For Whom the Bell Tolls – Coppola sells watches after film flop, Costner fears for his country with a sea view

Those who pay for their own dreams can face ruin if things go badly. Francis Ford Coppola, one of the iconoclasts of the socially critical "New Hollywood," recently admitted to being bankrupt. He will therefore be parting with some of his watch collection. "I need some money to keep the ship afloat," the legendary "Godfather" director (86) announced via Zoom from Rome. Seven of his timepieces will be offered for sale on St. Nicholas Day. The reason for this involuntary sale is Coppola's final film, "Megalopolis" (2024).

The epic sci-fi film about a new Rome, or "the death and rebirth of a republic," as Coppola put it in Rolling Stone, was his first directorial project since the vampire film "Twixt" (2011). He had been planning the film since the 1980s. The initial budget was $100 million, but it ballooned to $120 million. While some critics hailed it as a "masterpiece," audiences stayed away. According to the New York Times, its worldwide box office gross was a paltry $14.4 million.

Hollywood's calculations only consider a film profitable when it earns three times its production costs through theatrical release alone. This covers marketing and distribution costs, cinema levies, and taxes (approximately half of the ticket revenue). After that, revenue is generated from DVD, television, and streaming.

This isn't Coppola's first bankruptcy. In 1982, he directed the relationship-crisis musical "One from the Heart" starring Nastassja Kinski. The budget for that film also ballooned from two to 25 million dollars. Box office receipts: 637,000 dollars. Coppola filed for bankruptcy and made his next films to pay off his debts. The film was nicknamed "One Through the Heart" by some.

Coppola got back on his feet and entered the winemaking business in Northern California. To finance the "Megalopolis" budget, he sold two of his vineyards. He remains optimistic that the film will eventually be a box office success, like his anti-war film "Apocalypse Now" (1979). But those were more cinematic days. "Megalopolis" is now streaming on Netflix.

Kevin Costner's western "Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1" (2024) is available on Prime Video. Estimated budget: $100 million. Box office: $38.7 million. This is also a passion project – one he's been working on for decades – for which Costner, as reported by the industry magazine "The Hollywood Reporter," took out a mortgage on his ten-acre property in Carpinteria on the Pacific coast (estimated value: $60 million).

This wasn't Costner's first collapse either: For "Dances with Wolves" (1990), he borrowed money without a major studio on board. The result: $424 million in box office receipts, seven Oscars, and the renaissance of the Western. The disastrously performing dystopian films "Waterworld" (1995) and "The Postman" (1997) ended his string of successes and his influence.

Here's the gist: those who finance their own films retain control. No studio executives interfering or prioritizing the expertise of a test audience over the director's genius. Martin Scorsese experienced this firsthand with "Taxi Driver" (1975), where the studio considered cutting the violent scenes from his film. "He wanted to kill the studio boss," his friend Steven Spielberg recalls in the documentary series "Mr. Scorsese."

Then Scorsese won the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Freedom. Until his next film, "New York, New York" (1977), flopped. He continues to fight for his visions to this day. He sees himself as someone who "has to know the philosophy of every shot before I arrive on set."

There are also success stories. George Lucas financed his second "Star Wars" film, "The Empire Strikes Back" (1980), with a bank loan, thus securing his Skywalker franchise. Mel Gibson directed his biblical epic "The Passion of the Christ" (2004), which, with $611 million in revenue (on a $30 million budget), is the highest-grossing privately financed film. Currently, Donald Trump's Hollywood ambassador is working on the two-part sequel, "The Resurrection of Christ." An evangelical blockbuster?

Alfred Hitchcock demonstrated how cost-cutting can help with "Psycho" (1960). A film about a schizophrenic slasher with incestuous undertones – that seemed unmarketable to Paramount Studios in 1959. A woman murdered in the shower, the supposed heroine dead after a third of the film, the villain transformed into an (anti-)hero: Hitchcock enjoyed turning thriller rules on their head.

He mortgaged his villa for the project and filmed it cheaply and quickly—with the TV crew from his series "Alfred Hitchcock Presents"—in the then-cheaper black and white, as if the film were a series episode. "That was the experience I was after," Hitchcock told his colleague François Truffaut in 1962, "to find out if I could make a feature film under the same conditions as a theatrical film." The film cost $806,947 (equivalent to $8,662,466 today) and grossed $50 million (equivalent to $536,740,000 today). Hitchcock was able to keep his villa.

Meanwhile, at Costner's lakeside ranch, creditors are chomping at the bit. The fiasco could escalate. The second "Horizon" installment, already filmed, doesn't yet have a release date, partly because it's unclear whether the saga will ever get its third and fourth chapters. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Costner even went to Saudi Arabia in (unsuccessful) search for money. A cowboy knows no pain.

Among the watches Coppola is offering for sale is the FFC, which he created with the prestigious Swiss brand FP Journe – featuring a view of the movement and a gloved hand as the hands. It will go to auction with a starting bid of one million dollars. However, as the "New York Times" noted, this is less than one percent of the cost of "Megalopolis".

Coppola seems relaxed. He has everything and nothing to lose, he told Rolling Stone before the film's release. The passionate filmmaker has created his film exactly as he envisioned it. And with it, he wants to work against the division of America, "to deliver an energy that will defeat the people who want to destroy our republic." The spirit of "New Hollywood" speaks through him.

He now wears “a more plebeian watch” on his wrist, the New Rome creator told the “New York Times” – and showed off his Apple Watch.