|
|
'The Godfather' re-release: An offer you can't refuse
March 22, 1997
Web posted at: 2:30 p.m. ESTFrom Movie Reveiwer Paul Tatara
A lustrous new print of Francis Ford Coppola's epic 1972 masterpiece, "The Godfather," is currently playing in select theaters around the country, and if you're still sitting there reading this sentence instead of sprinting to one of those theaters -- what are you waiting for?
Paramount Pictures has re-mastered the soundtrack and restored the visuals to their famous burnt-orange glow to celebrate the 25th anniversary of this landmark film's original release. Anyone who cares about the art of filmmaking should see it, or see it again, as the case may be. A widely accepted argument can be made that "The Godfather" is the most brilliant American film of the 1970s, and that, my friends, is saying something.
I mentioned this in my piece on the recent re-issue of "Star Wars," but it's necessary to reiterate that there was a time (stretching from roughly 1967-1977) when American movie studios actually had some guts. Nervy, passionate young directors like Coppola, Roman Polanski, Martin Scorsese, and William Friedkin (to name only a few) were allowed by the money men to pursue their own deeply personal visions without completely buckling to the supposed limitations of the marketplace. Unflinching films like "The French Connection," "Chinatown," and "Taxi Driver" were treated as mainstream events while almost surreptitiously undermining what it was that American audiences expected from the mainstream.
Clip: "An offer he can't refuse"
(800k/21 sec. QuickTime movie)Entire film trailer
(4M/1:45 QuickTime movie)These were hungry directors working at the peak of their creative powers. They were the first generation of filmmakers raised on television (as a group, they had been nicknamed "the movie brats"), and their obsessive study of classic films on late night TV instilled in them a great respect for the intricacies of narrative. This deep background, when coupled with the revisionist tendencies of the French New Wave, threw off sparks that, for a while anyway, set the film world on fire. These young filmmakers were inspired by their lineage, and, freshly scarred as they were by the sociopolitical turmoil of the 1960s, were more than willing to toss aside any outdated precepts that didn't suit them. Francis Ford Coppola was the grand-daddy of them all, and "The Godfather" is probably his finest achievement.
An adaptation of a fairly lame, but wildly popular, Mario Puzo pulp novel, "The Godfather" was originally viewed as a quickie. The hope was that Puzo's saga of intense familial bonds within the violent world of the Mafia could be fleshed out into a passable film. Making cinematic history (or becoming, up to that point, the highest grossing picture of all time) was never part of the plan.
Coppola, who, at age 32, had already directed four uniquely drawn but seldom more than competent movies of his own, was best known as the Oscar-winning screenwriter of "Patton." What Paramount didn't initially realize they were getting was a director who understood the intricacies of "The Godfather"'s landscape like the back of his hand. Coppola's Italian-American background, with it's intense loyalty to family honor, constituted the basis of his worldview. The raw material in "The Godfather" triggered a lush, almost operatic tone in Coppola's style that his previous film work had never even hinted at. The man was almost literally born to direct this movie.
This is a truly staggering film, packed with so many great moments and dazzling performances, it's impossible to cover them all in one quick review. The all-powerful Don Corleone is played, of course, by Marlon Brando, and, though he won an Oscar for his work and sits at the center of the story like a corrupt Mount Rushmore, his performance is matched, if not out-distanced, by several other cast members.
Al Pacino plays Michael, the "good" Corleone son who finds himself succumbing to his darkest territorial impulses, an ultimately tortured character that is still the high water mark of Pacino's career. Pacino's gradual transition from fresh-faced war hero to coldly rational crime boss is a startling achievement. His performance alone would be enough to make the film indispensable. A pivotal scene (set in a cozy Italian restaurant) in which he hesitates for several agonizing moments before standing up and blasting a revolver point-blank into the startled faces of two adversaries, is absolutely harrowing, perhaps the finest thing that Coppola has ever committed to film. This is the first time Michael has performed a "business" duty for the family, and we can see in Pacino's wandering eyes the knowledge that there will be no return from the act of savagery that he's about to carry out. But he does it, for his father.
James Caan's portrayal of Sonny, Michael's rash older brother, is from the John Garfield school of urban tough-guy brio. Sonny is a live wire, a forceful reminder of what Michael doesn't want (from outward appearances, anyway) to become. Sonny's lack of discipline and gonzo temper tantrums are almost darkly comical, but one scene, in which he beats his brother-in-law to a bloody pulp for having taken a belt to his sister, puts a quick stop to any nervous giggles. Sonny plays by impulsive street rules, and this recklessness will ultimately be his extremely nasty undoing.
Perhaps the most underrated performance in the movie is given by Robert Duvall as Tom Hagen, the adopted son and legal adviser to the Corleones. Tom is the voice of reason, or at least as reasonable a voice as you'll find in a roomful of businessmen who casually murder their rivals. Tom keeps his hands clean by trying to negotiate peaceful answers to the family's problems. That he puts an end to stalled contract negotiations by placing the severed head of a film executive's prized racehorse in the man's bed clues us in that the Corleones are not to be trifled with. The moment when this occurs is precisely constructed by Coppola. His sure hand and masterfully understated tone guides the film from beginning to end.
Special mention must also be made of the costumes and set design, which perfectly echo Coppola's slightly subdued approach. The period is not belabored, as it almost always is in gangster films. The music (including the famous score, by Fellini favorite Nino Rota) isn't the usual stream of Glenn Miller tunes, most notably when a hit man is seen putting on a bullet-proof vest in preparation for a murder while "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" plays on a distant radio.
The film is overflowing with great dialogue and razor sharp supporting performances, especially John Cazale as Fredo, the most heart-breakingly human of the Corleones, and Abe Vigoda and Richard Castellano as the Don's lifelong friends, one of whom will betray Michael and provoke a bloodbath. There are several gloriously realized, if not iconic, images- The joyous wedding waltz, Michael pushing his gravely wounded father's bed through the hospital corridors, the whispered requests in the Don's office, and the devastating baptism sequence in which Coppola ingeniously cuts between cold-blooded murder and life-affirming religious ritual. It's all here and then some.
See "The Godfather" to get an intoxicating rush and to sample what commercially viable movies could still occasionally be if audiences would just demand something more from the studios...and if the studios would once again demand something more from themselves. It's an offer you can't refuse.
Related sites:
Note: Pages will open in a new browser window
- The Godfather - official movie site
- The Corleone Family Gate
External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.
Tell us what you think!
You said it...
© 1997 Cable News Network, Inc.
All Rights Reserved.