Francis Ford Coppola has made some of the most acclaimed films in cinema history — and now, on the eve of his 80th birthday, he’s ready to put all of his talent, knowledge and resources toward making the science fiction movie of his dreams.
“I plan this year to begin my longstanding ambition to make a major work utilising all I have learned during my long career, beginning at age 16 doing theatre, and that will be an epic on a grand scale, which I’ve titled Megalopolis,” Coppola told Deadline this week.
“It is unusual; it will be a production on a grand scale with a large cast. It makes use of all of my years of trying films in different styles and types culminating in what I think is my own voice and aspiration. It is not within the mainstream of what is produced now, but I am intending and wishing and in fact encouraged, to begin production this year.”
Coppola has been toying with the idea for Megalopolis since the early ‘80s. The story is about an ambitious architect who hopes to redesign New York City into a modern utopia, only to be stifled by a conservative mayor.
Coppola tried to make the project almost 20 years ago and even shot some second unit footage. However, after the tragic events of 11 September 2001, he decided to stop because the subject matter was a little too close to home.
According to Deadline, Coppola has a script ready to go and has begun talking to possible stars, including Jude Law. This is exciting news, because the man behind The Godfather, Apocalypse Now, and The Conversation hasn’t directed a feature film since 2011’s Twixt, a film notorious for having one of the weirdest Hall H panels in Comic-Con history and for being one of the first films to star Alden Ehrenreich, better known now as the young Han Solo.
If Coppola can pull off this project, though, fans will be able to cross Megalopolis off a long list of never-completed passion projects from visionary directors, such as Stanley Kubrick’s Napoleon biopic or Guillermo del Toro’s In the Mountains of Madness.
(h/t The Film Stage, who has even more information on the project.)