Why The Godfather?
The Godfather, My all time favourite film in the world!
I love the film The godfather because it's beautifully crafted and it's completely flawless down to the minutest detail. The acting is phenomenal. You can understand the undercurrents of the movies simply by the way the characters look at each other. It's a romance, a tragedy and a thriller rolled into one. The pace of the film is spot on; it conveys the gradual development of the plot and the rise and fall of the Corleone family.
The Godfather elevated mob movies to high art, paving the way for the street-level gangsters of Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets and Goodfellas, the suburban family crimes of The Sopranos, and the original sinners of Boardwalk Empire.
The Director
Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola born April 7, 1939 is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is considered one of the major figures of the New Hollywood filmmaking movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Coppola is the recipient of five Academy Awards, six Golden Globe Awards, two Palmes d'Or, and a British Academy Film Award (BAFTA). After directing The Rain People in 1969, Coppola co-wrote Patton (1970), which earned him the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay along with Edmund H. North. Coppola's reputation as a filmmaker was cemented with the release of The Godfather (1972), which revolutionized the gangster genre[6] of filmmaking, receiving strong commercial and critical reception. The Godfather won three Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Adapted Screenplay (shared with Mario Puzo). His film The Godfather Part II (1974) became the first sequel to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. Highly regarded by critics, the film gained Coppola three more Academy Awards: Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Director, and Best Picture, making him the second director (after Billy Wilder) to win these three awards for the same film.
The main Characters
Don Corleone
Michael Corleone
Fredo Corleone
Sonny Coreleone
Tom Hagen
Peter Clemenza
Salvatore Tessio
Connie Corleone
Emilio Barzini
Virgil Sollozzo
Apollonia Vitelli
Characters
My favourite characters in The Godfather
Character name:
Vito Corleone
Character information:
Vito Corleone (né Andolini, April 29, 1887 / December 7, 1891 - July 29, 1955) was the founder and Don of the Corleone family. He is the son of Antonio Andolini and his wife, the brother of Paolo Andolini and the husband of Carmela Corleone, with whom he has four children: Sonny, Fredo, Michael and Connie Corleone.
Portrayed by:
Marlon Brando
Brando became a superstar after appearing in such films as A Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront (winning an Oscar). However, in the mid 1960s, he appeared in a series of flops that made him unhirable, until Francis Ford Coppola fought to have him play Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather, a role that would earn Brando a second Academy Award.
Character name:
Michael Corleone
Character information:
Michael Corleone was Born on March 23, 1920, to Mafia don Vito Corleone and his wife Carmela, Michael has two older brothers, Santino "Sonny" Corleone and Frederico "Fredo" Corleone, and a younger sister, Constanzia "Connie" Corleone.The family consigliere, Tom Hagen, is their informal adopted brother. Later Michael was the Don of the Corleone family after his father Vito Corleone stepped down.
Portrayed by:
Al Pacino
Alfredo James Pacino was born on April 25, 1940 is an American actor. Considered one of the most influential actors of the 20th century, he has received numerous accolades: including an Academy Award, two Tony Awards, and two Primetime Emmy Awards, making him one of the few performers to have achieved the Triple Crown of Acting.
His role as a heroin addict in The Panic in Needle Park (1971) brought Pacino to the attention of director Francis Ford Coppola, who cast him as Michael Corleone in what became a blockbuster Mafia film, The Godfather (1972) Although Jack Nicholson, Robert Redford, Warren Beatty, and the little-known Robert De Niro were tried out for the part, Coppola selected Pacino, to the dismay of studio executives who wanted someone better known.
Character name:
Sonny Corleone
Character information:
Santino "Sonny" Corleone is a fictional character in Mario Puzo's 1969 novel The Godfather and its 1972 film adaptation. He is the eldest son of the mafia don Vito Corleone and Carmela Corleone. He has two brothers, Fredo and Michael, and a sister, Connie. In the film, Sonny was portrayed by James Caan, who briefly reprised his role for a flashback scene in The Godfather Part II.
Portrayed by:
James Caan
James Edmund Caan was born March 26, 1940 was an American actor. He came to prominence playing Sonny Corleone in The Godfather (1972) a performance which earned him Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actor. He reprised his role in The Godfather Part II (1974). He received a motion pictures star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1978.
Location
My favourite Scene
Scene:
The horse's head
In a film full of iconography, this is as indelible as it gets: to this day you might still find yourself threatening to send a horse’s head to anyone that crosses you. Only me? Okay. With Vito’s consigliere Tom Hagen (Robert Duvall) having failed to convince studio boss Jack Woltz (John Marley) to give lousy actor Johnny Fontane (Al Martino) a part in a film, Woltz awakes to find the decapitated head of his equine pal under his blood-drenched sheets,
Address:
Falaise, on Sands Point Preserve, the Guggenheim estate way out at 127 Middle Neck Road on Long Island.
Scene:
The Baptism
In the bloody climax of the trilogy’s first film, Michael’s devastating descent into darkness is fully realised. Bathed in the golden light of a big beautiful church, the baptism of Connie’s baby boy is intercut with images of men getting ready, preparing for something – climbing the stairs; putting on a police uniform. As the sounds of the baby’s wails and the dischord of the piano organ grow to a crescendo, we realise something terrible is about to happen. As Michael renounces Satan again and again, the stone-cold ruthlessness of his orders are enacted, and the heads of the mob families that dared to cross him are dispatched with. The formerly good-hearted Corleone boy has not only officially taken on the ‘Godfather’ mantle, he has become what his father always feared, in an unforgettable sequence that has spawned many a tribute since.
Address:
New York's Old St Patrick's Cathedral, 264 Mulberry Street between East Prince and Houston Streets in Little Italy.
Scene:
Michael shoots Solozzo and McCluskey
This is the scene where Michael Corleone is going to serve up street justice according to the plan that’s been cooked up, midway through his tense dinner with rival mobster Sollozzo and corrupt cop McCluskey he’ll retrieve a gun that’s been stashed behind the loo, return to the table, then blast both men with bullets.
Address:
It's no longer a restaurant or a fabric shop but a derelict buliding, 3531 White Plains Road, between East 211th and East 212th Streets just north of Gun Hill Road Station.
The Godfather
The Photo Gallery
