This is part of a series of articles reviewing the American Film Institute's Top 100 Films, as unveiled in 2007. Why am I doing this? Because the damned cinemas are closed and I have to review something.
(MA15+) ★★★★★
Director: Francis Ford Coppola.
Cast: Al Pacino, Marlon Brando, Robert Duvall, James Caan, Richard Castellano, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard Conte, Al Lettieri, Diane Keaton, Abe Vigoda, Talia Shire, Gianni Russo, John Cazale, Rudy Bond, Al Martino, Morgana King, Lenny Montana, Johnny Martino, Salvatore Corsitto.
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| "I don't know how to break this to you Al, but I'm not wearing any pants." |
There's one thing The Godfather does better than any other film - it makes you happily watch the ultimate corruption of a decent human being, and makes you cheer him along on his downward journey.
It's different to other "bad guy"-focused films. This is not the society-crushes-spirit of Joker, where we pity Arthur Fleck and what the world has turned him into. Nor is it the over-the-top satires of the villain-centric American Psycho or A Clockwork Orange, or the good-guy-does-bad-things-for-good-reasons story of Taxi Driver. The Godfather's "hero" Michael Corleone chooses to do the things he does. He never has to do them, and as much as he is fuelled by revenge, that revenge is fuelled by his own willingness for said revenge, and by his willingness to accept the blood that flows through his veins. At the start of the film, he makes it clear he has rejected his family's lifestyle - by the end he epitomises it.
The Godfather leaves you confused and dirty, yet fulfilled and satisfied, kind of like having great sex with someone you definitely shouldn't sleep with.
The film invites you into bad places you've never been and makes it all seem okay. This complicitness with the dark side starts with its portentous opening shot. It's a three-minute-long tracking shot of a shadowy, serious figure in a dimly lit room, pleading for a special kind of justice unavailable outside this nondescript location. It is beautifully filmed, intricately lit, and features a stirring monologue by Salvatore Corsitto (who appeared in just one other movie outside of The Godfather).
As Corsitto intones his horrifying tale, we are immediately drawn into a secret world with its warped views of respect, honour and family. The craft of Coppola's three-hour opus about an Italian-American crime syndicate is perfect, but it's the way it lets us into a hitherto-unseen world of deals and deaths that keeps us spellbound.
In the almost 50 years since its release, The Godfather has become the gold standard in mob movies; so much so, some mobsters used it as "how to" guide while others claimed it was like looking in a mirror. Regardless, The Godfather's reputation for greatness in part comes not from its veracity of the mafia lifestyle, but from a perceived authenticity. Most of us have no idea what mob life in the '40s and '50s was like, but The Godfather makes it seem like it was exactly like The Godfather says it was. And this stems from the perfection in its production design, and the truth that rings through the characters and their stories.
(Sidenote: there are children everywhere in The Godfather, but not in prominent roles. They're just there, like they are in real life. This goes a long way towards subtly and subconsciously selling the realism of the movie.)
Stanley Kubrick once said The Godfather "was possibly the greatest movie ever made and certainly the best cast". On that last note, he's spot on. Remarkably, Pacino, Caan and Duvall were all nominated for best supporting actor at the 1972 Oscars. Perhaps even more remarkably, they lost out to Joel Grey, who won for his incandescent turn as the MC in Bob Fosse's Cabaret.
(Fosse also edged out Coppola for best director, and Cabaret won eight out of its 10 nominations. But The Godfather managed to win best film and best screenplay, as well as best actor for Brando, who famously refused the award, sending indigenous American rights activist Sacheen Littlefeather in his place.)
Awards aside, its two key performances are lightning in a bottle. It reveals relative newcomer Pacino as an incredible talent (in only his third film) and captures Brando's last truly great turn (even though he had nearly three decades of film-making ahead of him). Individually they're stunning; together they elevate the film to somewhere special. Capturing Pacino on the ascent and final peak from Brando is the kind of unforeseeable magic that helps make a movie a classic.
Much like Scorsese's recent epic The Irishman, Coppola's The Godfather is riveting and perfectly paced across its 180 minutes. It never feels overlong or rushed, and it's regularly punctuated by shocking moments that floor you. It's tempo is old-school, but its first half an hour or so introduces so much - the threat of violence, the large cast, the themes of family and respect, and the wealth and reach of the Godfather's enterprise, all via a grand wedding. Within this time frame we also get two iconic moments - the horrific use of a horse's head, and the first of many variations on the signature line "I'll make him an offer he can’t refuse".
These now-oft-parodied elements have helped sustain the film's legacy, along with the likes of "Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes", the gunning-down of Tommy, Brando's voice and bulldog jowls, and Nino Rota's score. Even the title card's font is memorable. All these things are iconic for a reason - they stand out, while still serving their purpose in the end product.
It's different to other "bad guy"-focused films. This is not the society-crushes-spirit of Joker, where we pity Arthur Fleck and what the world has turned him into. Nor is it the over-the-top satires of the villain-centric American Psycho or A Clockwork Orange, or the good-guy-does-bad-things-for-good-reasons story of Taxi Driver. The Godfather's "hero" Michael Corleone chooses to do the things he does. He never has to do them, and as much as he is fuelled by revenge, that revenge is fuelled by his own willingness for said revenge, and by his willingness to accept the blood that flows through his veins. At the start of the film, he makes it clear he has rejected his family's lifestyle - by the end he epitomises it.
The Godfather leaves you confused and dirty, yet fulfilled and satisfied, kind of like having great sex with someone you definitely shouldn't sleep with.
The film invites you into bad places you've never been and makes it all seem okay. This complicitness with the dark side starts with its portentous opening shot. It's a three-minute-long tracking shot of a shadowy, serious figure in a dimly lit room, pleading for a special kind of justice unavailable outside this nondescript location. It is beautifully filmed, intricately lit, and features a stirring monologue by Salvatore Corsitto (who appeared in just one other movie outside of The Godfather).
As Corsitto intones his horrifying tale, we are immediately drawn into a secret world with its warped views of respect, honour and family. The craft of Coppola's three-hour opus about an Italian-American crime syndicate is perfect, but it's the way it lets us into a hitherto-unseen world of deals and deaths that keeps us spellbound.
In the almost 50 years since its release, The Godfather has become the gold standard in mob movies; so much so, some mobsters used it as "how to" guide while others claimed it was like looking in a mirror. Regardless, The Godfather's reputation for greatness in part comes not from its veracity of the mafia lifestyle, but from a perceived authenticity. Most of us have no idea what mob life in the '40s and '50s was like, but The Godfather makes it seem like it was exactly like The Godfather says it was. And this stems from the perfection in its production design, and the truth that rings through the characters and their stories.
(Sidenote: there are children everywhere in The Godfather, but not in prominent roles. They're just there, like they are in real life. This goes a long way towards subtly and subconsciously selling the realism of the movie.)
Stanley Kubrick once said The Godfather "was possibly the greatest movie ever made and certainly the best cast". On that last note, he's spot on. Remarkably, Pacino, Caan and Duvall were all nominated for best supporting actor at the 1972 Oscars. Perhaps even more remarkably, they lost out to Joel Grey, who won for his incandescent turn as the MC in Bob Fosse's Cabaret.
(Fosse also edged out Coppola for best director, and Cabaret won eight out of its 10 nominations. But The Godfather managed to win best film and best screenplay, as well as best actor for Brando, who famously refused the award, sending indigenous American rights activist Sacheen Littlefeather in his place.)
Awards aside, its two key performances are lightning in a bottle. It reveals relative newcomer Pacino as an incredible talent (in only his third film) and captures Brando's last truly great turn (even though he had nearly three decades of film-making ahead of him). Individually they're stunning; together they elevate the film to somewhere special. Capturing Pacino on the ascent and final peak from Brando is the kind of unforeseeable magic that helps make a movie a classic.
Much like Scorsese's recent epic The Irishman, Coppola's The Godfather is riveting and perfectly paced across its 180 minutes. It never feels overlong or rushed, and it's regularly punctuated by shocking moments that floor you. It's tempo is old-school, but its first half an hour or so introduces so much - the threat of violence, the large cast, the themes of family and respect, and the wealth and reach of the Godfather's enterprise, all via a grand wedding. Within this time frame we also get two iconic moments - the horrific use of a horse's head, and the first of many variations on the signature line "I'll make him an offer he can’t refuse".
These now-oft-parodied elements have helped sustain the film's legacy, along with the likes of "Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes", the gunning-down of Tommy, Brando's voice and bulldog jowls, and Nino Rota's score. Even the title card's font is memorable. All these things are iconic for a reason - they stand out, while still serving their purpose in the end product.
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| "Godfather... where is the bathroom?" |
Another sustaining factor of the film's legacy over the past 50 years is its symbolism. Oranges signify impending doom, Michael's facial wounds make him look like his father, a baptism juxtaposed with assassinations - these are elements that have drawn people back again and again, seeking greater depth.
But, as with so many American films, The Godfather also has profound things to say about America; in this case as viewed through the prism of Italian-Americans and, more broadly, criminals who would do anything to achieve the so-called American Dream. The film's opening line is "I believe in America" but later, we view a murder that takes place with the Statue of Liberty off in the distance, its back turned on the events. Smarter people than I have written about this theme in great depth, including Lena-Marie Lannutti, Tom Breihan from AV Club, Sterling Farrance, and dozens of academics (seriously, just Google "The Godfather and The American Dream").
This is the kind of deep film reading that turns many people off, but it helps preserve the film's legacy, and elevate it to high art. And The Godfather is high art, but it's that rarest of beasts - a film that is both exalted by critics and was a box-office smash (it was the highest-grossing film in US cinemas in 1972).
There's not many other films that can boast that double of critical and popular acclaim, but The Godfather is indeed the kind of the film that seemingly does it all on its way to merging art and entertainment.
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