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Hello Monday!
Curse and Coffee friends,
Today, we explore Francis Coppola’s million-dollar watch sale.
Hit reply and let us know what you think (we read all of your kind words).
Coffee at the ready…
The Big Sip
The take: The problem arrived. Francis Ford Coppola's custom F.P. Journe watch sold for $10.8 million on Saturday, nearly what his $120 million film grossed worldwide.
What happened: Coppola's one-of-a-kind FFC Prototype, nine years in the making, sold at Phillips New York after 11 minutes of bidding. It's now the most expensive timepiece from an independent watchmaker ever auctioned.
Why it matters: "From the beginning, [Journe] said 'Francis, if you ever have a problem, sell the watch,' said Pierre Halimi, head of F.P. Journe America. The watchmaker built an escape hatch into a friendship. Coppola pulled it.
What to watch: Whether Megalopolis finds its audience over time. Coppola believes it will. He said the same about Apocalypse Now, after selling his Oscars to finish it.
The man doesn't hedge. He liquidates and rebuilds. It's a pattern, not a crisis.
Sponsor Break
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Here’s Your Brew
The watch tells time with a mechanical hand.
Five fingers extend and retract to mark the hours. A concept Coppola pitched to Journe over dinner at his Napa winery in 2012.
"Has anyone ever used a human hand to tell time?" he asked.
Journe spent nine years answering.
The hand itself is inspired by a 16th-century prosthetic designed by French surgeon Ambroise Paré—black titanium, articulated, almost medieval.
It's part sculpture, part complication. Only two prototypes exist. Journe kept one. Coppola wore the other to Cannes in May 2024, weeks after his wife Eleanor died.
She's the reason any of this exists.
Eleanor gave him an F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance for Christmas 2009.
That gift sparked a friendship with the watchmaker, then a dinner, then a question, then nine years of collaboration.
Her watch sold Saturday for $584,200—more than double the high estimate.
The total haul from seven watches: roughly $11.7 million.
Enough to keep the ship afloat.
Two Sides, One Mug
The case for selling: Art funds art. Coppola has always bet everything on the next vision. The watch did exactly what Journe said it would: convert craft into liquidity when the moment demanded it.
The case against: Some objects hold meaning beyond market value. Eleanor's gift. A nine-year collaboration. The watch he wore to Cannes in grief. Liquidating memory has a cost that the spreadsheet doesn't capture.
Our read: Coppola is sentimental about making things. The watch bought him time to make another film. That's the trade he's always taken.
Receipt of the Day
Hodinkee — December 7, 2025
"From the beginning, [Journe] said, 'Francis, if you ever have a problem, sell the watch.' I saw a video of Coppola in 1985 saying that he had to sell his Oscars from The Godfather to fund Apocalypse Now."
Why it matters: Coppola doesn't fail and retreat. He fails and sells something to keep going. The currency changes. The bet doesn't.
[Hodinkee]
Spit Take
Watch sale: $10.8 million. Film gross: $14.4 million. [Phillips]
Your Coffee Break Links (and water cooler chatter)
🔗 Coppola puts Sentinel Building up as collateral — The San Francisco landmark he's owned since 1973. He nearly lost it in the '80s, too.
🔗 The full story of the FFC watch — Phillips' deep dive on how a dinner question became a nine-year collaboration.
🔗 F.P. Journe joins the $10 million club — Robb Report on what this means for independent watchmaking, alongside Patek and Rolex now.
Join your team of caffeinated skeptics.
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One bold take, the best counter, and the receipt(s) that prove it (all in sixish minutes).
Mugshot Poll 📊
What would you sell to fund your passion project?
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