It’s worth retracing the bloody footprints

I

RECENTLY, I watched Francis Ford Coppola's classic and grand trilogy again: The Godfather I, II and III. Based on Mario Puzo's 1969 novel.

What makes these films worth revisiting many times?

Obviously, the excellent cinematography. Scenes that will stay with you forever: like the death of Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), lonely with a wandering dog around him, abandoned by man and God; a murder with glasses; the slicing open of Don Francesco Ciccio's (Giuseppe Sillato) stomach by Vito Corleone (Robert de Niro); the horse's head in an opponent's bed; the scene where Michael confesses, in an indirect way, that he killed his mother's son (instead of directly acknowledging that it was his brother); the car explosion in Sicily in which Michael's first love dies; Michael telling his brother Fredo (John Cazale), “You are no longer my brother and when you visit our mother, let me know a day in advance so I'm not there"; Kay Adams-Corleone (Diane Keaton) confessing her baby son was aborted, rather than miscarried; Kay looking at Michael while we know he's lying about his involvement in Carlo's death …

And of course the ending: the melancholic Intermezzo from Pietro  Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana (1890) plays while Michael is hit and his daughter is shot dead on the steps of the Teatro Massimo in Palermo.

The family had briefly united in Sicily to hear the son, Anthony (Franc D'Ambrosio) sing. The opera is a foreshadowing of doom, infidelity and a vendetta. And death, with the protagonist, Turiddu, being murdered.

With Michael's initially silent scream; then the yell and his wide-open mouth …

Syncopated with Kay's screams and the beloved cousin,Vincent (Andy Garcia), who had ended the relationship minutes earlier, looking on in shock.

II

In a commentary to coincide with the films' release on DVD, Coppola explains how he built the film based on Puzo's novel. Taking everything apart and putting it in a large book with transparent paper. In the margin, asterisks and comments about exactly what he wanted to use.

And like Alfred Hitchcock, he made a storyboard – the entire film worked out in drawings so he knew exactly what he wanted to use.

For a long time, he walked around with this ledger in a bag and looked at scenes again in coffee shops.

The first impressions of a reader are always important, Coppola confesses.

He explains the process:

• The synopsis;
• The period, starting in the 1940s;
• Images and tone;
• The search for the core of the story (he followed Elia Kazan's approach to A Streetcar Named Desire);
• Dangers he must avoid, such as clichés and too much exposition;
• A reorganisation of the book into a “multi-layered road map";
• Showing rather than telling, with asterisks to which he returns. Here, Hitchcock's Psycho played an important role in the way it gives information and manipulates the viewer.

There were negotiations with Puzo. And with Paramount Pictures, with its prescriptions. Among other things, the studio was initially uncertain about Pacino.

III

The first film (I consider the trilogy one movie) was shot in 1972. It takes place between 1945 and 1955. The second appeared in 1974 and covers the period from 1958, with flashbacks to the family's early years. (With a revisit, watching three, then two, then one again to unlock the hidden codes: Pacino, De Niro and Marlon Brando).

The third appeared in 1990. Here, too, there are flashbacks. The period is the late Seventies and the movie features the death of Pope John Paul I in 1978 and the Vatican banking scandal of 1981-82.

IV

A film in three parts that strings together all of life: family, dependency, the role of the church, patriarchy, foul play (the mafia), vanity, greed …

One can see all seven deadly sins here.

Sin and penance.

Guilt and complicity.

Michael Corleone, who can't escape the trail of blood he created.

Exactly as his wife had warned.

V

At the time, there was negative criticism about Sophia Coppola's talent, and her father was accused of nepotism for casting her. I don't share this sentiment. She interprets exactly what is expected of her as Mary Corleone, the daughter of Michael and Kay.

With each visit, one realises this is how such a child would behave in the film. Her father barred the mother from the house. She grew up in isolation under the cloud of displeasure.

Sophia later became an exceptional filmmaker in her own right. Lost in Translation (2003) and Marie Antoinette (2006), in particular, are excellent. She has come a long way from the little baby in the baptismal scene to the woman confronting father Michael Corleone because he denies her agency. And ended a love affair on her behalf.

Cent'anni.

♦ VWB ♦

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