Ack, forgot to answer this question.
I agree, it’s confusing. The guy who says that is working for Roth, but he says it to make him believe that Michael betrayed him and thus give him a reason to testify againest Michael, to save his own skin.
Look at the scene again. You can see Tom look at Neri in the room with a look that says “Get out of here, close the door. Don’t let him see you.” Neri killed her, after drugging the Senator. He’s in the bathroom afterwards.
At that point, they had the Senator. He was going to do whatever they wanted. Great setup.
There’s also the fact that in the book it’s implied that Fanucci isn’t a real Don, but is faking it. Where’s his empire? Where’s his hitmen? In the deleted scene with the assassination attempt, where is his protection? Hence why he seems like a caricature in the flashback scenes.
[QUOTE=Francesca]
I’m afraid not. Rocco’s very much dead by Part 3.
QUOTE]
I stand corrected. Rocco was dead. Blame a Faulty memory combined with a GodFather Companion book in which listed Rocco as alive in Part Three despite his demise at the end of Part II.
Another favorite:
“They said Michael Corleone Did this and Michael Corleone did that and I said Yeah… Sure but it was all lies.”
Regarding the hit on Roth, I went with a simple explanation: the hitman had been offered a buttload of money for an effective hit, enough worth risking his life. He knew it was high risk but he’d never have to work again. He failed to get out alive (OR, Christopher Walken had his daughter in a van outside).
There’s occasional talk of a Godfather IV, which sometimes is about Vincent (who leads a Corleone empire that has completely gone to seed (crack, street crime, etc.) and has to fight the Russian, Vietnamese and other mobs for territory. (The advantage to this is that Michael could have a cameo- he’s blind and sick in Sicily, but he does not die until around 1999 according to the official genealogies [though watching the movie it was easy to assume he died a few months after his daughter’s death]). The other talk is to have a “Tween-quel” set between DeNiro’s last scene in GF2 (waving goodbye in Sicily?) and Connie’s wedding day, with presumably DeNiro playing Vito again and younger actors (perhaps Scott Caan) as the young Sonny, Tom, Fredo & Michael.
My favorite deleted scenes:
Genco’s death (when he half-jokingly/half-seriously asks the Don to ward off death)
Mama Corleone’s reaction when told about Vito’s shooting. (Sonny is trying to tell her but can’t get it out and she calmly demands “Santino… did they kill him?” When told he’s still alive she goes upstairs to change clothes and head to the hospital.)
Sonny unable to sit in his father’s chair.
Or they could have a movie that takes place during the last time the major five families had an all-out war (Clemenza mentions that the last time a major war happened between the families was ten years before the first movie started).
Okay, this Frankie Pentangeli thing bugs me no end. I’ve seen this movie ten times and I still don’t get it. First off, we know that Frank Pantangeli is a literary stand-in for Clemenza. Richard Castellano was apparently given an offer he could refuse from don Copolla and sat out the film which was a huge shame. The tragedy of Michael and Peter Clemenza turning on each other would have beat Lear, Othello and Hamlet put together. Clemenza was a rock for the old man and the family. Whatever story they cooked up to write Clemenza out of the picture was complete claptrap. It wouldn’t have been just Michael getting off the hook with the Feds if it was Clemenza who agreed to kill himself after the failed testimony. We all would of been brokenhearted crying, like in Love Story. Oooh! Bad example! How 'bout lIke when little Travis has to put the hit on his own dog in “Old Yeller”. Yeah, like that!
But anyway, Pentangeli is having turf wars with the Rosato brothers and Michael, for his own reasons, stifles him, possibly knowing that he will get killed. This is apparently no concern to him but we don’t know why because Michael is LYING to EVERYONE he talks to. When the attempted hit on Michael happens, Michael knows it was Roth. It has to be Roth, through Johnny Ola (this is all pretty well established later in the film), through Fredo. We don’t know who the hit-men are, because it doesn’t matter. But Fredo is actively involved, because someone has to open the curtains to Michael & Kay’s bedroom. The household help have always been told to leave them closed. “Michael, why are the curtains open?” Did Fredo manage to get to one of the servants to leave them open, or did he do it himself? Either way, that act shows plainly that he most certainly DID know it was going to be a hit. That may have influenced Michael’s decision to execute him later. So Michael tells Tom that Roth did it and makes him the Don (way too many questions about that act, mind…starts…hurting…) and tells Tom that he’s the only one he can trust now. He’s lying again, but at this point we have no way of knowing what Michael is thinking about anything. We only know what happens.
Which is, he goes to Roth and blames Pentangeli for the hit attempt. This is partially to keep Roth off base and thinking he’s safe. ("…but keep your enemies closer.") At which point he tells Roth (no, better yet, he asks permission) to whack Pentangeli. “He’s small potatoes.” And the hit is on. So it has to be Michael, not Roth who passes the word to the Rosatos that they are free to take out Frankie.
Roth would have no reason at that point to order the hit, he knows Michael is going to take care of it. When the hitmen say, this is from Michael, Copolla/Puzo are surely confusing us by making it seem like the murderers are setting up Michael, but they really are trying to kill him. It just doesn’t work out.
Michael has to know that the hit didn’t work out - he knows what’s going on, his people are everywhere. There’s no body, no funeral, and Frankie disappears. He knows he’s been pinched. He MUST have heard what happened. So WHY are we lead to believe that MIchael knows nothing about a hit that he clearly planned? A maguffin to set-up the testimony scene? Because they couldn’t figure how to deal with him and got their continuity jumbled?
In any case, when Frankie Pentangeli’s brother Vincenzo shows up at the trial, it’s not as a hostage who’s life is in danger, it’s as a fellow Sicilian Don (a man of honor) and brother who looks down with disgust at his turn-coat, squealing brother, and it’s the shame that shuts Pentageli up. The deal offered to him by Tom closes the case, but it can easily bee seen as an act of mercy by an otherwise ruthless Michael to let him die cleanly by his own hand and save his family’s honor and property at the same time. I often wondered how badly Tessio suffered on his last ride. It couldn’t have been pretty.
I guess I gotta go watch it ten more times, and I’ll see something I’m missing. But I really think that they just got lost in the story.
- Vincent is the most likely progeny to take over the original family turf in NYC. All the regular family members left the LI mall and went to Nevada. Remember that Vincent is very distressed about the conditions in the old neighborhood. Sonny’s legit sons probably couldn’t even find it on a map.
(Nevermind that Vincent growing up in NYC is inconsistent with his mother moving to Nevada in the book as well as other points about her that have been brought up.)
The presumption is that only a “street tough” like Vincent could really restore the Family’s central power.
-
It is clear that Frankie’s brother is basically a hostage. While Tom’s little speech in the hearing room on the brother’s honest background could be dismissed as a lie, the conversation between Frankie and Tom in the prison clearly indicates that it wasn’t. Frankie clearly says his brother could have been the head of his own family but didn’t want that sort of thing. Tom also reassures Frankie that his brother is safely back in Sicily. If anyone has any doubts about this point, just watch this scene.
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The shot of Tom looking over to Neri cleaning up in the bathroom clearly suggests who killed the girl.
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About Connie and Carlo. That’s just the way some women are. Even today, there are women who get beat up by their husbands/boyfriends but lie to the police about where the bruises came from. In particular, it appears that Connie main view of Carlo as the father of their children which made his murder dispicable. “Think of the children.”
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Fanucci was protected by The Black Hand. The info given suggests he was just the local neighborhood enforcer and collector for much more important people. Fanucci believed that being so protected was enough. He was stupid. Vito was smart. And so it goes.
As to my “real life” connections to the Mafia:
I moved to Rochester NY (The Summer Home of the NY Mob) during the A-Team vs. B-Team wars. So a lot of media on a regular basis as to how hits were done and why. This are not smart people.
My step-father also sold real estate for an AZ land company run by Tony Bonano. He met him several times. Got screwed out of a lot of commissions and quit. You don’t complain to Tony Bananas.
But that is “modern times” compared to the era of most the first two GF movies. It is clear in the book that the centuries old “code of ethics” that the first couple generations of Sicilian-American bosses still lived by were already disappearing by the late 1950s.
Again, the guy that shot Roth was probably not a professional hitman but someone that was forced into doing the job for quite desperate reasons.
Now, my question:
I’m confused about what people are saying about Rocco. He appears a couple of times in GF1, notably in the ride with Paulie. He is part of Clemenza’s capo regime so it is not surprising when Frankie “inherits” him in GF2. Apparently he was picked up after being wounded in the hit on Frankie and then turns against the Family. The last I recall seeing him is during his testimony in the Senate hearing. At that point he is completely out of the Family business, need I say more?
Have I got something wrong? What’d I miss?
No, no - that was Rocco Lampone, one of Michael’s lieutenants along with Al Neri. He’s the one who when Michael asks if Roth is impossible to get at, assures Michael something along the line that anyone can be gotten. It is likely he who both set up as well as executed the hit and had some hope of getting away in the crowd.
You’re mixing up Willy Cicci ( who does one of the final hits in GF I - the revolving door hit as already mentioned ), who eventually become Pantangeli’s lieutenant and Rocco Lampone, who was the guy who killed Paulie while Clemenza was taking a piss and also one of the guys who machine guns down Tattaglia in the end. Cicci remained a Clemenza associate, Rocco became Michael’s man ( or he may have been Corleone retainer from the start that was just working under Clemenza for a time ).
- Tamerlane
When Michael moves the Corleone operation out to Nevada, he holds court at the old house in NJ…and allows Clemenza to set up his own Mafia “Family”. In the real world, exactly HOW is this done? Do you have a formal “coming out” ceremony? How do you tell your former Corleone family members that thier paychecks will now come from the Clemenza family?
Finally, Michael keeps telling Kay that “within 5 years, the Corleone family will be completely legit”-was this his intent? Surely, even a cool-headed guy like Michael gets tired of being a Mob boss…it is unhealthy, and you always have to give orders to get guys whacked!
I have watched this scene. Many times. It is clear that he is not a hostage. Look at his face. He is pissed off at his brother for going against the old ways. Frankie says his brother could have been the head of a family here in America. I thought it was implied that he was a big shot back in Sicily. Big fish in a little pond. Tom even says he tried to take him to dinner but he couldn’t wait to get back to Sicily. He was being treated as an honored guest. It was implied that the brother was there to remind Frankie of omerta. If they were threatening Frankie there were other targets. Remember he had a family that Tom promised to take care of. They were a lot closer than Sicily. They would not bring the brother in front of Congress to make the threat. If they had to go through with it and kill him it would look pretty bad at a time when they were trying to make Michael look like a businessman.
Actually, he puts on the cop uniform and kills Barzini. In the books, he was described as a former cop, and that was his uniform. That hit really put him way up with Michael.
The former cop who kills Barzini (and Moe Greene, in the book) is Albert Neri. He was reqruited by the Don personally and made his bones as one of Clemenza’s men, but he was always destined to be Michael’s #1 enforcer.
I’ve wondered this myself. I’ve also wondered if the new “families” are expected to stay faithful to the Corleones, kind of like extended family or something.
Clearly Clemenza and Tessio were hot to start up business of their own. So eager that Tessio couldn’t wait for Michael to settle all family business. Or maybe Tessio felt that, with he Corleones out of New York, it was better to hook up with another New-York-based Don like Barsini, to get a slice of the drug trade? Tessio did seem merely impatient (“I’m not askin’ for help, only take of the handcuffs!”), but maybe he had bigger plans in store. I can’t imagine Clemenza would ever turn on the Corleones, so I surmise that Clemenza and Tessio were not planning to go into business together.
Anyhoo, it is a good question: How does one go from the status of Caporegime to Don? Search me.
Funny, I looked at that scene a lot, too, and to me the brother looked scared. Like he was telling Frankie “For God’s sake get me out of this.” Michael tells Kay that he wouldn’t even stay for dinner, he’s on a plane back to Sicily. It’s a lie, just like the rest of what he’s telling her.
I thought that the easy way he lies to her then is an interesting contrast to the scene at the end of GFI when he lets her ask him “just this once” about his business and then lies about killing Carlo, and he seems to have just a little difficulty lying with a straight face.
Crap. Your right. I was thinking of the Don In sicily, not the one Vito kills during the festival.
Thanks, Tamerlane, can’t believe I got so messed up on those two.
As to the ongoing debate regarding Frankie’s brother’s status: Even naive Kay was bright enough to realize the implied threat to him.
As to the capo regime setup near the end of GF1.
Clemenza and Tessio are the two subbosses. They are promised that each can split off from the family after the move to Nevada. Vito and Michael don’t trust them enough and a third capo regime is formed in secret. ?Who was this head of this one, Neri? It is explained well in the book but I believe the movie/saga only brings it up when Tom tells Michael he knows about the extra spending. Note that during the funeral Michael learns who the rat is, so Clemenza is viewed somewhat more trustworthy. Still, the hits during the christening should have been all been done by the secret regime but the movie clearly shows Clemenza doing one of the hits. (And Willy Cicci?) It would have been dangerous to let Clemenza in on such a major move while Tessio was still around. Michael had no way of knowing if Clemenza, or one of his men, had allegiances to Tessio that would have spoiled the plan.
As noted in the aside between Tom and Michael during the funeral, they both viewed Clemenza as “most likely to suceed”, but “Clemenza was always smarter” than Tessio. Tessio erred, Clemenza benefitted passively. That’s smart.
The relationship at most levels between a member and his boss is a two-way street. Money and info flow up, protection and orders flow down. So I imagine that when Clemenza became head of his own family, he took over payoffs to the NY officials and the like and stopped sending money up to Michael. Clemenza’s relationship to inferiors would change little. The fact that he took over the big house in the mall would be signal enough as to his change in status.
But that’s probably not the whole story. Michael’s big move completely changed the dynamics of the Five Families. Clearly he was the boss of bosses. Clemenza moved up to head of a Family, but Michael also moved up to an unprecedented level. Hence, his concern was playing off the new heads of the families against each other for leverage against the other emerging regional bosses.
?What happened to the men in Tessio’s regime?
I think it was Tessio they said “was always smarter” and that his going with Barzini was a good move for his own sake.
An important “extended scene” portion in the outtakes for those who haven’t seen it: after the hit on Vito the still civilian Michael enters his father’s study where Tessio and Sonny are talking. He wants to help but Tessio and Sonny clam up. When pressed, Sonny finally says (frustrated) something to the effect of “sure Mikey, you wanna help? Sal and I were just discussing whether we should put a bullet through Paulie’s head or through Clemenza’s for Pop getting shot… who do you think the traiter is?” (He’s facetious in asking Michael’s opinion, but not in his statement that they were debating whether or not to kill Clemenza.) Later it’s found that Paulie was the traiter and Clemenza’s clean.
I thought this was a heavy moment because, as learned in GF2, Clemenza & Tessio & Vito were a triumvirate who went back 30 years together, but when the heat was on Clemenza’s best friend and his godson didn’t even hesitate over whether or not to kill him.
In GF3 I wondered where Don Altobello came from. The heads of the families were killed in Part 1 and he was never mentioned (even though he was close enough to the family to be Connie’s godfather). Was he from Jersey? Was he a Corleone capo who formed his own family after the move to Nevada? Whaa? (And did he offer Connie the canoli because he was suspicious, and why didn’t she get sick?)
I think it would be interesting to learn what Michael was doing between the late 1950s and 1979. We know that he developed diabetes, moved back to NYC, let Kay take the children, and became very tight with Connie again while moving the family increasingly into legitimate business. How involved was he in the mob at this point? Did Zasa fear him? Were there any significant women in his life (other than Connie)? How did Tom Hagen die (i.e. was it natural causes [of course IRL it’s because Duvall was insulted that he was being offered about 1/3 of what Pacino got)?
Richard Castellano must have been one of the biggest idiots or one of the greatest drama queens in history. (I know he was straight, but that doesn’t exclude one from the title.) The GF was the greatest movie success in history to that point and by all accounts he was offered plenty of money for GF2, but wouldn’t resume Clemenza because he wanted to write his own lines. CLEARLY, Coppola and crew knew what they were doing since… again… they’d just made the most successful movie of all time. YOU DON’T TURN THIS ONE DOWN. (When you look at his later credits, he ended up doing TV mafia miniseries and other schlock where his dialogue was far inferior and his input was probably still not welcome.) I’ve wondered how much he was paid for the first movie (I know he got more than Brando’s $50k) and why he was paid so much since he wasn’t a big star at the time (other than physiologically).
I also wonder how much Vigoda got; he was working as a cab-driver when he auditioned for the role in a casting call and Coppola happened to like his looks. In interviews he has always expressed extreme appreciation for the role since it landed him the part of Fish on Barney Miller and he made more money in any year of the mid-1970s than he’d made in his entire life to that point. When asked on one show if he minded the fact that he’s treated as a joke (on Conan O’Brien and other pop-culture reference shows), he basically sneered in a “get real” way and said something to the effect of “that’s asking me if I’d rather go back to being broke at the end of the month or being 45 with no prospects or fame or money”, which I found really really refreshing. Point: Abe seems to be a groovy old dude.
According to the DVD commentary, it *is *a Carmine compostion and the title is “This Loneliness.”
Ok I have the DVD on now.
First in the court scene he looks pissed, not scared.
Then there is the dialogue between Tom and Frankie after the senate hearing:
Doesn’t sound like a hostage. If he could have had his own family in the US it is very unlikely he is some chump that could be kidnapped and sent to the US as a hostage. More likely he was a big fish in the small pond.
Consider how much power Michael has in Sicily to allow this. His only connection according to Parts I and III are Don Tomasino. Tomasino was regarded as a wise man not taken to rash actions and a beloved figure. Not likely the man to have another player kidnapped.
Also if Michael wanted to get at Frankie it would make more sense to have his children or wife beside him during the case rather than flying to Sicily to pick up his brother.
Finally if his brother was “tougher” and “old fashioned” would he have been a victim? It would seem, instead, he would be quite displease if his brother broke Omerta (sp?). It would be a deeper threat as his brother would likely take the venegence required for such a display of disloyalty