunday’s spoiler-free review.*
Considered within the traditional framework of popular narrative cinema, Francis Ford Coppola’s long-awaited opus, Megalopolis, is a terrible film.
I wrote in my initial review that Megalopolis is “a humbling reminder that ‘great’ filmmakers don’t invariably produce ‘good’ art” and “That Francis Ford Coppola sat behind the camera doesn’t change the fact that Megalopolis is philosophical prattle cloaked in the pastiche of prestige.”
I criticized the film’s “gaudy CGI reminiscent of Cats (2019).” Its incomprehensible tone reminded me of Showgirls (1995), a gloriously unserious Camp classic.
For more on Showgirls, check out:
Most importantly, for the ensuing reflections, I felt that Coppola’s failed fable was “powered by intellectual ambitions befitting an Ayn Rand novel (pejorative).”
Ayn Rand’s Utopia & Coppola’s Dystopia
Ayn Rand, mother of Objectivism and evangelist of “the virtues of selfishness,” was a terrible author who used “novels” to express her terrible ideas, philosophy, and worldview.
I’ve put “novel” in quotes because Rand’s most famous works are polemics disguised as novels. Her cold, utilitarian prose fails to conjure convincing human emotions. Evaluating Rand’s writings within the framework of narrative fiction, which prizes compelling characters and an interesting plot, her novels are dogshit. Her work’s enduring appeal is rooted in the philosophical ideas that her novels preach.
Her adoration for “laissez-faire” (i.e., unregulated) capitalism and disavowal of altruism have made her an intellectual darling among conservatives with wet dreams of dismantling the social safety net.
In Rand’s utopia, poor people are lecherous failures whose well-being is not the responsibility of successful men. Her philosophy of “I’ve got mine, go fuck yourself” is woven into the tattered fabric of American society.
Watching Megalopolis, a terrible movie that attempts to communicate Coppola’s worldview, I found myself thinking of Rand’s work in my desperate attempt to ascertain what the fuck Coppola was trying to do with his gilded shit-heap of a film.
Considering Coppola’s film within the framework of philosophical fiction, which employs narrative to articulate the artist’s worldview, doesn’t magically make Megalopolis a better film. However, it may help illuminate Coppola’s intent.
I can’t say for certain that Ayn Rand was rattling around in Coppola’s head. Frankly, I have no idea what that man was thinking.
There’s far too much going on in Megalopolis to assert any single influence as the film’s guiding force. However, overlapping plot points between Megalopolis and Ayn Rand's works facilitate an intertextual conversation between the two artists.
It seems that Coppola’s film, which tells the story of powerful men with conflicting visions for the future, grapples with notions of the “ideal man” central to Rand’s writing.
Surface Level Similarities
In Megalopolis’ opening minutes, a block of housing is demolished, setting the stage for a clash between Mayor Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito) and Chairman of the Design Authority, Ceasar Catalina (Adam Driver).
Rand’s 1943 “novel,” The Fountainhead, tells the story of an architect, Howard Roark, whose modernist brilliance eludes his contemporaries. After several rejections, Roark’s rival, the untalented Peter Keating, gets offered a major project. Keating enlists Roark’s help to build something great. Roark agrees to assist Keating on the condition that Roark’s input remains anonymous and that his designs are unchanged. In the end, when Roark’s vision for a skyscraper is altered, he blows up the entire building in a fit of petulance and rebuke of compromise, which Rand’s work regards as righteous.
Where Mayor Cicero envisions a casino, Ceasar dreams of building an urban utopia out of “megalon,” a revolutionary bio-adaptive building material he discovered. As the two titans clash, jealousy and ambition spur additional plots to undermine those in power.
Rand’s 1957 “novel,” Atlas Shrugged, features a self-made steel magnate, Hank Rearden, who develops an alloy that is lighter and stronger than steel, perfect for the construction of a new railroad. Jealous competitors malign him and his breakthrough discovery. When Rearden refuses to sell his metal to the government for research, his proprietary alloy becomes the subject of a smear campaign, resulting in a boycott of his revolutionary metal.
Noting the similarities between Megalopolis and Rand’s most famous works, I couldn’t help but wonder if Coppola made the conscious choice to work within Rand’s distinctive framework. As the film progresses, descending into an incoherent absurdity that sharply contrasts Rand’s utilitarian prose, the divergence between Rand and Coppola’s underlying worldview emerges.
Working within the same sandbox and using similar tools, Rand and Coppola end up with vastly different sandcastles.
Ceasar Catalina & the Imperfect Ideal
In her 1968 introduction to The Fountainhead, Rand states the intent of her writing with little space for ambiguity. In her own words, the purpose of her writing is “the projection of an ideal man… a moral ideal.” It is her “ultimate literary goal… an end in itself— to which any didactic, intellectual or philosophical values contained in a novel are only the means.”
Coppola’s film offers us Ceasar Catalina, a visionary who seeks to leverage his power to manifest his vision of utopia. However, situated against a society in decline, his appeals to hope render him an idealist. Many within the film, and perhaps the film itself, regard Ceasar’s idealism as folly. His utopia is never clearly defined beyond its shimmery, golden aesthetic.
In a deeply cynical world, Coppola’s film seems to suggest that his idealism may not be suited to Megalopolis’ political moment. Despite presenting Ceasar as an ubermensch, clearly positioning him as the most ideal prospective leader within the film, Coppola goes to great lengths to demonstrate his numerous imperfections.
Ceasar is eccentric to the point of alienating others. He is prone to bouts of instability. He engages in heavy substance abuse to escape himself for a few precious hours. For unspecified reasons, his mother loathes him, rendering him emotionally remote. He is simultaneously a paragon of success and deeply unhappy— an idealist in despair.
The soul-crushing reality of our political moment, sublimated into the world of Coppola’s Megalopolis for artistic exploration, is too jaded to believe in Ceasar as a political savior. Nothing in the text suggests Ceasar is truly capable of solving Megalopolis’ manifold problems.
To understand the imperfections of Megalopolis’ ideal man and why he’s unable to effectuate change, let us consider the world he occupies and how it differs from that of Rand’s fiction.
Rand elaborates on the conditions which foster her ideal man, writing:
“Since my purpose is the presentation of an ideal man, I had to define and present the conditions which make him possible and which his existence requires.
“Since man’s character is the product of his premises, I had to define and present the kinds of premises and values that create the character of an ideal man and motivate his actions; which means that I had to define and present a rational code of ethics.
“Since man acts among and deals with other men, I had to present the kind of social system that makes it possible for ideal men to exist and to function—a free, productive, rational system which demands and rewards the best in every man, and which is, obviously, laissez-faire capitalism.”
*pause for laughter*
It’s ironic that laissez-faire capitalism is the reason our civilization is facing the specter of extinction, which is Megalopolis’ raison d'être. The glorification of unregulated capitalism is where Coppola and Rand seem to disagree, at least in part.
As the owner of a successful winery and self-financed filmmaker, Coppola is clearly a capitalist. Megalopolis is a one-hundred-twenty million dollar vanity project facilitated by his capitalist ventures. However, as a reflection of America, Megalopolis foregrounds the inequities of capitalism. As elites vie for power, the impoverished masses express their discontent in a collective fury that is harnessed and wielded by ambitious charlatans.
In Megalopolis, capitalism and the greed it inevitably spawns are not virtuous. They have contributed to society’s decline. This is not tantamount to Coppola disavowing capitalism. However, within the film, it is clear that laissez-faire capitalism has not resulted in an ideal world, nor does it position the “ideal man” to effectuate positive change. Ceasar has the potential to improve Megalopolis’ world, but how exactly he would do so is left ambiguous. It’s noteworthy and no accident.
For all of Megalopolis’ talk of hope and idealism, its crumbling world is built upon a nihilism that threatens to subsume society. Amid a crisis of confidence, Megalopolis’ political system flounders as mobs of dissatisfied citizens threaten to revoke their ‘consent of the governed.’ Its hedonistic elites, insulated from the masses, are indifferent to the decline, decay, and destruction surrounding them.
Megalopolis is a society on the brink of surrender. It is a tinderbox that, with a spark, is ready to burn to the ground. Its world is bleak, and its conception of humanity is dismal (albeit not irredeemable), contrasting Rand’s views of human nature in interesting ways.
Coppola’s Contradictions
Continuing her explanation of intent, Rand asserts:
“It is not in the nature of man—nor of any living entity—to start out by giving up, by spitting in one’s own face and damning existence; that requires a process of corruption whose rapidity differs from man to man. Some give up at the first touch of pressure; some sell out; some run down by imperceptible degrees and lose their fire, never knowing when or how they lost it … all of these vanish in the vast swamp of their elders who tell them persistently that maturity consists of abandoning one’s mind; security, of abandoning one’s values; practicality, of losing self-esteem.”
Here is where the corrupt city of Megalopolis, with its ideal man mired in imperfections, begins to express a confusing ambivalence. Coppola’s film points to problems but, unlike Rand’s work, only notionally presents solutions without clarity or conviction.
Instead, Megalopolis languishes in contradictory notions about leadership that “facilitate a dialogue” without committing to a single point of view. According to Megalopolis, the hallmark of utopia is the dialogue itself, not leadership solutions that will improve the quality of life.
Coppola’s film invokes Marcus Aurelius, a Roman philosopher-king and paragon of philosophical stoicism, to highlight the contradictions of “ideal” leadership. His philosophy emphasizes reason and virtue to achieve a “blessed” society. His ideas comport with, and likely influenced, Rand’s objectivist school of thought.
Three quotes within Megalopolis, presented in succession, contain contradictory sentiments that, situated alongside Rand’s philosophical assertions, undermine Objectivism’s coherence and the concrete certainty of her worldview.
These quotes arise during a discussion between Ceasar, Mayor Cicero, and his daughter Julia. At the beginning of the film, Julia begins training under Ceasar’s tutelage. In an act of romantic defiance, Julia and Ceasar fall madly in love and conceive a child.
Late in the film, Ceasar and Mayor Cicero, a foe turned into family, discuss the dangers of idealism. He asserts that Ceasar’s utopian ideas inevitably lead to dystopian outcomes.
In an attempt to undermine Ceasar and drive a wedge between him and Julia, Cicero prompts his daughter to recite a quote from Marcus Aurelius’ writings to bolster his argument against Ceasar.
Julia recites the following:
“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.”
As an advocate for the status quo, Mayor Cicero's proffered wisdom arises, in the words of Ayn Rand, from the “vast swamp of… elders who tell [the uncorrupted] persistently that maturity consists of abandoning one’s mind; security, of abandoning one’s values; practicality, of losing self-esteem.”
Rand continues her description of human nature:
“…few hold on and move on, knowing that that fire is not to be betrayed, learning how to give it shape, purpose and reality. But whatever their future, at the dawn of their lives, men seek a noble vision of man’s nature and of life’s potential.”
Julia, a free-thinking individual liberated from her father’s worldview, recites two additional Aurelius quotes.
These additional quotes are meant to demonstrate Julia’s philosophical prowess and intellectual freedom. Undermining her father’s conventional wisdom, Julia throws her support behind Ceasar, a man who still seeks “a noble vision of man’s nature and of life’s potential,” reciting:
“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.”
The second quote suggests that Mayor Cicero's misguided attempts to remain in power have aligned him with the majority and landed among the “ranks of the insane,” who have deluded themselves into thinking the status quo remains tenable.
Towards the end of her 1968 introduction, Rand claims:
“…one of the cardinal reasons of The Fountainhead’s lasting appeal… is a confirmation of the spirit of youth, proclaiming man’s glory, showing how much is possible.”
On this point, Coppola’s Megalopolis seems to openly doubt the validity of The Fountainhead’s purported reason for its enduring appeal. As discussed above, Megalopolis is a film that reveals the imperfection of its “ideal man,” positioning him as the ideal leader without articulating a coherent vision or displaying genuine conviction. Its undercurrents of nihilism and hopelessness cast doubt on the youthful Ceasar’s ability to achieve much of anything.
By the film’s conclusion, all we know for certain is that Ceasar has built a glittering eyesore where there once existed affordable housing. He’s also installed motorized walkways, commonly found in airports, in Central Park. In Ceasar’s utopia, a walk through the park is a thing of the past! In Megalopolis’ utopia, the city’s denizens can glide on a beam of golden light through Central Park and into a better, brighter future whose specifics remain entirely unclear.
Rand concludes:
“It does not matter that only a few in each generation will grasp and achieve the full reality of man’s proper stature—and that the rest will betray it. It is those few that move the world and give life its meaning—and it is those few that I have always sought to address. The rest are no concern of mine; it is not me or The Fountainhead that they will betray: it is their own souls.”
Ayn Rand has no interest in the plebians and infidels that simply don’t get it. Their ignorance will be their damnation. Yet, within her stated philosophy, there always exists the potential for an individual’s intellectual and philosophical salvation. You need only adopt Ayn Rand’s worldview and, in so doing, enlighten your soul! Subscribing to her system of belief has the power to overhaul your entire life.
Or, as Julia puts it in her third and final quote from Marcus Aurelius:
“Our life is what our thoughts make it.”
It is a vague, arguably insubstantial assertion that proposes that our thoughts create our reality and that how we think determines how we comprehend the world around us.
Like Megalopolis, the sentiment is obviously profound and profoundly obvious.
The Sum of Megalopolis’ Parts
It’s not that Megalopolis is less than the sum of its parts; rather, its parts are so disparate that they cannot cohere into a summation. As a philosophical text, it rambles without saying much. The meaning you extrapolate from Megalopolis is highly variable, depending on your willingness to wade through a sprawling, terrible film on the supposition that Coppola actually has something of substance to say.
Megalopolis is like a Rorschach test, designed to prompt you to combine associations, interpret, and discern what you see. The act of interpretation is the point.
What you see is more important than what’s actually there because what’s actually there is just a blob lacking intrinsic meaning.
I don’t believe Megalopolis has a coherent message or singular point. You can ponder it for hours, straining to see meaning and pull a coherent worldview into focus.
Finding concrete meaning in Megalopolis is like seeing the face of Jesus on a piece of bread you’ve toasted. It’s probably hallucinatory, but it would be difficult to convince you of that fact.
As I wrote in my initial review, “The film waffles on about time, love, and human nature. It occasionally poses intriguing questions like, ‘Is this society… the only one that's available to us?’
“It’s a fable that refuses to answer its own questions, instead asserting that ‘when we ask these questions, when there's a dialogue about them, that basically is a utopia.’”
Insofar as Megalopolis is a fable, it is a failure. However, perhaps the contours of its failure can be better understood when considered alongside the even more insufferable works of Ayn Rand, whose lofty philosophical musings were also distilled into uncompelling artistic failures.
My Post-Film Utopian Dialogue
When Megalopolis ended, there was an eruption of rapturous applause steeped in irony and derision. One of the biggest laughs came right before the end credits when Coppola dedicated the film to his wife, Eleanor, who passed earlier this year. There was a mean-spiritedness to our collective derision that is, unfortunately, perfectly suited to Megalopolis. The audience’s second-hand embarrassment ultimately negated Coppola’s loving dedication.
Our laughter arose from genuine incredulity: that Eleanor Coppola deserved better than Megalopolis and that Francis Ford Coppola ought to be positioned to deliver a better film, more worthy of memorializing the love of his life.
I laughed along, a fact I’m not proud of, but, in my defense, Megalopolis broke me.
It took me a while to acclimate to the film. At first, I strained to hear the dialogue being drowned out by mockery. As time passed, it became evident that Megalopolis wasn’t an intellectual titan. It was so far from what I expected. However, as my disappointment gave way to disbelief, I could only resign to the giggles. By the time Ceasar gets shot in the face by a twelve-year-old, I howled with laughter.
Despite being a terrible movie, seeing Megalopolis in a crowded theater proved to be a wonderful viewing experience. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to recommend you do the same since Megalopolis’ box office numbers suggest you’ll be hard-pressed to find enough willing viewers to fill a single theater.
I saw the film with my boyfriend, a scholar of religious studies. He wasn’t laughing along with us. Our post-film discussion revealed that Megalopolis was the most polarizing film we had ever seen together. I gave the film one star, and he gave it five.
We both enjoyed the film but experienced it very differently. We agreed that Megalopolis was more interesting as an intellectual exercise than a cinematic viewing experience, and in that regard, we agreed Megalopolis was not a good film.
I asked if his praise of the movie was ironic.
No, he said, it was not.
So, did he really take Megalopolis seriously?
No, not really.
Through its absurdity, he felt that the film was “making a mockery of us.” As a student of semiotics, he felt that the vexatious maximalism was a feature, not a bug, which forces viewers to lean in if they have any hope of making meaning out of the film's dizzying barrage of symbols and references.
I attempted to get on a similar intellectual frequency, asking, “What are we to make of the numerous references to other stories and fables? When Julia first enters Ceasar’s office, why is she dressed like Little Red Riding Hood? Does that imply Ceasar is the Big Bad Wolf?”
“I thought Julia looked like a handmaid from A Handmaid’s Tale,” he replied, subverting my interpretation of that particular symbol and tapping into an entirely different fable.
“The confusion is a manifestation of Coppola’s distress,” he elaborated, “The distance between the reality we know and the over-the-top absurdity we see onscreen is so vast that it brings semiotics to its breaking point.”
“But if the signs and signifiers are so muddled, what does it all mean?”
His response was simple: “We’re just supposed to play with it.”
And so we did, asking each other the questions that evidently epitomize Coppola’s hazy, ill-defined conception of utopia.
Where my boyfriend saw a puzzle of sorts, I saw an incoherent collage. It’s not that Megalopolis is less than the sum of its parts; rather, its parts are so disparate that they cannot cohere into a summation.
A Bit of ‘The Bard’
At the beginning of the film, Ceasar enters a town meeting of sorts, introducing himself with a complete recitation of Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” speech. At the time, I thought that Ceasar, like Hamlet, was teetering on the brink of self-destruction. In retrospect, I don’t know why the monologue from Hamlet was included.
After the credits rolled and I’d had my “utopian discussion,” Megalopolis brought to mind a different soliloquy from another of Shakespeare’s tragedies, Macbeth.
After Macbeth’s untempered ambition culminates in a successful plot to depose the king, now, with the crown atop his head, he realizes that his pursuit was folly. His monumental success rings hollow.
Like Hamlet, he is at the end of his rope when he says:
“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more…”
Ultimately, this seems a more fitting comparison for Coppola, who, against all odds, has realized his passion project before being forced to exit life’s stage.
I do not know if the audience’s response makes Coppola’s “achievement” ring hollow.
Of the film itself, I can confidently say that:
“[Megalopolis] is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
With that, I must move on. Goodbye, Megalopolis. Thanks for the laughs.