Movie Reviews

Megalopolis (2024) – Movie Review

Published

2 years ago

September 29, 2024

Megalopolis, 2024.

Written and Directed by Francis Ford Coppola.
Starring Adam Driver, Nathalie Emmanuel, Giancarlo Esposito, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Voight, Jason Schwartzman, Talia Shire, Grace VanderWaal, Laurence Fishburne, Kathryn Hunter, Dustin Hoffman, James Remar, Chloe Fineman, Isabelle Kusman, D.B. Sweeney, Haley Sims, Balthazar Getty, Bailey Ives, Adams Bellouis, Madeleine Gardella, and Romy Mars.

SYNOPSIS:

The city of New Rome is the main conflict between Cesar Catilina, a brilliant artist in favor of a utopian future, and the greedy mayor Franklyn Cicero. Between them is Julia Cicero, her loyalty divided between her father and her beloved.

Somewhere buried underneath the bluntly narrated New Rome parallels to America’s current downward spiral, the family scheming, betrayals, sociopolitical commentary, endless philosophical musings quoting other famous works and speeches that never quite stick or mean much, sci-fi concepts such as a biological building material dubbed Megalon, the earnest desire to build a promising future and preserve crucial aspects of the present and past, and an ensemble where everyone seems to think they are in a new movie from scene to scene, is a good film within legendary writer/director Francis Ford Coppola’s decades-in-development-hell passion project Megalopolis.

These haphazard elements come together for a final scene that is sincerely moving. The preceding 2 hours and 10 minutes is an onslaught of ideas presented and ambitious set pieces (ranging from living, breathing, suffering statues to extravagant Roman-inspired weddings with modern twists such as wrestling matches replacing gladiatorial combat to futuristic envisionings of a better world) carrying an impressive, transfixing visual language (courtesy of cinematography from previous Francis Ford Coppola collaborator Mihai Malaimare Jr) that ensures even if viewers are flabbergasted at how disjointed and unwieldy the narrative is, it is undeniably hypnotic and striking to absorb.

The question then becomes, does that mean anything if the film is ambitious to a crippling fault and a structural disaster? An early scene sees New Rome Chairman of the Design Authority/architect Cesar Catalina (Adam Driver, who is either miraculously on Francis Ford Coppola’s wavelength or so locked into his distinct take on the character that, if nothing else, it’s a memorable performance for right and wrong reasons) stopping time during the demolition of a building. The reason doesn’t matter, but at times, Megalopolis is similarly catastrophically crumbling (under the weight of its gigantic audacity) that one wishes they too could say “time… stop!”, take a breather, and digest what’s happening for a moment.

By the way, yes, Cesar can stop time. However, it’s an ability that plays more into characterization than anything plot-specific, which might be why it’s one of the few and far between elements that work here. Not only is he a man who can stop time, but he is also paranoid that there isn’t enough time to accomplish his ambitious dream of building a futuristic utopia called Megalopolis. There is also something about the idea of someone who can stop time yet still feels as if they don’t have enough, which is trippy and compelling.

Cesar is opposed by the polarizing Mayor Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito), who is less concerned about the future and more interested in doing something about the present. Yet, he mostly appears to be selling the usual political lies to keep up public trust. However, that support is gradually fading and soon transitions into full-blown riots (with other factors coming into play.) As such, he is determined to do whatever he can to put up a roadblock for Cesar, even if it means slandering his public image as possibly having murdered his wife since the body was never recovered. Mayor Cicero’s socialite daughter Julia (Nathalie Emmanuel) attempts to fool Cesar in disguise and gather some intel (one of the film’s most unintentionally hilarious scenes, and one that is inexplicably being used to market the theatrical run), which is easily seen through and gets her belittled in such a manner that, to be a fly on the wall while everyone was working through the performances would have been a treat.

Nevertheless, romance eventually develops and becomes the film’s heart, and it probably should have been a more significant focus. Instead, Megalopolis is caught up in backstabbing wealthy relatives of Cesar, including a billionaire bank owner played by Jon Voight (he looks seriously confused and not in a funny way, but the concerning late-career Bruce Willis way where there turned out to be a neurological diagnosis in play), a power-hungry cousin (Shia LaBeouf) willing to doublecross anyone, and Cesar’s former mistress and gossip-obsessed newscaster Platinum Wow (Aubrey Plaza delivering the most consistent performance, and a fittingly crudely nutty one at that even if the character comes across as a misguided, uneasy helping of rampant misogyny from the film’s controversial filmmaker.)

The in-house scheming and drama between them take away from a relatively moving romantic subplot between Cesar and Julia, even if there still isn’t any real character development happening. It more comes down to a feeling radiating from the screen. Considering that aspects of Cesar’s egotistical personality and humiliating slander are on full display, it also doesn’t feel out of the realm of possibility that Francis Ford Coppola is throwing up a version of himself on screen (a theory more credible considering the ending credits dedicate the film to his deceased wife). Francis Ford Coppola’s call to action to build a better world with updated principles is admirable and even something some people need to hear, but one wishes that he constructed a better movie out of it than Megalopolis.

Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★

Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd, or email me at MetalGearSolid719@gmail.com

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Movie Reviews

1986 Movie Reviews – Dangerously Close, Fire with Fire, Last Resort, and Short Circuit | The Nerdy

Published

4 hours ago

May 9, 2026

Press Room

1986 Movie Reviews – Dangerously Close, Fire with Fire, Last Resort, and Short Circuit | The Nerdy

by Sean P. Aune | May 9, 2026

Welcome to an exciting year-long project here at The Nerdy. 1986 was an exciting year for films giving us a lot of films that would go on to be beloved favorites and cult classics. It was also the start to a major shift in cultural and societal norms, and some of those still reverberate to this day.

We’re going to pick and choose which movies we hit, but right now the list stands at nearly four dozen.

Yes, we’re insane, but 1986 was that great of a year for film.

The articles will come out – in most cases – on the same day the films hit theaters in 1986 so that it is their true 40th anniversary. All films are also watched again for the purposes of these reviews and are not being done from memory. In some cases, it truly will be the first time we’ve seen them.

This time around, it’s May 9, 1986, and we’re off to see Dangerously Close, Fire with Fire, Last Resort, and Short Circuit.

Dangerously Close

I would love to tell you what the point of this film was, but I’m not sure it knew.

An elite school has turned into a magnet school, attracting some “undesirables,” so a group of students known as The Sentinels take up policing their school, but will they go too far?

The basic plot of the film is simple enough, but there is an oddball “twist” toward the end tht served no real purpose and somehow turns the whole thing into a murder-mystery. Mysteries only work when you know you’re supposed to be solving them, and not when you’re alerted to one existing with 15 minutes left.

Decent 80s music, some stylistic shots, absolutely no substance.

Fire with Fire

Oh wait… I may want to go back and watch Dangerously Close again over this one.

Joe Fisk (Craig Sheffer) is being held at a juvenile delinquent facility close a high-end all-girls Catholic school. One day while running through the forest as part of an exercise he spots Catholic schoolgirl Lisa Taylor (Virginia Madsen) and the two fall immediately in love because… reasons.

This film is just so incredibly lazy. The ‘love story’ really can just be chalked up to ‘hormones.’

Last Resort

Once again I am baffled how Charles Grodin kept getting work so much through out the 1980s.

George Lollar (Grodin) is a salesman in Chicago in need of a vacation. He loads up the family and takes them to Club Sand, which turns out to be a swingers resort as well as surrounded by barbed wire to keep rebels out.

There are a lot of talented people in this movie such as Phil Hartman and Megan Mullally, but the film lets them down at every turn with half-baked ideas of jokes. Supposedly, Grodin rewrote nearly the entire script and I think that explains a lot about how this film feels like unfinished ideas. It’s a Frankenstein monster of a script with half-complete ideas that feel like they are from completely different movies.

Short Circuit

Lets just get this out of the way: What in the world was Fisher Stevens doing?

NOVA Laboratory has come up with a new series of military robots called S.A.I.N.T. (Strategic Artificially Intelligent Nuclear Transport). Following a successful demonstration for the military, Five is struck by an electrical surge and finds itself needing ‘input.’ After inadvertently escaping the lab, it wands into the life of Stephanie Speck (Ally Sheedy), who cares for animals and takes Five in. Dr. Newton Crosby (Steve Guttenberg) is trying to get five back, while the security team wants to destroy it.

Overall, the film is thin, but harmless. The 80s did seem to love a ‘technology being used for the wrong reasons’ theme, and this falls into that camp. What is mind-blowing, however, is Stevens as Ben Jabituya, Crosby’s assistant. Not only is he wearing brown face, but he’s doing a horrible Indian accent and later reveals he was born and raised in the U.S.

His whole character is mystifying.

Honestly, a couple of decades ago I may have recommended this movie, but it’s a definite pass now just for being offensive.

1986 Movie Reviews will continue on May 16, 2026, with Sweet Liberty and Top Gun.

Movie Reviews

Movie Review: AFFECTION – Assignment X

Published

16 hours ago

May 9, 2026

Press Room

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: May 8th, 2026 / 08:34 PM

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Jessica Rothe, Joseph Cross, Julianna Layne
Writer: BT Meza
Director: BT Meza
Distributor: Brainstorm Media
Release Date: May 8, 2026

AFFECTION is an odd title for this tale. While it is about a number of topics and emotions, fondness isn’t one of them. Obsession, definitely. Love, possibly. The kind of general warm fellow feelings associated with “affection”? No.

There have been a lot of movies lately in which characters – mostly women – are grappling with false identities and/or false memories imposed upon them, mostly by men.

Let us stipulate that the protagonist (Jessica Rothe) in AFFECTION is not an android or in an artificial reality. However, we can tell something is way off from the opening sequence. A car is stalled on a tree-bordered highway. Rothe’s character is lying face down on the asphalt beside it, possibly dead.

But then the young woman rises, dragging a broken ankle. She experiences a full-body seizure. Fighting to recover, she sees oncoming headlights and tries to run, only to be hit by a car.

The woman wakes up in a bed she doesn’t recognize, next to a man (Joseph Cross) she likewise is sure she’s never seen before. One big confrontation later, the man says his name is Bruce – and that the woman is his wife, Ellie.

Ellie insists that her name is Sarah Thompson, and she is married to someone else, with a son. When she sees her reflection in a mirror, she doesn’t relate to the face looking back at her.

Bruce counters that Ellie has a rare neurological condition that causes her to block out her waking life and believe her dreams are real. This is why they agreed, together, to move to this isolated house, without the kinds of interruptions that can hinder Ellie’s recovery.

The set-up is presented in a way where we share Ellie’s skepticism. But Ellie and Bruce’s little daughter Alice (Julianna Layne) immediately identifies Ellie as “Mommy!” Alice appears to be too young to be in on any kind of deception, so what is going on here?

AFFECTION eventually explains this via a helpful videotape, though it’s so convoluted that viewers watching on streaming may want to replay the sequence to make sure they understand the exposition.

Writer/director BT Meza musters a sense of menace and lurking weirdness, as well as making great use of his location.

We still have a lot of questions, many of which are still unanswered by the film’s end. It may not matter to the points AFFECTION is trying to make, but a better sense of exactly how all this started might help our investment.

As it is, despite a heroically versatile performance by Rothe, a credible and anguished turn by Cross and appealing work from Layne, we’re so busy trying to piece together what’s important and what’s not and how we’re supposed to feel about all of it that it can be hard to keep track of the action as it unfolds.

Agree or not, Meza’s arguments are lucid and illustrated clearly by AFFECTION’s events. However, the movie is structured in a way that becomes more frustrating as it goes. We comprehend it intellectually but can’t engage viscerally.

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Movie Reviews

8News Reel Talk: ‘The Devil Wears Prada 2’ movie review

Published

1 day ago

May 8, 2026

Press Room

8News Reel Talk: ‘The Devil Wears Prada 2’ movie review

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — In this episode of 8News Reel Talk, digital producer Julia Broberg is joined by anchor Deanna Allbrittin and reporter Allison Williams to talk about “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”

The hosts gave their reviews and assigned the following star ratings:

Deanna: ★★★★.5

Allison: ★★★.25

Julia: ★★

To watch more livestreams and digital video content, head to the WRIC+ Originals page. You can also watch full on-demand videos on your smart TV using the WRIC+ app.