In Megalopolis, writer/director/producer Francis Ford Coppola has curated a world that melds American architecture with decadent Roman ideals. As it so happens, the country is called New Rome, a place where the wealthy, the weak, the plentiful and pitiful congregate. The audience sees Cesar Catilina – a giddy Adam Driver – picturing a utopia where he can rectify the needs of the citizens. He is constantly criticised by Franklyn Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito), the town’s garrulous mayor who believes in ruthless pragmatism over ideals. Between them stands Julia Cicero (Nathalie Joanne Emmanuel), who wants to support her father (Franklyn) and the man she is swiftly falling in love with (Cesar). The three of them parade around New Rome, discussing the intricacies of life through a variety of mediums, languages and gestures.

Considering Coppola’s passion for literature – two of his most fondly remembered films, Apocalypse Now (1979) and Rumble Fish (1983) were adapted from novels dear to the director’s heart – it should come as no surprise that Megalopolis is structured like a novel from the early 20th century. Coppola’s latest creation is an aesthetic work, essaying the philosophies and aphorisms that has centred modern civilisation since the Roman Empire. Jon Voight’s Hamilton Crassus parades around like an Emperor or General returning from glory, his eyes leering over every voluptuous woman who passes his way. In its own way, Megalopolis mirrors the works of 20th century writers Virginia Woolf and William Faulkner in that it perceives life to be one lingering art form that multiplies, metamorphosises and changes with every passing painter.

Jason Zanderz (Jason Schwartzman) brings the comedy; Fundi Romaine (Laurence Fishburne) counters with perspective; while Clodio Pulcher (Shia LaBeouf) brings the anarchy, hissing and laughing like a rogue from one of Shakespeare’s galleries. While he seems to let cohesion slip out of his grasp, Coppola is still a man of great presence and elegance, populating the screen with colour, contradiction and architecture, saluting his country’s ingenuity for architectonic structure. Rather than adapt someone else’s novel, Coppola has curated his own, piecing it together for the medium is most associated with: cinema.

Purportedly a labour of love for the artist, Coppola began stitching the outline for the work during the 1980s, which might account for the depiction of the supporting cast; costumed harlots who offer sexual gratification to the nearest and dearest buyer. A throwback of sorts to Biblical decadence, Coppola exhibits a lowly virgin who promises chastity and candour to the husband/customer with a predilection for obedience. The scene bolsters whimsy, but is ruined by the presence of scantily naked women prowling for wealthy, wilful spouses. Accusations of casual misogyny have followed Coppola for decades – for all their virtues, The Godfather Trilogy scarcely gave Diane Keaton or Talia Shire chances to breath, let alone shine – and Megalopolis does little to rectify this aspect of his work. There’s one death in particular, where an arrow is placed delicately above a woman’s bosoms, feels like it was lifted directly from an Alan Moore graphic novel; a grotesque misjudgement in an exhibition of controlled, creative precision.

Countering the argument comes Julia, a high-riser who progresses from dilettante to confidant over the runtime. She’s also a hybrid of her father’s mercenary ambition and her boyfriend’s dreamy-eyed utopianism. Recognising the importance of family, Julia draws both men further into the conversation through a discourse based on offspring, suggesting that the lessons of the past can be melded with prognosis through a baby’s footsteps. Family is a common theme in Coppola’s work, but it pours through Megalopolis like a commodity the obscenely wealthy Crassus can never get his hands on. Fittingly, the film ends with a dedication to Eleanor Coppola, his recently deceased wife and creative consigliere of four decades.

Megalopolis operates on a number of levels, and divides itself across a variety of fast cuts, montages and sermons, the ne plus ultra of the director’s creative abilities, and indeed, the project is one Coppola is unlikely to repeat, either as a book or a t.v. series. History may paint Megalopolis as a codicil of sorts – at 85, the writer’s age is a concern – and measured in his oeuvre, Coppola’s lustre has lost none of its singular flavour. Megalopolis sits completely on its own two feet, and can be viewed either as a continuation of his work, or a culmination. The project stands as a novel for cinema, invoking a jeu d’esprit that is more commonly witnessed in other corners of artistic endeavour, positing a larger importance on the contradiction and depth than the central story.

Driver revels in this retro-futuristic environment, his body a cocktail of excitement and stoic observation, and theatre alumnus Dustin Hoffman cameos as Cicero’s vivacious, verbose advisor. (“I can take the thunder,” he smirks; “it’s the lightning I can’t stand”). As scripts go, this is one of Coppola’s more loquacious works. The dialogue suits the actors; particularly Fishburne who narrates the picture, with the gusto of a stage set. LaBeouf’s Clodio is similarly animated, strolling and sneering from the sidelines, developing many of his deadlier plans in women’s clothing. Schematically, Clodio is akin to a tragic foil, the Mercutio of this cinematic universe, an entrepreneur let down by his taste for sexual excess;.a lone crab in a sea of well-mannered sharks.

Acting as an attack of sorts on the senses – the opening montage that depicts Cesar waltzing beside a ledge holds hallucinatory, as well as exhilarating, qualities – Megalopolis delivers everything that a movie should. That it could just as well as a book is just an added bonus.

Megalopolis premiered in the Official Competition of the 77th Festival de Cannes, when this piece was originally written. In cinemas on Friday, September 27th.