TSPDT placing: #6
Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
Written by: Mario Puzo (novel & screenplay), Francis Ford Coppola (screenplay)
Starring: Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, John Cazale
The Godfather (1972) doesn't need an introduction, nor does it necessarily require a review. Nevertheless, I'm going to go on telling you what you already know: this is one of the great American films of the twentieth century. The 1970s was a landmark decade for Hollywood film-making, and Francis Ford Coppola was particularly productive, releasing the first two Godfather films (1972 - 1974), The Conversation (1974) and, perhaps his magnum opus, Apocalypse Now (1979). This week I was fortunate enough to experience a cinema screening of The Godfather, and this second viewing only inflated my respect for Coppola's achievement. On my initial viewing in 2006, I had been very impressed with the film, but also hopelessly lost for the most part. With literally dozens of speaking roles, and frequent allusions to otherwise unseen characters, the plot had left me stranded, just as The Big Sleep (1946) always manages to do. Suddenly, however, much of it became clear to me; the characters' motivations, deceptions and emotions gently drifted into focus. This was stunning, complex cinema, the sort of bold film-making that puts most modern movies to shame.
A notable artistic observation regarding The Godfather is that Coppola's film-making style is strictly traditional. Whereas a new generation of filmmakers like Martin Scorsese and William Friedkin were introducing a gritty new cinema aesthetic, Gordon Willis' cinematography is graceful, understated and handsome, predating his excellent work for Woody Allen {the most notable example being Manhattan (1979)}. A sprawling family saga, The Godfather boasts a staggering ensemble cast of emerging and established actors, as well as many unknowns who nevertheless give letter-perfect performances. The scenes of violence are typically abrupt and effective, but much of the film's running-time is more closely concerned with dialogue and human interaction, particularly among family members. Needless to say, the quality of talent is more than enough to make these scenes, not only watchable, but astonishingly compelling. Every character down to the smallest speaking part – and there are a lot of them – has such a richly fleshed-out personality, making their actions and development throughout the film both authentic and interesting.
Marlon Brando – in what, along with Last Tango in Paris (1972), was deemed a grand comeback – gives a towering, Oscar-winning portrayal as Don Vito Corleone, the aging head of an Italian organised-crime family. Having endured decades of corruption and inter-family conflict, and seeing his household disintegrate in the futile pursuit of family honour, Vito finally understands in his final moments the folly of his wasted life, and the fateful mistakes that led to this undesirable lifestyle {these precursor years would be explored in greater depth, with Robert DeNiro in the role, in The Godfather: Part II (1974)}. Most central to the story, however, is the transformation of youngest son Michael (Al Pacino), who, in the course of the film, effectively sells his soul to retain that elusive "family honour." The climactic sequence, utilising Eisenstein's style of montage to its fullest extent, intercuts the baptism of Michael's nephew with the simultaneous assassination of the Corleone family's enemies. This scene also serves as a baptism of sorts for Michael, symbolising his irreversible initiation into a life of crime, and the final transaction of his soul.10/10
Currently my #1 film of 1972:
1) The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola)
2) Sleuth (Joseph L. Mankiewicz)
3) Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes {Aguirre: The Wrath of God} (Werner Herzog)
4) A Warning to the Curious (Lawrence Gordon Clark) (TV)
5) Frenzy (Alfred Hitchcock)
6) Avanti! (Billy Wilder)
7) Silent Running (Douglas Trumbull)
8) Jeremiah Johnson (Sydney Pollack)
9) Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask (Woody Allen)
2) Sleuth (Joseph L. Mankiewicz)
3) Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes {Aguirre: The Wrath of God} (Werner Herzog)
4) A Warning to the Curious (Lawrence Gordon Clark) (TV)
5) Frenzy (Alfred Hitchcock)
6) Avanti! (Billy Wilder)
7) Silent Running (Douglas Trumbull)
8) Jeremiah Johnson (Sydney Pollack)
9) Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask (Woody Allen)
Recently-released criminal mastermind, Doc Erwin Riedenschneider (Sam Jaffe), has, for the last seven years of his incarceration, protected the plans for the most ambitious and profitable heist of his "distinguished" career. He arrives in a dreary, smoggy, crime-ridden city, where low-lifes patrol the darkened streets and law officers, some honest and some crooked, do their best to control the escalating crime-rates. The Doc hires a diverse assortment of essential criminals to ensure the success of his caper – a "boxman," or a safecracker (Anthony Caruso) with a young family, a "top-notch" getaway driver (James Whitmore) with a twisted back, and a small-time "hooligan" (Sterling Hayden) with a costly passion for horses. Also involved in the elaborate scheme is Cobby (Marc Lawrence), a sleazy, treacherous bookie, and Alonzo D. Emmerich (Louis Calhern), a bankrupt professional businessman who agrees to finance the operation but houses plans for a disastrous double-crossing. The film's female protagonists come in the form of innocent Doll Conovan (Jean Hagen, prior to her career-defining performance in 'Singin' in the Rain (1952)') and an up-and-coming Marilyn Monroe as Emmerich's sexy, playful and naive young mistress.
As was typical in film-noir films of the era, whose contents were dictated by the meddlesome Production/Hays Code, the ultimate moral of the story is that crime doesn't pay. Each of the thieves receive punishment for their involvement in the robbery, either through conviction or death, as does the fraudulent detective (Barry Kelley) whose corruption is described as a "one in a hundred" case. Nevertheless, Huston succeeds in creating a certain amount of empathy towards the criminals, sympathetically presenting the audience with each man's reasonable motivations towards breaking the law. By recruiting our support, Huston invariably places the audience in the shoes of a criminal, suggesting, as the perfect scheme begins to unravel, that our own fates lie in the balance. This evocation of realism is certainly complemented by Harold Rosson's gritty, documentary-like cinematography, and the heist sequence itself – while falling well short of Jules Dassin's breathless 30-minute counterpart – is tense, intriguing and authentic. As Huston himself explains in a pre-film introduction on the DVD release, each of his characters is immoral, largely unlikable and driven by a debilitating vice; however, despite this, or perhaps because of it, we can't take our eyes off them.
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