Gushing over the golden greatness of Godfather Part II

It’s not even up for debate. The greatest sequel of all time remains The Godfather Part II, directed by Francis Ford Coppola and released 50 years ago this December. Serving as both a sequel and a prequel to The Godfather (1972), the movie continues the story of the Corleone crime family while exploring its origins. The screenplay is based on Mario Puzo's novel and masterfully intertwines two narratives. One follows Michael Corleone as he leads the family’s empire in the 1950s, dealing with betrayal and personal tragedy, while the other delves into young Vito Corleone’s rise to power in the early 1900s, showing his journey from Sicily to becoming a respected Mafia leader in New York City.

To listen to our CineVerse group discussion of The Godfather Part II, conducted last week, click here. To hear the latest Cineversary podcast episode, which spotlights this film, click here.

Why is this film worthy of celebration 50 years later? What elements make it a masterpiece that holds up five decades onward? It’s arguably at least as good, if not better in many ways, than the first film (released two years earlier in 1972), which is a rarity for a sequel. The vast majority of cinematic follow-ups disappoint audiences because they can’t maintain the same level of quality as a beloved original.

Part II benefits as a true, seamless continuation of the first film in which most of the same creators and actors participated. Coppola returned as director and co-wrote the screenplay again with Puzo, co-producer Gray Frederickson, composer Nino Rota, cinematographer Gordon Willis, and production designer Dean Tavoularis were aboard again, as were Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, Robert Duvall, John Cazale, and James Caan (Marlon Brando and Richard Castellano backed out). In other words, it’s hard for Part II to fail when almost all the same stellar talent is back on the team and The Godfather magic is still fresh only two years later.

Part II is also longer and more epic in scope, taking us dramatically deeper and fascinatingly further into the world of the Corleone family and its enemies. Unlike the first film, which is primarily set in New York and secondarily in Sicily, the events in the sequel involve multiple locations around the world, including Las Vegas, Havana, Miami, Lake Tahoe, Sicily, and New York. And there are more new characters in the second film to capture our interest and add depth to this continued narrative.

Viewers require more patience and concentration because the film regularly shifts between two timelines and presents a nonlinear narrative that can be a bit offputting but enriching to those watchers who enjoy looking for connections between the past and the present, which can add more resonance to the saga and especially the increasingly complex character given the most attention: Michael Corleone. There are 12 shifts between the present (Michael in the late 1950s) and the past that occur over the film’s extended runtime.

Part II boasts one great performance after another from one of the all-time best casts, with many regarding Pacino’s work here as the best of his career. In 2009, Total Film placed him in fourth place on its list of "The 150 Greatest Performances of All Time," and in 2006 Premiere positioned it at #20 on its ranking of "The 100 Greatest Performances of All Time." A bit of trivia: Pacino is one of only six actors to be Oscar-nominated two times for portraying the same character.

Slant Magazine reviewer Matt Noller wrote: “Pacino’s work in the first two Godfather films, the second in particular, ranks among the finest performances in film history. They came during a time when the young actor still knew the benefits of subtlety, and his performance is an exquisitely balanced combination of strength, dignity, doubt, and moral decay, all accomplished with next to nothing in the way of histrionic displays.”

De Niro won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as young Vito, although you could argue that several other thespians in supporting parts were as deserving of that statuette, particularly the outstanding John Cazale (Fredo’s come-to-Jesus meeting with Michael—in which the anger and shame of being the passed-over middle son is expressed in a surprising outburst, followed by Michael’s pitiless renouncement and banishment of Fredo—represents the best sequence in Part II because of its dramatic gravitas and pitch-perfect performance. Ponder that Cazale had a perfect batting average in cinema, appearing in only five films before his untimely death, but with all five being masterpieces). Michael Gazzo as Pentangeli, the legendary Lee Strasberg as Hyman Roth, and even Gastone Moschin as Don Fanucci also particularly shine in their parts.

Part II also delights with the sudden appearance of unexpected faces we can more easily identify 50 years later, like Harry Dean Stanton as an FBI man, Danny Aiello in a tiny part as one of the Rosato brothers, and filmmaker Roger Corman (who gave Coppola his start) as one of the Senators during the congressional hearing.

The second chapter would be nowhere near as compelling without Nina Rota’s insightful music: hauntingly beautiful and appropriately evocative of the first film. Additionally, the period details—vintage 1950s automobiles and apparel, evoking the hardscrabble tenement architecture in 1917-era New York, substituting the Dominican Republic for Cuba to recreate the look of that pre-revolution country—all ring true and add world-building veracity to the film.

Surprisingly, the movie garnered mixed reviews upon its original release, although its reputation significantly rose eventually; today, Part II is now regarded as one of the finest pictures in history. In 1997, the American Film Institute ranked it as the 32nd greatest film in American cinema, and it held onto this spot in the AFI’s list a decade later. It slotted at No. 9 on Sight & Sound's Directors' list of the top 10 films in 1992 and No. 2 in 2002, with critics placing it at No. 4. In Sight and Sound’s 2012 list, the film was ranked No. 31 by critics and No. 30 by directors. The screenplay came in 10th best on the Writers Guild of America's list of the greatest screenplays in 2006. Additionally, The Godfather Part II was listed No. 7 on Entertainment Weekly’s "100 Greatest Movies of All Time" and was ranked No. 1 on TV Guide’s 1999 list of the "50 Greatest Movies of All Time on TV and Video." The Village Voice placed it at No. 31 on its 1999 poll of the "Best Films of the Century," and it appeared on the National Society of Film Critics’ "Top 100 Essential Films of All Time" list in 2002. In 2017, it was ranked No. 12 in Empire magazine’s reader’s poll of "The 100 Greatest Movies" and No. 19 in their 2008 poll of "The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time." Finally, it ranked No. 10 in the BBC's list of the "100 Greatest American Films" in 2015.

Better than the original?

Part II was the first sequel and one of only two sequels to win the Oscar for Best Picture. That honor certainly helps elevate this movie above rivals for the title of all-time greatest sequel. Contenders for that crown include The Bride of Frankenstein, The Empire Strikes Back, Aliens, Terminator 2, The Two Towers and The Return of the King, The Dark Knight, and Mad Max: Fury Road. Tellingly, The Godfather Part II is the only title among this throng that isn’t a genre-heavy sci-fi/fantasy/action picture.

“I think it’s every bit as good as (Godfather) One,” said film critic Kenneth Turan. Peter Bradshaw, film critic for The Guardian, wrote: “It is even better than the first film, and has the greatest single final scene in Hollywood history, a real coup de cinéma.”

“One of the best American films of its generation got one of the best sequels ever made - hardly something that obviously had to happen, and it speaks immensely highly over everyone involved in making Part II that they so consistently took the hard path to making something that could stand head and shoulders with the original, deepening it and expanding it while hardly ever repeating it,” per Alternate Ending writer Tim Brayton. Part II is “a more focused and intensified experience than the first movie, and pretty much everything works towards making sure we feel that intensity.”

“The director somehow managed to turn Part II’s weakness into strengths,” posits RogerEbert.com contributor Gerardo Valero. “For instance, few film series by nature have lost as many characters during their first entry… but their substitutes turned out so well, we don’t end up longing for these alternatives all that much…When trying to assign each of these films their rightful place, the most important factor to consider is that they tend to be even more interesting when looking towards the interior of the family as opposed to when looking outside, and Part II comes second to none in this regard.”

Defenders argue that Part II has more depth and a wider sweep, essentially telling two stories in one with the flashbacks to young Vito in Italy in the early 1900s and crosscutting back to his son Michael in the United States in the late 1950s. That makes it essentially a prequel and a sequel, all in a single package. The dual narrative and more sophisticated structure make this work even more fascinating to many viewers and critics than its predecessor.

Part II also benefits from better character development, tracing Michael’s arc and ascendancy to greater power while navigating complex and often dark family dynamics. This debatably makes The Godfather Part II a more thematically rich and psychologically interesting film. Here, the filmmakers get an even bigger canvas—202 minutes versus 175 minutes for part I—to tell the story and weave their cinematic magic.

That 202 minutes makes Godfather Part II one of the lengthiest movies in film history. Other than John Frankenheimer’s adaptation of The Iceman Cometh, released in 1973 and running one minute shy of four hours, Godfather Part II had the longest runtime for an American narrative film since Patton (1970, 170 minutes), a runtime that wouldn’t be surpassed until Heaven’s Gate in 1980. It was also one of the last American films to include an intermission. Interestingly, Coppola and/or De Niro collaborated on six of the lengthiest movies of the 1970s: Patton, The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, 1900, The Deer Hunter, and Apocalypse Now.

So, which reigns supreme: Part I or Part II? Head to head, the critical scores are close. The Godfather garners a 97% fresh rating and a 9.2 out of 10 critical score on Rotten Tomatoes versus Part II’s 96% fresh rating and 9.8 out of 10 critical score; at Metacritic, the original boasts a 100 Metascore compared to 90 Metascore for Part II; and at IMDB, The Godfather earns a 9.2 out of 10 versus a 9.0 out of 10 for its sequel.

Tracing Part II’s wide influence

The Godfather Part II broke new ground with its dual narrative, blending Michael Corleone’s cold-blooded mob leadership in the 1950s with flashbacks of his father Vito’s more sympathetic rise to power years earlier. This bold structure offered viewers insight into how the past shaped the present, crafting a complex, layered story that inspired future filmmakers to use nonlinear timelines and parallel storytelling to enhance character depth and thematic richness.

Later movies that would emulate the nonlinear narrative approach that utilizes interwoven flashbacks and dual storylines include The Deer Hunter, Once Upon a Time in America, Pulp Fiction, Memento, Kill Bill: Vol. II, Mama Mia: Here We Go Again!, and The Irishman (interesting that De Niro appears in several of these), as well as multiple seasons of so many popular modern television shows including Lost, Boardwalk Empire, Cobra Kai, Westworld, and Better Call Saul.

Especially before and during the early 1970s, when sequels weren’t as common as today, subsequent chapters were often viewed as cash grabs. The Godfather II set a new gold standard of excellence for sequels that may never be topped.

Consider how the color palette, art direction, and overall nostalgic-tinged look of the flashback sequences have been emulated by many films depicting vintage early 20th century New York, as evidenced by copycat aesthetics in films like Ragtime (1981), Annie (1982), Once Upon a Time in America (1984), Newsies (1992), Far and Away (1992), Gangs of New York (2002), and The Immigrants (2012).

This was also the first major American film to use the words “Part II” in its title.

A triumph for Coppola

Victor Fleming released both Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz in 1939, the same year as John Ford’s Stagecoach, Young Mr. Lincoln, and Drums Along the Mowak. In 1957, Bergman’s The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries debuted. Spielberg had two crown jewels in 1993: Schindler’s List and Jurassic Park. Yet in 1974, Coppola released not only The Godfather Part II but also The Conversation; his output in '74 may represent the best year ever for a major director.

Of course, Part II holds up in large part thanks to Coppola's filmmaking savvy. The director capitalized on more creative control, greater filmmaking freedom, and less studio interference from Paramount, which didn’t grant him that latitude for the first picture. The filmmaker helms one fantastic scene and performance after another, from the first communion party and Vito’s arrival in America to the fall of Cuba to the murders of Hyman Roth and Fredo. The sequence where Vito stealthily tracks Don Fanucci through the Feast of San Gennaro street celebration and then shoots the mobster outside his apartment is exemplary, and the Senate Hearing segment when Pentangeli sees his brother in the courtroom and changes his testimony offers another masterclass in direction; there are a lot of moving parts in that latter sequence, and Coppola sticks the landing beautifully.

But probably Coppola’s greatest achievement with Part II was his choice to use and successful execution of the crosscutting narratives and alternating timelines. The director said his concept for this film was to "juxtapose the ascension of the family under Vito Corleone with the decline of the family under his son Michael ... I had always wanted to write a screenplay that told the story of a father and a son at the same age. They were both in their thirties and I would integrate the two stories ... In order not to merely make Godfather I over again, I gave Godfather II this double structure by extending the story in both the past and in the present."

The challenge in presenting both a prequel and a sequel in one film: Where and when do you choose to cut between the two timelines? Choose wrong and you can upset the rhythm, tone, and pacing, as Coppola discovered when preview audiences rejected his first cut of the film, forcing the filmmaker to re-edit the movie and shift less often between the past and present stories.

Per co-editor Richard Marx: “When you shorten the story and keep cutting away from it, you limit emotional involvement. And Francis’ ultimate decision was that we would try and cut back and forth fewer times to keep the audience involved.”

Steven Spielberg said in an interview: “Godfather Part II maybe is more Francis Ford Coppola’s movie because it takes huge chances in changing the form of storytelling and altering the common narrative…It was more a Hollywood tradition in the storytelling of Godfather I, and there was an anti-Hollywood approach to the telling of the second Godfather story.”

“His decision to do a simultaneous sequel-prequel, thus juxtaposing the father, Vito, as a young upstart who makes his way to wealth and power and the son, Michael, who is losing his grip on it and lamenting the burden he has taken, may be Coppola’s greatest achievement as a filmmaker and storyteller,” according to Soham Gadre, an essayist for The Spool. “The same visual elements exist from the previous film, however the compositions are more wide-angled, and there is a lot more space to the scenes. Coppola is clearly more enamored with world-building than the previous movie… the flashback sequences perfectly exemplify what the first film had missed, which is a sense of connection and confrontation of the immigrant experience in America.”

A complex but fulfilling dual narrative

The intricacies of Part II’s plot also necessitate sturdier concentration but reward watchers who pay attention. For example, ponder the attempted hit on Pentangeli. Who orders the hit? Roth, not Michael. Why? It’s been speculated that Roth resents Michael for past killings, like the killing of his old friend Moe Greene in the first film, and knows he must play three-dimensional chess with the Corleone family to win in this game of power. Pentangeli, caught between his issues with the Rosato brothers (Roth’s allies) and his loyalty to Michael, becomes a pawn in this game. When Michael hints to Roth that he suspects Pentangeli may have plotted against him, Roth seizes the chance. He instructs the Rosatos to attack Pentangeli, framing it to look like Michael’s betrayal. This scheme aims to shake Pentangeli’s loyalty and push him to testify against Michael, giving Roth a legal edge since killing Michael had failed. In the end, Roth's plan backfires as Pentangeli reaffirms his loyalty to the Corleones, leading to tragic results.

Also, ruminate on Fredo’s betrayal. How and why does Michael’s older brother backstab him? By secretly agreeing to assist Johnny Ola and Hyman Roth during tense negotiations between Roth and the Corleone family, although the exact nature of his help remains unclear. This betrayal enables Roth’s men to make an attempt on Michael’s life at home. It has been conjectured that, with Michael out of the way, Fredo could take over the Corleone family business, which would please Roth, although it’s doubtful Fredo would have agreed to have Michael assassinated. The thing that trips up Fredo is later, while in Havana, when Michael discovers his brother is the traitor when Fredo inadvertently reveals he met Ola, despite previously denying it.

A small point, but consider why Corleone soldier Rocco Lampone is ordered by and agrees to assassinate Roth. Rumors abound that he betrayed Michael by secretly killing the two men who shot at Michael through the window to hide his involvement in that hit. Recall that Michael asked Rocco to find the assassins and keep them alive, but Rocco says “We’ll try.” Perhaps Michael knew the two assassins would be killed by a traitor in the family. Rocco was present when the bodies were discovered. While we know Fredo is the traitor, he isn’t a killer. Rocco possibly accepts the suicide mission of killing Roth in front of the FBI because he faces a similar fate as Pentangeli—having plotted against Michael and failed, he chooses to die in a way that protects Rocco’s family.

Life lessons from the Corleone family

Part II is richly imbued with fascinating themes and subtexts that suggest multiple interpretations. One key reading? The sins of the fathers are visited upon the children. In The Godfather, when Vito said, “There wasn't enough time, Michael. There just wasn't enough time,” he was expressing his disappointment that Michael couldn't fulfill his dream of achieving legitimacy and becoming a respected political leader, like a senator or governor. Vito had hoped that, unlike himself, Michael could avoid a life of crime and instead gain power in respectable circles, free from the mafia’s influence. However, with Sonny's death and Fredo's shortcomings, Michael felt forced to take over the family business, trapping him in the same life Vito had wanted him to escape. This lost dream haunted Vito, and as the sequels reveal, Michael would never fully escape the dark legacy of the Corleone family.

Often, the shifts in timelines between the younger Vito and his mature son Michael present undeniable parallels that suggest an inevitable generational heritage of crime, corruption, and evil initiated by the father and continued by his son. These juxtaposed visual and contextual associations present both similarities as well as differences between father and son. When the timeline swings back to the past, the look and feel are somewhat nostalgic, presenting young Vito as a likable figure who ascends to early power through intrepid crime and violence but steadfastly and consistently appears devoted to his family. In contrast, we witness Michael at the peak of his potency and influence yet continually pushing his family away from him, alienating loved ones, and ignoring his children. Recall some of the key compares and contrasts:

• Revisit the scene where Michael is told Kay had a miscarriage, immediately followed by the scene of a concerned Vito watching his wife tend to their young, sick baby.
• Think back to the sequence following Vito’s murder of Fanucci where he returns to his wife and young children sitting on the steps and, holding his new child, says “Michael, your father loves you very, very much”; after a brief intermission, the next thing we see is the adult Michael returning home after his crimes, but to a cold, quiet, and empty house occupied only by Kay, sewing away obliviously in the next room—tellingly, the two don’t talk or embrace.
• Recall the last two scenes, in which we first flashback to December 7, 1941, and observe tight yet tense family dynamics between him and his siblings, who leave him sitting alone while they go embrace father Vito in the next room; we then cut to the final shot of an utterly solitary Michael in the story’s present day, sitting outside and presumably reflecting on all he’s lost.

Also, contemplate how imagery and events in Part II echo similar shots and sequences in Part I, such as:

• Michael eating an orange (Vito ate an orange during his death scene);
• Vito stating he’ll make Fanucci an offer he can’t refuse (Brando’s most famous line from the previous film); Fanucci’s killing during a religious festival (the Feast of San Gennaro), which harkens to the murder montage at the conclusion of Part I when Michael bumps off multiple enemies while his baby son is baptized in a church.
• The lavish first communion party Michael hosts, during which Michael conducts backroom dirty dealings with Senator Geary—remember that Part I also began with his family celebrating a sacrament, Connie’s wedding, and included closed-door meetings with the family patriarch and his supplicants.
• The ailing and vulnerable Roth in the hospital who escapes an assassination attempt, which reminds us of Brando’s Vito lying helpless in a hospital bed yet protected from his assassins by Michael.

Part II espouses another irrefutable truism: the costs of corruption and cruelty. Michael’s victories against his enemies come at the expense of his loved ones and the utter loss of his humanity. In a key scene, he asks his mother if, by being strong, you can lose your family. She replies no, you can never lose your family—yet Michael tragically does by the end of the film, opting to kill his brother, alienate his wife Kay, ignore his children, and treat Tom and Connie with coldness and detachment. The last image of the completely isolated family patriarch ruminating somberly on his state of affairs while sitting outside in the thick of dead leaf-strewn autumn—also the autumn of his life—suggests his dramatic fall from grace, the tragedy of his trajectory away from his father’s ethic (ever working, even if illegally, to help his family), and an empty, soulless man who has forfeited everyone dear to him despite triumphing against his adversaries. Vito, were he still alive, would not be proud of the legacy he hath wrought.

The second chapter is also, certainly, a meditation on the dark side of the American dream. “It is the ghost of the American Dream that haunts the first two-thirds of Francis Ford Coppola’s epic gangster saga, the broken promise of a new life for those who crossed the ocean to free themselves from the poverty and violence of their homes just to find more of the same,” Slant Magazine’s Matt Noller postulates. “Coppola’s gangsters speak coldly about their world, like politicians or CEOs. It’s a pure expression of a capitalist society that values the bottom line above all else: Profit is the goal, and the shootings and stranglings are simply a means to an end. Emotions don’t—or shouldn’t—come into play. ‘It’s not personal, just business,’ the mantra goes.”

They say absolute power corrupts absolutely, and therein lies a further evident theme. Godfather II reminds us that there is no honor among thieves and that it’s not enough to simply “let me wet my beak a little,” as Fanucci says. The powerful and greedy will always want more and are inclined to betray their partners for a bigger slice of the cake (recall how Roth carves up a cake decorated to resemble Cuba, a metaphorical carving up of the country). A solid gold telephone, a hedonistic nightclub act, and a pat on the back from Roth telling Michael that he’s rich and formidable enough to influence an American president are all examples of the avaricious hubris demonstrated by these powerbrokers who secretly shape the fates of many.

A further thesis? Living life as a high-stakes game of chess. Michael adopts his father’s lessons to “Keep your friends close but your enemies closer,” and “try to think as people around you think.” That means, to vanquish and outwit his foes, he has to cleverly remain several steps ahead of rivals and anticipate their next moves (not easy when Roth is an even craftier chess player). Yet he also has to sacrifice relatives and allies as pawns in this game and play with a remorseless ruthlessness that results in the deaths of his brother and several minions and in Michael being estranged from his wife, kids, and extended family. In the end, his gamesmanship savvy, brilliant maneuvering, and insistence on not wiping everyone out, “just my enemies,” solidify Michael’s power and wealth but at a great cost to his personal life.

A cinematic gift that keeps on giving

The biggest present Part II bestows on us is its trusty ability to dispel the myth that all sequels suck. Whenever that pessimistic axiom is levied against Hollywood and its crassly commercialistic byproducts, the correct retort is to simply cite The Godfather Part II as the exception to the rule. It’s a quick way to shut up the naysayers and remind cynical cinephiles that, with the right creative TLC, film follow-ups can do more than exceed expectations—they can actually outshine their predecessors.

The second Godfather film is a marathon of a movie, true, but no scene seems superfluous, no performance feels out of step, no directorial choice appears self-indulgent. By the time it’s over, we crave more, and we’re intrigued to explore Part III and revisit Part I to identify even more of the connective tissue that masterfully links these works.