Lionsgate Pulls ‘Megalopolis’ Trailer That Had Fake Critic Quotes: ‘We Screwed Up’
Lionsgate is pulling the trailer for Francis Ford Coppola’s “Megalopolis” that was released this morning after the internet observed that quotes about older Coppola films like “The Godfather” and “Apocalypse Now” as attributed to film critics like Pauline Kael, Andrew Sarris, Roger Ebert, and more, all appeared to be fabricated.
“Lionsgate is immediately recalling our trailer for ‘Megalopolis,'” a spokesman for the company said in a statement provided to IndieWire. “We offer our sincere apologies to the critics involved and to Francis Ford Coppola and American Zoetrope for this inexcusable error in our vetting process. We screwed up. We are sorry.”
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From the moment Lionsgate released the first trailer for Francis Ford Coppola’s “Megalopolis” on Wednesday morning, online cinephiles began to suspect that something was amiss. The trailer attempted to lean into the film’s polarizing critical response by posting negative reviews from Coppola films like “The Godfather” and “Apocalypse Now” that are now universally accepted as classics. The only problem, many fans began to notice, was that many of the quotes attributed to the likes of Pauline Kael and Roger Ebert did not actually appear in those critics’ official reviews of the films.
For instance, Ebert was said to have described Coppola’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” as a “triumph of style over substance,” but the quote actually appears in Ebert’s review of 1989’s “Batman” directed by Tim Burton, while Ebert was among the positive voices writing about “Dracula.” As for Kael describing “The Godfather,” she allegedly called the film “diminished by its artsiness,” despite her being one of the biggest champions of the film and its sequel.
John Simon, Stanley Kauffmann, Vincent Canby, Owen Gleiberman, and Rex Reed were among the other critics quoted in the trailer that appeared to be inaccurate or faked.
Lionsgate is handling the distribution of “Megalopolis” in the U.S. and has planned a theatrical and IMAX release for September 27, as IndieWire first reported. But Coppola himself is bankrolling the marketing for the film, and it was announced just this week that Utopia, the distribution label run by Coppola’s nephew Robert Schwartzman, was also teaming up with Lionsgate on the marketing to provide “alternative marketing services.”
If creating a massive controversy over fake film critic quotes to generate buzz was by design, which appears to be not the case, mission accomplished.
“Megalopolis,” a $100 million+ production self-funded by Coppola, has been dogged with controversy both real and imagined from the beginning — fitting in a way for the auteur behind such hectic productions as “Apocalypse Now.” First there were reports that the film was a chaotic set, something Adam Driver personally came forward to deny. Once top film studio executives saw the film at a private showing in April, the plan was to land a major studio distributor before it would premiere at a festival, but reaction was mixed to the point that some doubted it would have much commercial appeal. It then played at Cannes to some raves and some glorious pans and no awards and went without a buyer for months despite a healthy market out of the festival.
More recently, a video surfaced that appeared to show Coppola touching and kissing scantily clad extras in a leaked video from a night club scene. One of the extras in the video came forward to defend the director and the conditions, while another continued to speak out to the press that she was “in shock” by being kissed by the director.
“Megalopolis” stars Driver alongside Giancarlo Esposito, Nathalie Emmanuel, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Chloe Fineman, Kathryn Hunter, Dustin Hoffman, D.B. Sweeney, Jason Schwartzman, Baily Ives, Grace Vanderwaal, and James Remar.
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