Francis Ford Coppola Releases a “Weirder Cut” of Megalopolis
According to CinemaDrame news agency, A year ago, Francis Ford Coppola took his epic sci-fi film Megalopolis to the Cannes Film Festival to tell the story of an idealistic architect and a corrupt politician trying to rebuild a post-apocalyptic city. Despite its star-studded cast, the film neither succeeded at the box office nor received positive reviews.
The director of The Godfather and Apocalypse Now personally financed Megalopolis with a $120 million budget to retain ownership of the film and its final cut. After Cannes, Megalopolis remained without an American distributor for several weeks until Lionsgate stepped in and gave it a limited release with a 138-minute version. The film earned over $7 million before Lionsgate quickly ended its theatrical run. Coppola opposed releasing Megalopolis on digital platforms or Blu-ray discs, and it is not even available for rental on Amazon.
This 85-year-old filmmaker has now partnered with Live Nation to take a different approach to distributing his film. He has rented several major theaters across the United States and plans to hold Q&A sessions following screenings of Megalopolis.
On Monday night in New Jersey, Coppola held the premiere event where he delivered a 68-minute speech. He spoke on various topics, including the new cut of Megalopolis, claiming that a “weirder” version featuring deleted dreamlike scenes is on the way: “It was even weirder. I own the film, I can do whatever I want with it.”
Tickets for these events have mostly sold out, with only a few seats remaining for upcoming screenings in Denver, Dallas, and San Francisco.
