# Godfather II Questions **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 16, 2009, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619 "2009-01-16T17:29:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/21 "2009-01-17T01:15:31Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > _The Godfather_, in its essence, isn’t a Mafia movie like _Scarface_ or _Goodfellas_; it’s a Greek tragedy cloaked in Sicilian black robes. :rolleyes: “Fuckin’ Greeks.” ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/22 "2009-01-17T01:58:22Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > This stuff is implied because there is no other way to do it. Godfather movies assume an intelligent audience and do not overly exposit on every detail. So what does that make me, a complete idiot? 🙂 But seriously, if it is indeed implied, that means the details of Fredo’s betrayal were in fact never stated explicitly, and that’s what I was getting at. ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/23 "2009-01-17T02:03:56Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Remember the story that Michael tells Kay at Connie’s wedding? “Luca Brasi held a gun to his head, and my father assured him that either his brains or his signature would be on the contract.” Vito did not hold ordinary morality about innocent people high on his list of virtues. > Stranger Okay, fair enough. But the would-be Luca Brasi victim stood in the way of something Vito wanted. The prostitute was an unrelated bystander, as it were, and I don’t think Vito would have involved her. He would have, for example, simply sent Luca Brasi to Geary, and made him the same offer that he couldn’t, er, refuse. ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/24 "2009-01-17T02:06:18Z")
And while I’m at it asking these questions, it seems that the young Vito wasn’t aware of Fanucci’s actions and the whole Black Hand thing. But he’d been in NYC for what, 16 years and was working at a store that Fanucci regularly hit up. How could he not have known about it? ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/25 "2009-01-17T02:15:57Z")
> [@Fiddle\_Peghead](#): > > Okay, fair enough. But the would-be Luca Brasi victim stood in the way of something Vito wanted. The prostitute was an unrelated bystander, as it were, and I don’t think Vito would have involved her. He would have, for example, simply sent Luca Brasi to Geary, and made him the same offer that he couldn’t, er, refuse. I don’t think Vito’s way was possible by the time of Godfather II. “Kay, my father’s way of doing things is over, it’s finished. Even he knows that.” One of the subtle ironies of not only how Michael is different from Vito but how the world itself has changed: instead of refeshingly open, above-board payoffs and strongarming, you have nasty little deals in nasty little rooms away from public view. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/26 "2009-01-17T02:30:52Z")
> [@](#): > > Okay, fair enough. But the would-be Luca Brasi victim stood in the way of something Vito wanted. The prostitute was an unrelated bystander, as it were, and I don’t think Vito would have involved her. He would have, for example, simply sent Luca Brasi to Geary, and made him the same offer that he couldn’t, er, refuse. I don’t know. I think Vito could be both pragmatic and old-fashioned in how his code of honor applied. He’d probably figure that the girl didn’t deserve any consideration because she was a prostitute. She could be sacrificed. But neither Vito or Michael could have literally held a gun to Geary’s head. He was a Senator; an open threat like that would have just gotten you arrested. Michael used the implied threat of having Geary’s secret life revealed. Geary may have figured out that the Corleones killed the girl when he sobered up but he still couldn’t afford the exposure of admitting he had been there when she was killed. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/27 "2009-01-17T06:36:05Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > I agree that Vito is smarter than Michael, which is, of course, the tragic flaw; however hard Michael tries and however ruthless he is prepared to be, he’s just fated to be not quite good enough to overcome his own weaknesses. The flaws of Sonny and Fredo are apparent to everyone; Michael’s flaws are more subtle, but ultimately just as fatal. _The Godfather_, in its essence, isn’t a Mafia movie like _Scarface_ or _Goodfellas_; it’s a Greek tragedy cloaked in Sicilian black robes. > > Stranger I think Michael is even smarter than Vito. He figures out that it is Roth before a war erupts and heads it off when Vito didn’t figure out it was Barsini until Barsini starts saying “we” at the meeting. But Vito has a humanity that Michael gives up, that’s Michael’s flaw. But I definitely agree that it is like a Greek tragedy. He could have been Governor Corleone, Senator Corleone. Instead he’s, as Kay says, a monster. > [@Fiddle\_Peghead](#): > > So what does that make me, a complete idiot? 🙂 > > But seriously, if it is indeed implied, that means the details of Fredo’s betrayal were in fact never stated explicitly, and that’s what I was getting at. Must be, as it’s pretty well settled in these parts that I’m a plain old idiot. But seriously, I’ve seen the thing over and over and over and looked for motivations. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/28 "2009-01-17T07:03:08Z")
Maybe everyone’s already seen this, and it might not be “canon”, but I thought [these scenes](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPp0a5OEsTw) were interesting. Especially the scene starting at 3:00, I thought it showed a side of Michael that didn’t come through in the movie as it was released. ---
**Author:** ![Tenar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/35a633/32.png) [@Tenar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tenar)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/29 "2009-01-17T07:29:18Z")
[quote=“The\_Second\_Stone, post:18, topic:481619”] Pentangeli realized that Micheal needn’t have had any part and that was the message Michael was saying when his brother showed up: “I could have killed you any time I wanted, why would I do it that way and then botch it? Your brother will fly around the world on my word, you would have done the same and nobody would have seen you again.”/QUOTE] I’m not quite sure I get what you’re saying here, so forgive me if I’m repeating what you’re saying, but my feeling regarding bringing Pentangeli’s brother to the hearing was that it was Michael’s way of saying “Talk, and I kill your family.” ---
**Author:** ![Tenar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/35a633/32.png) [@Tenar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tenar)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/30 "2009-01-17T07:30:25Z")
[quote=“Tenar, post:29, topic:481619”] > [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > Pentangeli realized that Micheal needn’t have had any part and that was the message Michael was saying when his brother showed up: “I could have killed you any time I wanted, why would I do it that way and then botch it? Your brother will fly around the world on my word, you would have done the same and nobody would have seen you again.”/QUOTE] > > I’m not quite sure I get what you’re saying here, so forgive me if I’m repeating what you’re saying, but my feeling regarding bringing Pentangeli’s brother to the hearing was that it was Michael’s way of saying “Talk, and I kill your family, including your brother.” The brother may or may not have realized that that was Michael’s intention. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/31 "2009-01-17T14:20:34Z")
I consider these questions to mark a serious flaw in the whole trilogy–there’s ambiguity, which cuts both ways, positive and negative, and some of these are negative in the worst sense of the word, places where Coppola didn’t really know or understand what exactly he was trying to convey, other than a general sense of menace. By making Michael into such a troubled, torn, mysterious protagonist, whom Coppola both admired and despised, all he ends up conveying to me is sheer ambiguity. What I would like is ambiguity that enriches the experience of watching the films, whichever way it cuts, and this ain’t it. ---
**Author:** ![Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harvey_The_Heavy)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/32 "2009-01-17T15:51:41Z")
Another thing I’ve always wondered about: How on earth did they get Rocco to just walk up and blow away Roth in the airport? Didn’t he know it was a suicide mission? ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/33 "2009-01-17T17:33:02Z")
> [@Harvey\_The\_Heavy](#): > > Another thing I’ve always wondered about: How on earth did they get Rocco to just walk up and blow away Roth in the airport? Didn’t he know it was a suicide mission? I always wonder about that too. ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/34 "2009-01-17T18:17:57Z")
I’m gonna say one more thing about the “Michale Corleone says hello” question and let it drop. It doesn’t make sense to me that this was some kind of set-up to get Frank to think Michael was behind the hit by using a fake killer and paying off a cop to show up at the right time. If the cop was in on it why would he shoot at the men in the street and why would they shoot back? Surely they would have been told about set-up. As I said I would do, I listened to the commentary by Copolla and he didn’t say anything about this line being ad-libbed by the actor. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/35 "2009-01-17T19:37:14Z")
Just because people are paid to do things, doesn’t mean that they know why they are doing things and that they are not betrayed when they do them. Remember the attempted hit on Michael at the Tahoe compound. They guys who shot the machine guns were killed and left there. That was the plan all along, and they didn’t know it. (And no, we don’t know who killed them, but not likely Fredo as he couldn’t be counted on to make sure it happened.) ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/36 "2009-01-17T20:21:18Z")
> [@Fiddle\_Peghead](#): > > I’m gonna say one more thing about the “Michale Corleone says hello” question and let it drop. It doesn’t make sense to me that this was some kind of set-up to get Frank to think Michael was behind the hit by using a fake killer and paying off a cop to show up at the right time. If the cop was in on it why would he shoot at the men in the street and why would they shoot back? Surely they would have been told about set-up. I’m sure it wasn’t a “fake” killer. Those were hit men and they were supposed to mess old Frankie right up. Having a cop burst in could just have been a matter of a tip off to go into that restaurant at that time. The cop didn’t have to be in on the whole thing, just enough to get him there at the right time. Put it to you this way: do you really think a cop just happened to stumble onto that scene? ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/37 "2009-01-17T20:57:06Z")
> [@Harvey\_The\_Heavy](#): > > Another thing I’ve always wondered about: How on earth did they get Rocco to just walk up and blow away Roth in the airport? Didn’t he know it was a suicide mission? I think someone in a previous thread on the movie said (based on the novel perhaps) that the airport assassin was dying of cancer. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/38 "2009-01-17T21:18:26Z")
> [@Fiddle\_Peghead](#): > > The prostitute was an unrelated bystander, as it were, and I don’t think Vito would have involved her. There may not be any basis for this, but I was always under the impression that the prostitute may have been someone they wanted out of the way for some other reason. Maybe she knew too much, or owed money. So they killed two birds with one stone, as it were. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/39 "2009-01-17T21:25:26Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > There may not be any basis for this, but I was always under the impression that the prostitute may have been someone they wanted out of the way for some other reason. Maybe she knew too much, or owed money. So they killed two birds with one stone, as it were. And if Coppola were half the genius he’s sometimes credited with being, he would have let us in on all such impressions. It’s not hard, doesn’t take that much time or even effort. It just takes genius to be subtle and crystal-clear at once. ---
**Author:** ![Bytegeist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@Bytegeist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bytegeist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2009, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619/40 "2009-01-17T21:57:16Z")
Interesting thread. While we’re here, may I piggy-back a side question about the _first_ Godfather film? I’ve never understood how Sonny’s murder was supposed to have been planned. The sequence of events we see in the film goes like this, if I remember right: [ol] [li]The Corleone daughter Connie has yet another bad fight with her philandering, wife-beating husband.[/li] [li]Connie calls Sonny on the phone to tell him about it. Sonny already knows about her unhappy marriage from earlier incidents. He becomes furious and tells her to stay put. He’s coming over to help.[/li] [li]Sonny barges out of the house, gets in a car and drives off. Tom Hagen watches helplessly, but sends a car of men to follow him.[/li] [li]Sonny reaches a toll booth at one end of a bridge or causeway. The booth attendant takes the money, then dives down out of sight. Men with machine guns spring up.[/li] [li]Men with machine guns proceed to give Sonny back his change in the form of a thousand bullets delivered directly into his body, and car. Men with machine guns flee the scene.[/li] [li]Sonny expires. The car doesn’t fare too well either. And it’s not entirely clear, but I guess we’re _meant_ to understand that one or two of those bullets made a lucky hit. Oh sure, it’s plausible, but I wish they’d tied up that little loose end.[/li][/ol] So going by what we see, I don’t understand how Sonny’s killers knew he would be driving by the toll booth on that particular day, at that hour. Connie’s fight seems to be spontaneous and genuine, not part of some elaborate ploy — and I can’t believe Connie would lure her brother into a trap anyway. Or, is this toll booth one that Sonny drove by frequently anyway, and the whole thing with Connie is just a coincidence? Any light someone could shed on this would be most welcome. Thankee kindly. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/godfather-ii-questions/481619.md?page=3)