The Godfather (1972)

Film: The Godfather

Director: Francis Ford Coppola

Country: USA / Italy

Released: March 1972

Runtime: 175 minutes

Genre: Gangster Movie

Studio: Paramount Pictures

Influenced: Scorsese, Brian de Palma, Sergio Leone, David Fincher, Park Chan-Wook, David Chase

Mario Puzo, author of the original novel The Godfather, worked together on the screenplay for the film with Francis Ford Coppola, and what they created together marks a quantum leap in cinema. In the movie's first two scenes, we get the measure of the Godfather, understanding his moral code of loyalty and his demand for deference (in the scene with Bonasera), as well as his strong family values (he won't take a wedding picture without his son Michael). He's also all about business, having no qualms about conducting a series of meetings on his daughter's wedding day. Coppola's direction is masterful from the outset, and along with the dark machinations in Don Corleone's meeting room there are moments of lightness and humour, like Luca Brasi rehearsing his lines and Corleone's wife Carmela and an old man singing the traditional Sicilian wedding song, Luna Mezzo Mare.

 "A man who doesn't spend time with his family can never be a real man"

Michael tells his girlfriend Kay about the offer that Don Corleone and Luca Brasi once made to someone that couldn't be refused, finishing the story by saying, "that's my family, not me", thereby launching the film's central plot line. Michael starts out as a "civilian" and war hero, who even gets cooking lessons from Clemenza, but we soon get a sense of Michael's nous (moving his father to a different room in the hospital) and his bravery and cunning (planning and carrying out the killings of Sollozzo and Captain McCluskey), and very rapidly he is no longer a "nice college boy", as his brother Sonny calls him. While hiding out after the killings in Sicily, Michael visits the town of Corleone, where he first sets eyes on Apollonia. His line to the father of his future bride – snitching means "your daughter would lose a father, instead of gaining a husband" – is nothing short of legendary.

At its heart, The Godfather is a profound examination of American capitalism and family values. The narrative unfurls in a seamless blend of crime drama and family saga. The way the Corleone family's story is weaved – blending private intimacies with the harsh realities of the underworld – was an innovation in itself. This stark contrast forces audiences to confront the reality that good and evil, legal and illegal, moral and immoral, often exist within the same spaces, people and families. Nino Rota's hauntingly beautiful score added a layer of emotional resonance, serving as the aural backdrop to the family's saga and almost becomes a character in its own right, deeply woven into the fabric of the narrative.

Gordon Willis's cinematography, referred to as "Rembrandt lighting", stands out as a significant innovation. His creative use of low-key lighting and deep shadows created an atmosphere that was as much a part of the story as the characters themselves. On top of that, Coppola's cutting-edge editing techniques, particularly the cross-cutting between the baptism scene and the orchestrated murders of the rival mob bosses, showed a new way of manipulating time and space in film. This montage is not only dramatic but also symbolic, contrasting the sacred with the profane, innocence with guilt and love with violence. Iconic scenes such as the bloody horse's head and "Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes" are also unforgettable moments in the film, adding to the aura of this undisputed masterpiece.