Well, what a coincidence. Last week I decided to watch III again. Saw it in the theatre with great anticipation and was disappointed, then again when the DVD set came. Felt about the same way. Watching for the 3rd time I thought it was mostly very good, with some classic lines and scenes, except for the ending. I will never understand the shot of an open-mouthed Michael with no sound, but more importantly it just seemed a cheap way to end the trilogy. A professional hit man tries to kill Michael and instead shoots his daughter in the heart. After seeing a violent opera, no less. There are many ways Michael could have ended up alone in Sicily, maybe because Mary would not have anything to do with him because he broke the romance. Anything except what happened.
A lot of people hated Sofia Coppola, and while there is a reason she became a director and not an actress, she wasn’t so bad, the character had nothing to say, her most significant lines were, “I love you, cuz.”
I have read that Coppola did not have final cut. I wonder if the final scene was his choice. In any case, I would like to see the new version. But not in the theater
I feel the first two movies told the entire story: the rise and the fall of Michael Corleone. There was nothing really left to say in the third movie and its meandering narrative was the result. I don’t see this as something that can be fixed with an edit.
Well, that is more or less what happened, it’s just that it was Anthony who rejected Michael, not Mary. But the ending still makes thematic sense, even if no one was really satisfied by it’s execution (sorry). Mary, the last vestige Michael had of a loving family, is condemned to pay for his sins.
“I feel the first two movies told the entire story: the rise and the fall of Michael Corleone. There was nothing really left to say in the third movie and its meandering narrative was the result. I don’t see this as something that can be fixed with an edit.”
I agree. The plot was frankly ludicrous and a number of scenes were bad remakes of Godfather I. And Sofia Coppola really was embarrassingly bad. IMHO, it would have been better if that movie had never been made.
Personally, I had no problem with the ending. As you mentioned, some of the middle scenes just didn’t sit well with me. The reintroduction of some of the characters was terrific: Calo and Don Tomasino. Kay, not so much.
the portrayal of kay in the movies is a bit off than the book … especially in the second movie as at the end of the first book michael gives kay an out whenever she wants it and she knowingly goes back so what they had her do in the 2nd movie confused me,
I have never seen Godfather III but I distinctly remember a comment in the review in Newsweek back when it first came out. “One of the Godfather movies has to be the worst, and this is it.” Not exactly a ringing endorsement.
(From faulty memory) There’s a big meeting around a big table in what looks like a boardroom. A helicopter with a machine gun hovers outside and mows them all down. It was something better suited to a 80s action flick.
