Not going to apologize for open spoilers here… 30+ years is past the statute of limitations, IMO.
Okay, so I love Godfather II. Or, more specifically, I love the Michael Corleone scenes in Godfather II. The DeNiro “Young Vito” scenes bore the cannolis out of me. I think the movie would have been stronger if those scenes had been taken out entirely. I think they’re slow, don’t accomplish much, and don’t truly relate to Michael’s supposedly parallel story. I feel like I’m missing something?
Here’s what I see when I watch it.
• Vito works in a store where the store owner is getting leaned on by the local mob kingpin. It’s because of the Don that Vito loses his job.
• Vito’s neighbor and buddy, Clemenza says “Here, stash these guns for me.” He does. (that’s like 5 minutes).
• He goes to the opera with his buddy who points out this chick he thinks is hot, who’s under the thumb of the Don.
• Clemenza gets Vito to help him break into the guy’s apartment and steal his carpet, while claiming the guy wanted them to have it (PS who steals a guy’s carpet?)
• Don Fannucci asks Vito for some of the money he’s been pulling down. After a lot of discussion, Vito offers Don Fannucci like ¼ of what he asked for. Don Fannucci says “hey isn’t that great?” (huh?) here’s another, like, 15 minutes.
• Vito goes to shoot Don Fannucci. We all know this is what’s going to happen, yet we have to sit through Fannucci going through the processional back to his place, Vito going to his place, Vito hiding, Vito unscrewing the light, the guy getting back to his place, Vito breaking the gun into pieces, Vito tossing each piece of the gun down various chimneys, Vito running…
• “My little kid loves having a dog, and even though we’re not paying rent and we’re not supposed to have pets, I don’t understand why the landlord would kick us out.” Landlord: “Of course, I kicked them out, they have pets and I could get a lot more for that room.” Vito: “Go ask around who I am.” Next day guy comes back “Oh holy crap, yes, I didn’t know. Your friend can stay and I’ll give her all sorts of piles of money too.” What could people have possibly told the landlord? “Hey, this guy Vito… remember that fat-ass mob boss that used to run this area? Vito snuck into his place and shot him.” Sure, that could be kinda frightening to realize this guy’s willing to kill, but Vito’s basically threatening him before he knows who Vito is. Does it matter much if the guy who is threatening to shoot you is a big man on campus or just some schlub with a gun? Lead poisoning is lead poisoning. (another, like, 15 minutes to basically say “people in the town now respect him and he’s in charge”)
• Vito goes back to Sicily and cuts up the guy who killed his family. (another, like, 10 minutes).
As an independent movie, I contend this would be REALLY boring. When compared directly up against Michael’s time in Havana, Fredo betraying him, etc., it seems to me to really pale in comparison.
One of the things that you’re “missing” is that you’re to compare and contrast (10th grade English paper term there!) the style and manner in which Vito built his empire… in the manner of a friend doing people favors, said “friend” having a fierce reputation that does the job for him… and how Michael maintains it, in a far more corporate, Machiavellian, the “deal” is all that counts, manner.
A lot of this is clearer in the book: Fanucci was considered a bad ass. This young guy not only stands up to the bad ass, he makes him lose face when Fanucci accepts the lower amount. Vito then decides that the neighborhood is better off without somebody who “preys on his own people” (I seem to remember that line in the book), kills him, and keeps the money for himself, except for a small payout for Clemeza/Tessio.
Since Clemenza and Tessio (in the book, not in the movie IIRC) weren’t up to the task of killing Fanucci, they gave Vito the leader role by default. Vito expands his activities, finally becoming a Godfather during Prohibition.
And Vito had to kill the guy who killed his family. It’s just the way things were (are) done: Vito would’ve lost a lot of respect if he didn’t get his vengeance.
I think your problem is that you are trying to compare the Rise of Vito to the parallel Rise of Michael. That was never intended in the book, and in my mind, was never intended by the movie (of course, I could be way off on that).
If you see the Rise of Vito as an “origins story” for the latter-day Vito, it works perfectly. That’s they way it was woven into the book, and I think it was stronger that way…TRM
I never thought of it as a parallel either, more of an origin and continuation. IMHO, the backstory on Vito seems to reinforce Michael’s character as the family legacy.
I think it was supposed to be a comparison to the *Fall *of Michael.
The Goidfather films, to me, were always about the immigrant experience. The second movie was all about contrasting the first generation - hard working, devoted to their families, old fashioned, direct - to their children, who were completely American and had lost touch with their past. Coppola, as a member of that second generation, was essentially turning the camera against himself.
The fact that they were all criminals is incidental to the story.
I believe that part of the “Young Vito” sequence is to show everybody that, despite his outer appearances, Vito is utterly ruthless in his desire to get what he wants, as ruthless as Michael… he’s just nicer about it. I’m sure that he saw Clemenza’s refusal to stand up for the “love of his life” at the opera as a severe character flaw.
See this does help. This is why I loves me some SD. I haven’t read the book. If Fanucci was more of a tool in the movie (Ya know, doing more to lean on people than “hey, you’re gonna hire this kid to work in your store” and “I want to wet my beak”), it’d be clearer. Sounds like the backstory was presented a lot more compellingly in the book.
Another aspect of the flashbacks I forgot to bring up — Fredo’s sick with fever and such. The docs bleed him with leeches. Okay great, that’s a nod to the audience “ha ha that’s why Fredo’s an idiot.” But a) if that scene weren’t there, it’s not as if I’d be asking “Gee I wonder if there’s a medical reason for Fredo being a schmuck”, and b) what does Fredo being a sick kid have to do with Vito’s narrative?
It’s not so much about Fredo being sick, but to contrast Vito and Michael as parents. Vito is portrayed throughout GF I and GF II as a devoted father and family man - caring for the sickly Fredo being one example. What does he say to Johnny Fontane in GF I? “A man who doesn’t spend time with his family can never be a real man.”
Michael, on the other hand, when we last saw him, came back from Cuba after not having seen his children or wife for months and needs Tom Hagen to tell him what he bought his son for Christmas because he hadn’t been there. When he does return to Tahoe he’s almost like an outsider within his own family.
The Young Vito section was in there, basically, because it was in the book. Yeah, yeah, I know, not everything in the book was in the movies. But after Godfather I, the sequel almost had to include the Young Vito stuff to tie it in with the first movie, and to placate the hard-core.
Here’s one commentary on **johnspartan’s **notes:
Vito was prepared to deal with a combative Fannucci when he offered him the 1/4 of what was asked for. He wasn’t about to take any shit from this guy and he needed to know where he stood. When Fannucci acquiesced so easily, it proved to Vito what an impotent Fannucci really was. Killing him was as logical as flushing the toilet.
Not to dog pile, but more proof of Vito’s contempt for Fanucci is in the book (or at least deleted scenes from the movie.) At one point, Vito watches as a couple of thugs try to rob Fanucci in a dark alley. If Fanucci were really a force to be reckoned with, Vito figures, no one would dare attack him. Then later Fanucci allows one of the thugs to buy off his vengeance, an offer no respectable Sicilian would ever accept.
But like everyone has said, the Vito scenes are for comparison to Michael. When someone refuses Vito a favor, he simply says “Ask the around the neighborhood about me, they’ll tell you I’m a good friend to have.” Refuse Michael, and you get framed with a dead hooker. Vito gets revenge for his brother. Michael gets revenge ON his brother.
Geary didn’t just refuse Michael a favor, Senator Geary leaned on Michael, demanding extortion form the Corleone family for the gaming license, then teling him “I don’t like you people”, in his HOUSE, where his wife sleeps, where his children play with their toys. I’m no mafia Don, but if someone did that to me in my own house, I would probably run them off with the broom, or take off my belt and chase them out the door. Micheal told Senator Geary that he (Geary) would pay the license fee himself for the family’s Casino, then arranged for that to happen. I think Vito and the lazy dog lady’s landlord was a good contrast.
Nitpick: that was Genco, Vito’s future consigliere, not Clemenza.
As for the OP, the first time I saw GF2, I similarly preferred the Michael story and got impatient with the Vito bits. I still think of Michael’s narrative as the core of the film, but now I’ve come to see the Vito story as essential in casting an ironic light onto Michael’s situation (as well as containing some incredibly beautiful cinematography). While both Vito and Michael are willing to employ ruthless measures to get what they want, Vito is doing it for his family–notice how most of Vito’s scenes return to his wife and kids (like at the end of the beautiful and riveting sequence centering on Fanuccio’s assassination–Vito returning home to find his whole little family watching the parade from the stoop of their tenement house, and he takes the little Michael in his arms and says to him: “Michael, your father loves you very much…very much” (though “very much” sounds so much nicer in Italian: “bene assai… bene assai…”)
Those scenes are the perfect foil for Michael’s story, which is, as Alessan points out, the fall of Michael Corleone. While he’s even more ruthless than his father, all that results from his actions is the alienation and dissolution of his family, not the protection of it–despite Michael’s own intentions (remember the scene where he’s talking to his mother about how he fears he might lose his family). By the end, he’s driven everyone away himself–Kay’s left him, Mama Corleone has passed away, and Fredo has been taken out and shot on Michael’s own orders–and the film ends with Michael left utterly alone on the shores of Lake Tahoe.
The perfect ending for the film, which makes it all the more regrettable that, 16 years later, they went and made the unnecessary and deeply-flawed Godfather Part III.
That was not Clemenza in the opera. That was Genco Abbandando, the guy Vito worked with in the Abbandando grocery store who later became Consiglieri to Don Corleone