Megadoc

In the fall of 1998, I had breakfast in New York City with Francis Ford Coppola. The occasion was this: he had called my boss, the editor-in-chief of Premiere magazine, requesting a meeting. Coppola held forth on how unfairly Premiere had treated him over the years, then mellowed to share he was working on a script for a dream project, a vision on urban civilization called “Megalopolis.” That was a quarter-century ago. Last year, Coppola unveiled his completed “Megalopolis,” a film he spent around $120 million of his own money on, which was met with widespread confusion by critics and audiences. It's a rare glimpse into the struggles and passions of a legendary filmmaker chasing his artistic vision against all odds.