Michael Corleone Says Hello

The overflowing streets of Little Italy. Fires in garbage cans. Old-timey streetcars. The lowbrow mass entertainment on offer--an operetta in which a man learns of his mother's death, then sings loudly of his plans for suicide.  ("Senza Mamma." We might think of the other mamas in this movie: Connie, berated for spending very little time with her children; Mama Corleone, who, like Vito's mother, will die before the curtain falls; the line directed at Tom Hagen, a command to "bring your wife, mistress, and children.") The circled X on little Vito's coat, at Ellis Island--meant to suggest a possible mental defect. The button-fly trousers, because, in Vito's early years, you would never see pants with a zipper.

I'm fascinated by Coppola's little acts of risk-taking. To cast your sister and your daughter--it's dicey and controversial. But it gives the movie a kind of aura of "the personal statement"; it suggests, "this came from my soul." (And who wrote "Senza Mamma"? Coppola's own grandfather, of course.) Coppola deliberately made a door difficult to open because he wanted to film a particular actor struggling with the stuck door; he wanted to see, and to capture, how that surprised actor would behave. The ad libs: A passerby in the street stopping young Vito to share news (conveying an impression of the universal respect young Vito commanded). Danny Aiello saying, "Michael Corleone says hello," moments after the attack on Pentangeli. (I can see why Coppola loved this bit of improvisation; it's classic irony, of course; but it's also Aiello's pop-culture worship of the idea of Michael Corleone, seeping into the character's lines. There's a bit of self-mythologizing happening. It's like people whispering about Captain Ahab, in "Moby-Dick," before he steps on-stage.)

It's also fascinating that this movie pays close attention to empathy, and specifically the strategic advantages of empathy. "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Get inside your enemy's head, so that you can make your own moves more wisely. Michael recalls how his father would operate; "he would try to understand how the other person was thinking, and he'd tailor his own behavior accordingly." This political savvy, this fascination with human actions--Coppola seems to be offering a kind of self-portrait when he describes Vito in these terms.

More tidibits:

-DeNiro and Brando are the only case of two people winning two separate Oscars for playing one character. (Kate Winslet and Judi Dench were both nominated for playing Iris Murdoch, but neither won.) DeNiro is a rare case where someone speaks English for basically zero percent of the movie, and still wins an Oscar. (Marion Cotillard and Roberto Benigni are other examples.) DeNiro had auditioned for the first "Godfather" and made such an impression that his fate was sealed. Coppola--a crazy artist!--thought for a long while that Brando could play Vito in youth, could play Vito at any age. Then he came to his senses. (Do you know that Winona Ryder wasn't the only person attached to the Sofia Coppola role? That part could have gone to Julia Roberts or Madonna.)

-The second "Godfather" is very much a story of the immigrant experience. We get the prow of a great ship, passing the Statue of Liberty. We get Ellis Island, people whispering about small pox. There are fairy-tale transformations; like young Tom Hagen, Vito will go from a lump of clay ("he's not bright! he's worthless!") to a fearsome individual. ("Immigrants. We get the job done.") The mother is weak; the mother is, all of a sudden, a powerful, knife-wielding witch; the mother is dead. (Coppola seems to take special pleasure in filming the body mid-air; this is not a dainty death; Mama seems to go flying before hitting the ground. It's a deliberately shocking, grotesque moment.) Vito Andolfini becomes "Vito Corleone" through carelessness; a lazy Ellis Island inspector rewrites history with the stroke of a pen. (The new name has a "magical fable" quality; it also unites Vito with the Earth; it suggests that his story is the story of the entire town of Corleone.)

-Michael Gazzo gave such a stirring "Senate Testimony" scene, in rehearsal, that Coppola insisted on filming right away. But there was a lunch break, and Gazzo got drunk, and then the scene was not what it had been previously. (Oddly, the character Gazzo replaced--Clemenza--had been played by the highest-paid actor in "Godfather I." Why would Clemenza have netted all the dough?)

-Coppola had visions of "The Conversation" (which he wrote, in addition to directing) dancing in his head while he made "Godfather I." He wrote "Patton." He invented the "Michael" portions of "Godfather II" from whole cloth. You get the sense of a young ambitious artist wishing "to swallow the world." DeNiro grew himself a mustache for the post-Intermission sequences, and he wore a kind of dental appliance to give him the Brando jowly look. There's particular care with the murders--which may make you think of Woody Allen, venting about how all the creative ways to film a murder have been taken. A man holding a pillow--a smothering tool--notes that that pillow (and his own chest) have been torn apart by a bullet. DeNiro extinguishes a light to make easier the murder of Fanucci; just as Fanucci begins toying with the flickering light, Fanucci's own fate begins to dawn on him (on Fanucci). (This scene parallels Michael's realization: "Why are the drapes open? Ah, I'm about to be killed!" It also parallels the famous sequence from the first movie: "Why is my bodyguard running away from my car? Ah! Apollonia is about to be killed!") Pacino initiates the steps-toward-the-murder of Fredo with a kind of biblical scene; he grabs Fredo and plants a long, intense kiss on Fredo's lips; then, in a thrilling moment, he holds Fredo by the cheeks and says, "I know it was you. You broke my heart." (Pacino is so frightening in this film. It's a pleasure to watch him with Duvall, who seems to suggest, without words, "I know the gender of your dead child. I know that *miscarriage* is also a euphemism here." The relentless high stakes of this story--the deaths, the murders, the lies, the globe-trotting travel, the shedding of moral codes of behavior--make everything feel mythic. At the same time, you feel as if you're watching people you could actually know.)

-I have an obsession with movies made shortly before I was born. So, in addition to the "Godfather" movies, I hope, soon, to watch, or re-watch "Klute," "An Unmarried Woman," "The Conversation," "Kramer vs. Kramer," "The Deer Hunter," "Sophie's Choice," "Dog Day Afternoon," "Serpico." Like Hitchcock before him ("Don't let people into the theater after the movie has started!"), Coppola managed to change the very nature of film-viewing. Producers worried the images were literally too dark for a drive-in movie; Coppola said, "Don't worry; people won't be watching this at the drive-in." Folks knew, while "Godfather I" was taking shape, that a sequel would be necessary. "Godfather II" is one of only two cases where a sequel won "Best Picture" at the Oscars. (Can you think of the other example?)

Well. Food for thought, when you're watching! God is in the details.