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Legendary director Francis Ford Coppola fielded questions at the 77th Cannes Film Festival's press conference about his latest film, Megalopolis, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Megalopolis had its world premiere at the fest, in competition, Thursday night.
Coppola spent decades and $120 million of his own money to make his sci-fi epic. Megalopolis' production was on the wrong side of disorganized. Certain creative talents were either fired or ended up quitting. There were reports about how the director was accused of making unwanted advances, such as kissing actresses.
Do you have $120 million laying around?
While Coppola wasn't made to address these questions, he talked about the film's massive budget. He brushed aside a question regarding how his use of his own money into the film would end up hurting the financial legacy he would leave his children.
“My children, without exception, have wonderful careers without a fortune. We are fine. It doesn't matter. All of you here: The money doesn't matter. What is important are the friends. A friend will never let you down. The money may evaporate,” he said.
The director was flanked by family members and the film's stars (who he said is family to him): Roman Coppola, Adam Driver, Nathalie Emmanuel, Giancarlo Esposito, Laurence Fishburne, Aubrey Plaza, Talia Shire and Jon Voight.
Esposito, who played Megalopolis' New Rome mayor, said that during the movie, he often didn't know “what was going to happen,” or where Coppola would take take the film. However, when he watched it for the first time during its Cannes premiere, “all of a sudden I got it: I'm not supposed to know anything, I'm not supposed to know anything and neither is Francis.”
“I have hope for our world because of you,” the actor addressed the filmmaker.
Rebellious and exciting filmmaking
Driver, the film's lead, playing Cesar Catalina, was part of the editing process, according to Coppola. The actor said that the production “felt like experimental theatre, which made it feel rebellious and exciting.”
He continued that he didn't think “we will ever see something that imaginative on that scale again. I think it is a one-of-a-kind film…I think it will get richer and richer historically.”
The director stated, “Our politics has taken us to the point where we might lose our republic. It's not the politicians who are going to be the answer. I feel it's the artists of America. My dream, my hope is that it's the artists of our country who are going to shine the light on.”
Megalopolis on IMAX
The film still doesn't have a US distributor, however, it already has a guaranteed IMAX release and has been sold to several European territories. Coppola screened the film to a few American studio heads in March, but it still doesn't have a buyer.
He said, “The studios are in great debt and their job is not so much to make movies as to pay their debt obligations.” The filmmaker suggested that tech companies such as Apple, Amazon and Microsoft, “with plenty of money” may be the future, and that the existing studios “might not be here in the future.”
The last time Coppola had a film in competition in Cannes, it was 1979's Apocalypse Now, 45 years ago. He's 85 years old now, and according to the South China Morning Post, he's number eight of 12 of the richest directors, with a net worth of $400 million. If he had indeed poured $120 million of his own money into Megalopolis, that's 30% of his personal wealth.
His two living children, Roman and Sofia, are both successful in their own right. Roman is the president of American Zoetrope, a film company and the founder and owner of the commercial and music video production company, The Directors Bureau. Sofia is an Academy Award-winning director. I don't think they need their father's money.
Coppola concluded, “When I died, I got to do this. I got to see my daughter win an Oscar, and I got to make wine and I got to make all the movies I wanted to make. And I'm going to be so busy thinking about what I got to do that when I die I won't notice it.”
