Michael wails over the body of his dead child in an extended scene that goes on for a lot longer than such scenes are usually allowed to last. This time, after once again doing away with his remaining foes, Michael loses his daughter, Mary (Sofia Coppola), when she gets in the way of a bullet intended for him (fired, it should be noted, by an assassin dressed as a priest). Then, he closed it all out with a truly grandiose, explosive ending - one that works not just as a finale to a single film, but to the entire series. But for this third installment of the Godfather saga, Coppola replicated the somber atmosphere and moody photography of the earlier entries.
By the time Francis Ford Coppola returned to the story in 1990 for The Godfather Part III (which he recently reedited and rereleased under a new title, The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone), his style as a director had become more florid, more emotionally extravagant and expressionistic (his next project would be Bram Stoker’s Dracula). The Godfather films have their wildly emotional moments, but they are in many ways defined by their grim, submerged tension this is probably the quietest blockbuster series in American cinema. It’s amazing how subdued Michael is during these scenes. The brief, final image of the movie is of a much older Michael, alone, his name now virtually synonymous with the Corleone crime family. By the end of the scene, as everyone else goes off to greet their father, Michael remains at the dinner table - the odd man out, determined to evade the influence of his family. The film ends on a flashback to a family dinner in 1941, when a fresh-faced Michael announced to his stunned brothers that he had dropped out of college to enlist. By killing Fredo, Michael effectively condemns himself. So much of Part II is about Fredo’s betrayal and the growing divide between himself and Michael. The Godfather Part II closes on a similar irony - this time, Michael’s victims include his brother Fredo (John Cazale). But in truth, it is Michael who has consigned himself to the darkness. If you read the basic action on the screen, it’s Kay who is being condemned, the one pushed outside the inner circle.
At the end of the first Godfather, after Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) vanquishes his foes, we see him at home, greeting his underlings as one of them closes the door on his wife, Kay (Diane Keaton).
And the movies’ respective endings often hold the keys to their meaning. All these films are about people who’ve been damned, whether they know it or not. That’s the word that comes to mind when I think of the Godfather saga. Photo-Illustration: by Vulture Photo by Paramount Picturesĭamnation.
0 kommentar(er)
