The Godfather: Part II

After watching "The Godfather" for the first time, I saw "Part II" the following day for the first time. The first film did not appeal to my tastes because I am not prone to pessimistic films and most anti-heroes. I can say the same about the sequel. "The Godfather: Part II" is a well-made film and is my favourite movie from 1974 by default but I side with some who say that the plot structure is unbalanced. The movie serves as both a sequel and a prequel so that is interesting but I would have liked this show more if it was solely a prequel.

The use of sound in the opening funeral shot is pretty impressive and was re-mastered quite well for Blu-ray. Now that Michael Corleone finds himself as the head of the family, he has huge responsibilities and risks that come with the job. As with "The Godfather", the main plotline of "Part II" was hard to keep up with but the Vito plotline was pretty simple and much more entertaining as a result. The design work on the film for this later plotline is very noteworthy. The main plotline with Michael seemed to lag too much. Usually when a dramatic movie has two plotlines, we transition from one to the other when one scene in one plotline relates to another scene in the subplot. I really didn't see this happening. Some who saw a version of the film as the release date approached felt the narrative structure was worse that the final version. Director Francis Ford Coppola and the editing team tried to fix the film in time but did not complete all their planned corrections and you can tell. On a more positive note, the cinematography of the senate hearings is perfect in replicating actual government hearing footage. It is like we are seeing a 1950's hearing as if people and equipment from the 1970’s filmed it. This contrast might have been a bad idea but it worked in this case. As a side note, Michael V. Gazzo's performance in the final senate hearing scene inspired actor Ernie Sabella in his vocal performance of a beloved animated character. The closing sequence where multiple people die felt unoriginal as the previous film had the same ending. The birthday scene at the end of the movie was meant to feature a cameo of Marlon Brando but because of disputes with Paramount, he did not show up to film the scene. The scene was re-written on the spot but this incidentally creates at least one comparison between the two plotlines. Michael is shown alone at the table and later in life is alone on his property.

The passage of time has been kind to "Part II". When it was released, the public and critics were divided despite its accolades. More recently, the film has gained a more positive reputation. With the sequel, Coppola almost had completely control of the production of the movie unlike with the first film. It seems Paramount learned its lesson about trusting the creative head of the project but apparently, they still had a few more things to learn. This was the first use of "Part II" in the title of a sequel and Paramount was opposed to it at first. Ever since 1974 however, other film franchises have followed suit. My favourite performance in this film comes from Robert De Niro. Not only did he play a convincing younger version of Marlon Brando's Vito Corleone but he also made the character his own. This time, I was watching for Joe Spinell. The moment he opened his mouth I knew it was him. Both he and Talia Shire would later appear in another Oscar-winning film: "Rocky". As a side note, James Caan received the same salary as the entire first film for just his one scene in the sequel. "The Godfather" won more Golden Globes than Oscars but "Part II" accomplished the opposite. It even won zero Golden Globes but more Academy Awards than its predecessor. Its wins include Best Picture, Director, Supporting Actor (De Niro), Adapted Screenplay, Art Direction and Original Dramatic Score. The latter win is important because the musical score of the first film was not deemed to be original enough. Only two sequels in history have won Best Picture: "The Godfather: Part II" was first followed by "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" in 2003. "Part II" was nominated at the Oscars for a total of eleven awards but both Michael V. Gazzo and Lee Strasberg lost to De Niro in the Supporting Actor category. Other losses were Shire as Best Supporting Actress, the costume designers and Al Pacino for Best Actor. It is the belief of many today that Pacino was robbed of an Oscar win for this movie. He has received a total of eight Oscar nominations in his career with the latest one in 1993 paying off with a long-awaited win. The American Film Institute has both "Godfather" movies from the 70's included all over its lists. "Part II" is the #3 gangster film and #32 on the list of all-time greatest movies. Michael Corleone is #11 on the list of villains and the line, "Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer", is #58 on the list of movie quotes (I never knew until now where that line originated from).

I was relived of a burden after my two-movie "Godfather" marathon because as a film fan, I think I was overdue in watching these two films. After doing so however, I can't say that I need to see these films again any time soon. They are masterfully made but they don't entertain me as much as other movies do that were made after 1975. The Robert De Niro scenes in "The Godfather: Part II" were good but the Al Pacino scenes could not live up to Marlon Brando's persona. The plot structure also had problems.

3 Stars out of 5