Space Invader: Does Art Have to Be Good?
Space Invader: Does Art Have to Be Good?
'Megalopolis' didn't break the bank, but did it break our brains?
The Tip Sheet has spun off. Introducing Space Invaders, a newsletter about movies and pop culture that invades this space on Saturday. Arrives irregularly during this pilot phase.
So much of what passes for film criticism these days hinges on the reviewer’s desire to set the discourse and not having any real engagement with the material as presented. Instant reactions, spoiler reviews, “the ending explained”, Rotten Tomatoes, all these things have reduced a film review to nothing more than an autopsy. We don’t watch movies; we dissect them and categorize all the parts.
The instant reaction to Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis was that it sucks, some went as far as to say that it was the worst movie they’ve even seen! Even before seeing Megalopolis for myself, I found it hard to believe that it was the “worst movie” ever, and like a lot of people online, I responded to that tag by thinking, “You’ve got to see more movies.” But fundamental to this pass/fail dichotomy of film criticism is this idea that you can only engage with art if it satisfies you emotionally; it must meet all of your expectations to succeed.
On cue, Variety published an article this week that might explain the crux of the problem: A risk averse studio system looking for a sure thing that doesn’t rock the boat…
“Those who did talk with Variety all agreed that the best defense is to avoid provoking fandoms in the first place. In addition to standard focus group testing, studios will assemble a specialized cluster of superfans to assess possible marketing materials for a major franchise project.”
Adam B. Vary’s piece was an exploration of toxic fandoms, how online trolls who don’t like equal representation, or plot developments that contravene well-established head canon, can scuttle the financial ambitions of a major piece of studio I.P. like the recently cancelled Star Wars series The Acolyte or the superhero flick The Marvels. The reaction from studios, it seems, is not to block out the trolls and concentrate on making something creative fulfilling, it’s to let the trolls into the creative process to inoculate a project from future attacks.
If this seems counterintuitive, you’re right.
The most famous recent example is Star Wars, where the massively negative online reaction to The Last Jedi prompted a creative reset in The Rise of Skywalker which retconned important character developments to bring the story in line with fan expectations. The result ended up appealing to no one in particular, with fans and critics of The Last Jedi both united in their collective shrug of indifference to the film, which still made a billion dollars but notably $300 million less than The Last Jedi.
The same year Last Jedi came out, another franchise film tried to shake off outsized fan expectations. Justice League was released that November after months and months of reports about behind the scenes turmoil that were mostly about resetting the film’s tone.
Warner Bros. wanted their DC heroes to have a very Marvel-like joie de vivre, which was not what Zack Snyder was going for with his Baroque vision and deep-seeded cynicism about superheroes, especially the one wearing the big, red ‘S’. Justice League was completed by Avengers director Joss Whedon, and the finished film was a mismatching patchwork of tones and styles, thoroughly imperfect but notably less dour than Snyder’s Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice. In 2021, Warners released Snyder’s completed vision of Justice League, which was well-received by many critics, including myself, not necessarily became his movie is better but because, if nothing else, it’s a unified vision made by a singular artist.
And so is Megalopolis. Coppola has been working on this project since shortly after the release of Apocalypse Now in 1979, and perhaps got the closest to making it 2001. He paused after the terrorist attacks of September 11 when making a movie about how politics and corruption get in the way of rebuilding New York after a disaster might have seemed inappropriate. (Having said that, politics and corruption did get in way of the redevelopment of the World Trade Center site, and there’s a whole documentary called 16 Acres about that if you’re interested.)
For the last few years, it seemed like Megalopolis would go down in history with Stanley Kubrick’s Napoleon, the last great project that a master filmmaker was never able to realize. But Coppola was finally able to realize it! That alone should be cause for celebration because no matter how you feel about it, Megalopolis is a unique film with a specific voice and point of view that wouldn’t exist without the filmmaker behind it.
But is Megalopolis good?
Define good. There are some interesting things in it, some interesting choices. There is some value in exploring the ideas around the self-made barriers that prevent us from getting to a better society. There’s some value in learning the lessons from the decline of one empire about how to navigate the decline of another. There is some value in collecting a bunch of great actors – some problematic – to bring such a meticulous and complex world to life.
But is Megalopolis good?
It does fall comfortably in the Coppola oeuvre and the Great Man Theory. In most of his movies, there’s ideas about how one is born to power and the ways their experience guides the use of that power, often to disastrous ends even as the Great Man tries diligently to avoid disaster. It’s interesting that Coppola still feels enamoured with the idea of the Great Man because recent events have shown us that the Great Man, in real life, is often self-serving, self-obsessed, and not nearly as clever as his hype has made us think he is.
But is Megalopolis good?
I don’t know.
I know I wasn’t bored. I know that I was equally fascinated and confounded by Coppola’s choices. For instance, we’re never told what Megalopolis is, why it’s an improvement on current city planning, or why it’s the key to a more utopian vision of society dreamed by Adam Driver’s architect character Cesar Catilina. We’re never told how megalon - the magical substance that makes Catilina’s vision possible - works, and we’re never told how he came up with it. He also has the magical ability to stop time. Why? We’re never told. Is Cesar Catilina a wizard? I think we have to assume he is.
There’s a fine line sometimes between overexplaining and treating your audience like they’re dumb and under-explaining and treating your audience like they’re smart. Sometimes, you’re aiming for the latter and you end up with a movie where you have to read the Wikipedia page afterwards just to check your visual comprehension skills. Megalopolis is like that, but I’m not sure that’s a failure. If you’re still engaging with a movie after it ends, how can that not be read as a success? Art doesn’t only exist in that period when you’re looking directly at it, otherwise why would you ever go back?
At issue is the increasing relevance we attach to profit. Megalopolis is unsuccessful because it opened in sixth place at the box office, which makes a couple of weird assumptions, the most obvious one being the belief that a movie has no life after opening weekend. There’s a long line of movies that bombed during their initial theatrical release that have become classics enjoyed by generations of viewers. Think about The Wizard of Oz, It’s a Wonderful Life and The Shawshank Redemption.
The emphasis on money is also strange because it’s not your money at stake, and this is especially true in the case of Megalopolis where Coppola funded it himself. What do you care what a rich guy does with his money? Elon Musk (another would be Great Man) spent $44 million to flush an entire business down the toilet, at least Coppola gave us a movie that’s interesting to talk about for a fraction of the cost.
So is Megalopolis good? Maybe that’s beside the point. Maybe there’s more to talking about a movie that whether or not it fits comfortably into a one of two very strict buckets.
You can now see Megalopolis in a theatre near you.
The Bookshelf:
The Lady in the Van (Sat-Sun, Tues-Wed)
Lee
Starting Thursday - The Apprentice
Galaxy Cinemas – Woodlawn:
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
Daddy’s Head (Tues)
The Forest Hills (Sun, Tues-Thurs)
Joker: Folie à Deux
Look Back (Sun-Mon)
Megalopolis (thru Wed)
Mobile Suit Gundam (Sun)
My Old Ass
Shrek 2 (Sat)
Speak No Evil (thru Wed)
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre – 50th Anniversary
Transformers One
The Wild. Robot
White Bird
Starting Thursday - My Hero Academia: You’re Next, Saturday Night
Galaxy Cinemas – Clair:
Temporarily closed due to flood damage.
Mustang Drive-In (open weekends):
Joker: Folie à Deux (early show)
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (late show)
Princess Cinemas – Twin:
Lee
Megalopolis
The Outrun
The Substance
Starting Thursday - The Apprentice
Princess Cinemas – Original:
Daytime Revolution (Wed)
A Different Man
Eno (Thurs)
A Nightmare on Elm Street – 40th Anniversary (Sat, Wed)
Starting Friday - The Woman of the Hour
Apollo Cinema:
Devara: Part 1 (Sat-Mon)
Eno (Tues)
Juno (Wed)
A Nightmare on Elm Street – 40th Anniversary (Sat)
The Phantom of the Opera – 2004 (Fri)
Ringu (Sun)
The Substance (Sat-Tues)
An Unfinished Journey (Sun)
Vettaiyan (Wed, Fri)
Weathering With You (Thurs)
This week on End Credits, Peter Salmon co-hosts as we head back to Gotham City for another go round with the Clown Prince of Crime and his new special lady friend. We’re going to go crazy with Joker: Folie à Deux, and if that’s not enough Joker for you we’re going to look at the seven actors that have all played the character on the big screen and rank them all from best to worst.
And finally, feel free to reach out to me by email at adamadonaldson [at] gmail [dot] com, or find me on Facebook, Twitter, and, of course, GuelphPolitico.ca!
