“The Godfather” can be described as a full circle narration. Hence the reason we develop a certain degree of empathy even for the villainous characters in the story. Applying by Mario Puzo and Francis Ford The Godfather is simply a brilliant illusion for it strays from the common conception of the Mafia. Thus, Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) is presented in the way he obtains the audience’s sympathy and respect. Throughout the film however, this career criminal does not engage in actions that the audience finds objectionable.
While watching the movie we do not see even one direct civilian casualty due to organized crime activity. No women forced into sex work. No one being destroyed by an addiction to gambling, etc. No stealing, no fraud, no racketeering. There is one and only one police officer, with such a degree of importance through verbal discourse, and he is not the most honest of men.
The objective of this work is to investigate the Mafia landscape from the inside out. And that’s its secret its appeal its enchantment however, it has in a way, shaped the public view of Mafia ever since then. The real world is supplanted by dictatorship, which is centered on the figure of the neatly aloof Godfather, and the only evil men are betrayers. There is one rule: the one that Michael D. Turner (Al Pacino) pronounces in Final Judgment of Empire, “Never take sides with anyone against the family.”
It is important as well that the first scene takes place in a dark, windowless room. This is the wedding day celebration which is the day for Vito Corleone’s daughter but as a Sicilian, must grant any reasonable request made to him on such day. Someone has come to seek justice for his daughter’s sex offender. Don Vito wants to know why he did not come out to meet him the first time.
“Like a good American, I went to the police,” the man says. The Godfather observed a moment of silence before answering. It became a motif that this time would underlie the whole movie “Why did you go to the police? Why didn’t you come to me in the first place? What makes you treat me like this? Have I done something for you to treat me with such contempt? If you had come to me in friendship, then this scum who has destroyed your daughter would be feeling the very agony now. It would be only necessary, that is, if an honest man like yourself made someone hatefully they would be my enemies and brute would fear you.” As the day wears on, there are two more scenes in Godfather’s darkened study that are interlaced with outdoor wedding scenes. When the wedding sequence comes to the end, most of the main characters will be presented there, and we will understand the primary things concerning their characters. This turns out to be a virtuoso stretch of filmmaking: once on stage, Coppola positions a large cast so effectively that you are instantly sucked into the Godfather’s universe.
“The Godfather” screenplay does not subscribe any patterns apart from that of passing authority from one generation to the next which is strictly classical. However, the authorship does not leave anyone behind, as it employs flashbacks to establish previously related events. For example, remember how Johnny Fontane, the washed out opera singer’s ‘ask’ gets rewarded in the Hollywood portions; how it is his weeping that foreshadows the jaw dropping scene of the geese who manages to get up from the daze in his bed with only the carcass of his racehorse. There is a ‘complaint’ that ‘someday, and that day may never come, I ask a favor of you. ’ This is made rather fascinating in that when the day comes the request is not some violent act (as in a typical film) but the wish of Don Vito that his wife doesn’t see the pitiable image of their son after the burning. And for the final, how a woman who dials the wrong number destroys Sonny James Caan is set up: It is all so well executed that quite a working memory is pulled in to reconstruct the appreciate sequence of events.
Now here is a trivia question What is the name of Vito’s wife? In the film, she doesn’t have a voice. Instead, a portly Sicilian abuela smiles at wedding photos beside her spouse, only to remain irrelevant to the action occurring in Vito’s study. There are not many places for women in the story as depicted in “The Godfather.” Sunny takes them in and throws them away. They have no use for his wife. Connie (Talia Shire), the Don’s daughter, is so low in the ranks that her own husband is barred from the family business. He is tossed a bone ”a living” only to be informed coldly by his sister when their own term comes to an end, they have all died.
The title comes full circle in that it refers to the son, not the father which is the irony of the title. The scene at the beginning shows Michael out of the family business and is trying to get a WASP, Kay Adams (Diane keaton) to become his wife. Everything changes when he moves his father’s bed in the hospital and while at it, and then whispers to the unconscious man, ‘I am with you now.’
Sicily is where Michael runs to escape the mob after an alleged hit, only to fall in love with Appolonia (Simoetta Stefanelli), whom he gets married to. The centre within effectiveness She is a Mafia widow. Obviously. He loves and cared for Appolonia just as he has done for Kay, but what is racing through his mind here that he cannot marry Kay anymore since he has decided to live the life of the Mafia? In America, after the death of Appolonia and his return, he looks for Kay and in the end, they get married. Did he mention Biodra to her? Such elementary particulars do not add to the main plot line.
Family loyalty is highly valued in such societies. There has been considerable talk throughout the film about a man’s word, yet a man’s honesty pales in comparison to a man’s devotion. Michael does not share the secret of his intention to kill the heads of the remaining families with Tom Hagen (Robert Duvall) as well. No less exciting segment is the dramatic “baptism massacre” It is a tip top direction in film-making. “As godfather”, for him baptism becomes like cover up, such that one can be a godfather in all sense.
There is no doubt that Vito Corleone acts as a morality figure in this movie. He is well advanced in age, conservative and is against the trafficking of illegal substances. He knows that people do not panic about “liquor, gambling even women”. However, drugs is very disgusting to Don Vito and one remarkable part of the movie is where all the mob heads gather for a meeting and he tries to convince them otherwise. The suggestion here is that there would no be any drugs mafia in the godfather world just the theory of victimless crime and crime would be in the fairest way possible.
The above is the form of my argument because I would like to emphasize the reason behind Coppola’s skilful narrative interpretation of his film as one that generates pity for its main characters. The Mafia isn’t a charitable and protective organization and the Corleone family is only a shade more just than the rest. Yet when the old man collapses and dies among his tomatoes, there is this sense that a giant has passed away.
Gordon Willis’ camera work is best known for its use of darkness, it is full of deep colors and atmosphere and is very expressive. This cannot be experienced on any small screen, as the image is unnaturally enhanced for lack of space. Into these dark rendered box like monastic rooms, Coppola fills with extraordinary looking heads. The main stars Brando, Pacino, Caan, Duvall are stunning in one sense or another, but neiher those who play their friends are selecte for their flat, shaven faces their immense cheekbones and mesoscopic eyes. Let’s take Abe Vigoda who played Tessio enforcer in the film. In the first encounter, he is the most difficult man to loathe; He is at the wedding dancing with a little girl wearing satin shoes pinned on his feet. Yes, sunshine when it actually really shines, on this day and not on any other. He who at first appears as a hulking figure who suggests to the viewer that violent retribution is a possibility is developed.
The Brando performance has earned its place in the history and is frequently copied. People know everything about his fat cheeks and how he played with the kitten in the first scene. These are actor’s devices. Brando employs them and not uses them: He acts up to the role to such an extent that in the final scenes where he says warningly two three times to his son, “Please, watch out. The man who comes to you to set up a meeting, that man is a traitor.” It is acting all right. It is the same that Don is getting old and boring and repeating himself but that may not be the case or rather people feel he is probably right.
Though Pacino plays Michael, it is so much more revealing than the other role, as he has managed in everyday life, and from his father, to remain quiet in front of the incorrect people, not to trust people who do not deserve, listen to advice but rely on oneself. Which is why, all the rest of the roles are so successfully taken up that a strange thing happened as I watched this restored 1997 version. Robert Duvall is well known to me but when he first came onto the screen I found myself thinking “So that’s Tom Hagen”.
Coppola traveled to Italy in search of Nino Rota who composed the scores for several of Fellini s films in order to get the score for the film. Upon first hearing the main somber and rather melancholic tune, I understood the point of this music: If only we heeded the Godfather, then everything would be much better than it is.
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