By Nathan Hurlbut
The Godfather Part II
‘The Godfather’ (1972) is a milestone in movie history. Based on the best-selling novel by Mario Puzo, Paramount Pictures immediately recognized the big screen potential for this melodramatic pot-boiler, and eventually enlisted director Francis Ford Coppola (their 12th choice!) to bring it to life.
No one could have predicted how successful the resulting movie would be. Not only was it the highest-grossing movie of 1972, but it was also a critical smash as well, winning three Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It has since been recognized as one of the greatest movies in film history.
Remarkably, ‘The Godfather’’s competition for that honor actually includes the its own sequel, ‘The Godfather Part II’ (1974). Of course, the enormous success of ‘The Godfather’ certainly must have made the idea of a sequel a daunting task for Coppola. After all, how do you follow up a movie that is both one of the most popular and most acclaimed movies of all time?
Fortunately, Coppola was motivated more by artistic aspirations rather than merely commercial ones. He recognized that a sequel provided the opportunity to delve much deeper into this narratively rich story, and a chance to expand and more fully flesh out the film’s characters as well. He and co-screenwriter Mario Puzo decided the sequel should encompass two separate time periods that wrapped around the original story. It would portray young Vito Corleone’s (Robert DeNiro) rise to power on the mean streets of New York City as an Italian immigrant, as well as his son Michael’s (Al Pacino) subsequent inheritance of the family business following his father’s death.
Perhaps it was the enormous success of the original that gave the filmmakers the confidence to push this sequel even farther in so many directions. Not only is the story expanded to encompass a multi-generational story, but treads into much darker territory than the original. While Vito’s rise to power is seen more as an extension of a husband and father’s desire to provide for his family in a new country, Michael’s brutal rise suggests exercising power merely for power’s sake. This striking comparison is immediately evident as Coppola cuts directly between scenes of Vito and Michael to show the contrast between the two character’s wildly divergent personalities.
Meanwhile cinematographer Gordon Willis compliments this thematically darker terrain with the film’s visual style as well. He employs shadows and darkness here to expose the story’s morally dark heart, while seeming to push celluloid’s very ability to capture the lowest levels of light possible.
Robert DeNiro accepted the daunting task of taking over Marlon Brando’s role by delivering a performance that equally rivals Brando’s. He grounds Vito’s motivations in a familial responsibility that makes its moral ambiguity all the more affecting. Meanwhile, Al Pacino effectively portrays Michael’s monstrous transformation from innocent dissenter to ruthless dictator with both a sympathetic eye and a repulsive degree of horror. It provides an enlightening testimony to the corrupting influence of power.
The impressive result is that ‘The Godfather Part II’ manages to not only compliment one of the greatest movies of all time, but rival ‘The Godfather’’s level of accomplishment as well.
‘The Godfather Part II’ is playing for one night only at Blue Jay Cinema as part of its Classics Series on Wednesday, March 13th.