Francis Ford Coppola chalks Megalopolis trailer debacle up as an oopsie
The filmmaker isn't sure what happened with the definitely fake, maybe AI-generated quotes in the film's last trailer
Photo: Robert Okine/Getty Images for Lionsgate
When a filmmaker spends 40-odd years toiling over a single project, you might assume that they would get extra neurotic about making sure every last detail goes according to plan as the actual release date gets closer. Under these circumstances, however, Francis Ford Coppola is remarkably chill about that whole “trailer with fake and potentially AI-generated quotes” debacle.
If you need a refresher, Lionsgate released a trailer for Megalopolis last month that would have been clever if it was, you know, real. “True genius is often misunderstood,” a voiceover from Lawrence Fishburne opened the since-pulled clip, which included a number of negative quotes from real critics about Coppola’s past work (the implication being that Megalopolis might be similarly ahead of its time). The only problem was that none of the critics had actually written any of it, with some speculating that the quotes were generated on ChatGPT or a similar AI platform. Lionsgate swiftly issued an apology and fired the marketing consultant responsible. An updated, AI-free trailer was released last week.
Speaking to Entertainment Tonight about the whole snafu for the first time, Coppola said, “I’m the one who said there were bad reviews, but I don’t know… It was a mistake, an accident, I’m not sure what happened.” Again, remarkably chill for a man who sold off his vineyards to make this movie happen. Then again, the whole trailer thing was kind of small potatoes compared to some of the other controversies surrounding this movie’s rollout. For years now, we’ve been reading reports of chaos on the Megalopolis set including crews quitting, ballooning budgets, and the fact that no one wanted to distribute it for a long time. More recently, extras have alleged that the director tried to kiss several women while filming to “get them in the mood” without their consent. This led to a back-and-forth between media outlets and different witnesses, all of which the director chalked up to the press “just trying to damage the picture” in an interview last month.
The film will finally be released to the public September 27, at long last freeing Adam Driver’s character from whatever time loop he’s stuck in.