Godfather question: Did anybody back home know that Michael got married while he was in Italy?*

exactly. I took that remark to be intended both ways. He was a true pimp as an occupation when he started out, and a pimp in his personal dealings with other mobsters.

 

One of the most impressive aspects of The Godfather and The Godafather II is the amazing chemistry that formed between the actors. For example, any scene with Michael Corleone and Frankie "Five Angels" is amazing because the natural flow and timing is impeccable. The viewer really feels that they are dropping in on a conversation -- there is nothing stilted, forced, or "plastic"about it. Both Al Pacino and Michal Gazzo are formidable actors, but their respective performances intensify each other.

 

The Don knew that the Tattaglia family couldn't do it on their own so somebody else must have been in it with them. 'I didn't know until today that it was Barzini all along' or words to that effect. And yes Tattaglia was 'just a pimp' indicating the family was into prostitution and didn't have the clout to take on the Corleone family without help.

 

With both part 1 and 2 the actors become the characters, when watching Pacino he IS Michael, I forget I'm watching Al Pacino. Same with all the other actors. In Part 3 I can never quite forget it is Al Pacino playing a role. And the less said about Sophia the better... She has however turned it a pretty good director!!

 

This as well, not just a family which was running prostitution rackets but also willing to sell themselves to another.

 

Which raises another interesting question. Did Sollozo know Barzini was backing the Tattaglia family? Or did he go into this thinking only he had the Tattaglia family behind him?

 

He must have known. He wouldn't have been as confident if it was only the Tattaglia's backing him; as has been stated, they were really only into women and bars. Knowing that he also really had the backing of 'The Wolf' Barzini, he felt confident in making his move.

 

Excellent points. And I had forgotten he told her he was getting them out of crime. Perhaps it was as simple as Kay being Michael's anchor to the good we see in him early in the Godfather. Maybe he thought by marrying her, it would give him the strength to steer the family legitimate. With their resources, you would think he could have done it. Did he even try?

 

My thinking is yes. It was a very bold movie to [attempt] have Vito killed, and IMO, he would never have taken such a step without knowing he had backing of more than 1 of the families.
Barzini was shrewd; this way, if things blew up, he could come out clean and plead ignorance of the Vito killing if he had the Tattaglias killed.

 

My feeling as well, otherwise it would be an almost suicidal move to take on the Corleone's on their own.

 

Do you know what a superb movie and also what a great forum this is. Until reading this thread today I had never thought about the OP's original question and also what Sollozo knew about Barzini. So many layers to this film...

 

Even in the book, Vito says 'you notice how Barzini never committed himself in this affair. One might never have know that he was in any way concerned. This is a man who doesn't get caught on the losing side'.

 

I don't know if his heart was really into being legitimate in the end. I think he set out that way but the desire for revenge took over him and he ended up the desolate figure we see portrayed in the last shot of Part 2. Part 3 is about his attempt at redemption. What is the line in part 3? 'Every time I try to get out, they pull me back in!!'

 

Yes but Barzini's fatal mistake was underestimating Michael and he fell into the trap the aging Don and Michael set up to convince him the Corleone family was fading away. As cunning as 'the wolf' was 'King Cobra' got him in the end

 

The franchise really ends for me at Part II. Michael on that bench is the ending Coppola intended. III just feels like different people to me.

 

And to answer the original question I think Michael was blown away by Apollonia - love, lust the whole gamut. He had to have that woman. The love of his life. Kay was more a marriage of convenience. He needed a real family to go with the 'other family' and Kay was the respectable all American woman. Whether he loved her I think is an open question but Kay certainly loved Michael.
Close family would know Michael was married in Sicily and I guess when he returned it wasn't talked about as it was too painful for Michael to discuss. It did though add to his feeling of needing complete control over the safety of the family (both immediate and wider) and was a stepping stone into turning him into somebody who would kill his own brother in order to do so.

 

Yes, it doesn't seem like the same Michael as he is in the first two. Also misses Tom Hagen badly.

 

I think this has always been the danger of The Godfather. It has always been pointed out that this film might make us sympathetic to organized crime. But what is the aspect that makes it so? It could be the scheming, deals, and power. But I would suggest that it is the strength and love of their family. That was VERY attractive in the 70s, as it is today, when as you say the American family has declined. A dedicated hard-working father. A loving and loyal wife and mother. Obedient children that admire their parents and are successful. Michael is a decorated WWII hero for instance (Navy Cross for heroism, Silver Star for gallantry against and enemy, Navy and Marine Corps Medal for saving fellow soldiers, and a purple heart).

 

Yes, that really was the main reason Vito knew it was Barzini. He was certain Tattaglia could not (and likely would not have the nerve on his own to) do it.

 

Also I think the charisma of the actors truly inhabiting the characters. I remember the first time I saw The Godfather I watched it with my Mum and Dad and when Sonny gets shot on the causeway my Mum was really sad that he was dead. This despite the film very clearly showing him as a hothead, prone to adultery and a violent man. Somebody you would need to tread very carefully around. And yet, for all that, a character we really care about because as you mention above he has the love for and of his family. But also James Caan plays the role so perfectly and gets the charisma of the character so right.

We feel sorry for Fredo when he sits weeping at the side of his shot and seemingly dying father, a father who is head of the most powerful crime syndicate in the US and yet again someone we care about because of his love of the family and the charismatic portrayals of both characters.

Yes, we should not like these people, who are after all criminals, but they are portrayed as 'men of honour' only committing violence to those who deserve it and respecting the core family values.

In the end though part 2 shows that crime does not pay without a cost and that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts completely. The arc of the central character, Michael, goes from the innocent trying to make his way in life without his family 'that's my family Kate, not me' to the almost broken man at the end of Part 2 who has alienated or killed everyone close to him as his power becomes complete.

 

Part of the answer is the first five minutes.
Just like in Patton, Coppola allows the main character a chance to put all his cards on the table. In this case, Vito is discussing what he views his role in the Italian community.
Instead of the 'here it is' of the Patton monologue, we get Vito's innocent portrayal of his role as Godfather to some poor schlub who had his daughter raped and beaten and then the courts fail him. His faith in America is gone, you can't help but feel for him. And here is the man to save the day. That scene sets the tone deliberately. When your tired, your hungry, masses get poo'ed on by their new homeland, who you gonna call?
The scene is the moral center they want you to remember. Be part of the family--we will protect you at all costs and we won't ask you to crawl.

 

Well, one can of course be cynical about the move to Nevada. Cynical in the sense that the casino business, as it played out in real life, certainly could (and often enough was) be run as a criminal enterprise. But I think there were indications here and there that we as viewers could, perhaps should?, see the move as one Michael hoped would lead to being legit.

I understand the points others made above about the decline of the family as portrayed in I and II. But Michael knew all along that the pull of familial ties in his family (in all families?) came with complications. At first it is clear he had set for himself a path that would keep him away from the criminal part, and Vito himself was supportive of that. Subsequent events led him to take the path he did instead.

And of course the notion of family was not straightforward in any case, since Kay represented the path of going with his own nuclear family. So it was more extended, Old World family intertwined with the family business versus the American nuclear family. As the story progressed BOTH family structures declined.

 

We might ask you to return the favor though...

 

I read The Godfather years ago. Has anyone read the entire book series (including the ones penned after Puzo)? Are they all worth delving into?

 

One of my favorite parts. What favor will he ask of the man with a raped daughter? Fence stolen goods? Dispose of a dead body? Put a hit on someone?

And instead the favor is the honorable task of using his skills as an undertaker, so a boy's mom does not have to see him mangled.

But even that has an undercurrent of evil, since her son is mangled from being shot in a mafia hit.

Just brilliant