Cinema: The New Hollywood: Dead or Alive?

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If the chairman of Hollywood's smartest studio does not have fun making deals, what are those visionary mavericks Coppola and Lucas doing playing the game —indeed, setting up their own studios? For one thing, it allows them to buy control of their films. With the profits from Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, Lucas, 36, could probably buy control of every film in Hollywood and have enough left over to pick up an MX missile: he is said to be worth more than $100 million. He is building a model-village production plant—a sort of Disney World for cineastes—in Northern California's Marin County. He has seven more Star Wars movies in mind. And he has just produced an adventure film by another strong director: Spielberg's Raiders of the Lost Ark. Spielberg is proud that their picture was completed under schedule and within the budget: $19 million. "Lucas was to me what David O. Selznick was to his directors on Gone With the Wind. I respect his comments totally. Raiders proved that two people can make a movie together and remain friends." The film will be released this June.

"Lucas has a bank called Star Wars," notes Spielberg, 33. "Coppola doesn't have a bank—only courage and fortitude. Chutzpah too: his Zoetrope Studios is preparing more than a dozen challenging projects, despite the fact that Coppola nearly went bankrupt just a month ago. The minimogul, who drives a mini-limo, a customized black Volkswagen Rabbit with dark tinted windows, admits that it is hard to keep one eye on the artistic horizon and the other on the bottom line. "Film makers are not necessarily good administrators. And the concept of the studio is vitally important. But the majors understand the selling of films more than the making. Zoetrope is based on the new technology. We're in the vanguard of the electronic revolution, and I want the other studios to copy us. They can make excellent pictures and a lot of dough too."

At the moment, Zoetrope—where Coppola is shooting his $23 million musical drama One from the Heart—is a futuristic anachronism. The technology is indeed new: computerized story boards, video-taped rehearsals and pre-editing on video rather than film. But the concept of actors and artisans under contract recalls the studio system that flourished for 40 years and died out in the '60s. Can Zoetrope work? Can it be profitable? Will a dozen cantankerous directors chafe under the effusive rein of an auteur-mogul? Many people in the New Hollywood, including some of Coppola's competitors, hope he makes it. Others are more skeptical. Says Ned Tanen: "Francis has all the answers. Too bad someone doesn't give him the questions."