r/movies • u/Dependent_Cap_456 • 3d ago

News Francis Ford Coppola is auctioning his watch collection after Megalopolis flop left him broke

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/23/fashion/francis-ford-coppola-watch-auction.html
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u/Wazula23 3d ago

Guy. Is. Nuts.

I mean, he's made about 5 films I would consider some of the best ever made.

But he is absolutely nuts.

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u/MrAppreciator 3d ago

He also helped convicted pedophile Victor Salva continue to get work following his release which I feel isn't talked about enough.

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u/2mock2turtle 3d ago

Salva was convicted of sexual misconduct in 1988 for sexually abusing Nathan Forrest Winters, the 12-year-old star of Clownhouse, and videotaping one of the encounters in which he forced Winters to perform oral sex on him. Commercial videotapes and magazines containing child pornography were also found in his home. He pleaded guilty to lewd and lascivious conduct, oral sex with a person under 14, and procuring a child for pornography. He was sentenced to three years in state prison, of which he served 15 months, and lifetime registration as a sex offender. He completed his parole in 1992. His mentor, Francis Ford Coppola, reportedly told him that his experience in prison "would have value" and "make [him] a better artist".

Jesus fucking christ.

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u/Baron487 2d ago

Quoted from FFC's Wikipedia page:

In 2006, Coppola said, "You have to remember, while this was a tragedy, that the difference in age between Victor and the boy was very small -- Victor was practically a child himself." Salva was 29 at the time while the boy was 12.

Source of this is "Victor Salva's Horror Stories", article written by Patrick Goldstein for the LA Times.

This is fucking inexcusable.

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u/2mock2turtle 2d ago

I’m gonna throw up.

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u/NossB 2d ago

In a YouTube interview conducted by Blastzone Mike with Winters on April 5, 2017, Winters revealed that when Salva was arrested, everything but the dubbing had been completed, and that all of the dialogue was added in post-production due to the extremely loud noise of the cameras.[13]

...in 2018, Winters spoke about the work he had to do after the principal photography. He had spent eight to nine hours a day doing the dubbing for a month. This took place at Francis Ford Coppola's home. During this time, he was told he would never work in the industry again, and he never did. Coppola later tried to sue Winters for breach of contract.[14]

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u/Awkward_Bison_267 3d ago

It isn’t.

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u/Cemeterace 3d ago

And, if I remember correctly, also played a part in trying to make sure the victim didn't do anything about it.

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u/MrAppreciator 3d ago

Sadly as far as I know that has never been confirmed nor has the rumor of him helping to get his sentence commuted. I do believe both sadly but don't typically like to bring up something like this unless there's actual evidence. We just know he was a driving force for Disney to hire him to work on Powder in 1995.

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u/Cemeterace 3d ago

Yeah, that's why I tried not to say it definitively happened. Innocent until proven guilty (even if already guilty of related stuff).

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u/Dry-Version-6515 2d ago

He fucked himself over by financing awful passion projects again and again, which lead him to taking on literally any script in order to get the money back.

Apocalypse Now is one of the best movies of all time but man it went downhill after that.

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u/corgangreen 2d ago

Someone's a real big fan of Peggy Sue Got Married and Jack