Every Francis Ford Coppola Film Ranked From Worst to Best
Today marks the long-awaited arrival of “Megalopolis,” legendary director Francis Ford Coppola’s first film in 13 years. But the process of getting the experimental epic, about a dreamlike version of New York City where an architect develops the ability to stop time, has been a project over forty years in the making, after Coppola dreamed up the initial idea towards the end of production on “Apocalypse Now” in 1977. Spending years directing work-for-hire films like “Jack” and “The Rainmaker” to fund the ambitious project, a fusion of science fiction with operatic grandeur, Coppola planned to make the movie in 2001, shooting hours of test footage before production halted at least partly due to 9/11.
The day before Coppola’s 80th birthday in 2019, the director announced that the project had been reborn. But without any companies willing to spend the money to finance and distribute the epic, Coppola was forced to take it on himself, selling part of his winery business to fund the movie to the tune of $120 million. For a long time, even as the movie began production with a starry cast headed by Adam Driver, it was unclear whether or not “Megalopolis” would ever find distribution. It took until June 17, well after the film first screened, for Lionsgate to acquire the movie and set it for a big, bold IMAX release.
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In most cases, an auteur like Coppola getting to put out a big-budget, aggressively ambitious and personal project like “Megalopolis” would be seen as a celebratory moment. And yet, “Megalopolis” comes into theaters with so much chaos surrounding it that it doesn’t really feel like an unqualified triumph. The movie made its grand debut at the Cannes Film Festival, where reviews were mixed and incredulous about whether the gonzo film could find a life outside of the Croisette.
More troubling, there are the rumors about Coppola’s poor leadership on the project, particularly allegations that the director would kiss female extras on set without consent, which has spiraled into a lawsuit from one extra alleging civil assault, civil battery, and negligent failure to prevent sexual harassment. Coppola has responded by filing a libel lawsuit against the publication Variety and two editors who reported on the allegations. It’s a messy, uncomfortable situation that seems destined to cast a pall over the film itself — the inclusion of two men, Shia LaBeouf and Dustin Hoffman, with sexual misconduct allegations of their own in the cast doesn’t help when you try to separate “Megalopolis” from the context it was created in.
With all this baggage, now is somewhat ironically a complicated time to be celebrating Coppola. Still, regardless of the morality of the man himself, it’s hard to deny the work he’s produced and the seismic effects it has had on Hollywood. Wildly ambitious almost to his detriment (“Megalopolis” is not Coppola’s first troubled production, by a long shot), the director is best known for the American classics that are the first two “Godfather” films, which define the mafia genre for many. But at his heart, and despite the many mainstream films he’s made, Coppola is an experimenter, a cinematic outsider who toys with weird, ambitious ideas that kill when they’re executed well and fizzle when they aren’t.
It’s his relentlessness as a filmmaker that’s lead to cinematic perfection like his ’70s run; it’s also that ambition that’s lead to famous flops like “One From the Heart” or failures like “Youth Without Youth.” Some of Coppola’s reviled films have been reclaimed and some…not so much. And yet, that’s what makes Coppola such a fascinating director, the mix of films that feel universal and thoroughly absorbed by our culture and the films that were made for basically nobody except the man himself.
Now that “Megalopolis” is is theaters for the world to see, it’s time to take stock of Coppola’s messy, beautiful, singular filmography. Read on for all 23 Francis Ford Coppola movies, ranked.
With editorial contributions from Christian Blauvelt, Christian Zilko, Jim Hemphill, Harrison Richlin, Tony Maglio, and David Ehrlich.
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