The Godfather
(1972)
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Francis Ford Coppola's epic masterpiece features Marlon Brando in his Oscar winning role as the patriarch of the Corleone family. Director Coppola paints a chilling portrait of the Sicilian clan's rise and near fall from power in America, masterfully balancing the story between the Corleone's family life and the ugly crime business in which they are engaged. Based on Mario Puzo's best-selling novel and featuring career-making performances by Al Pacino, James Caan and Robert Duvall, this searing and brilliant film garnered ten Academy Award nominations, and won three including Best Picture of 1972. |
This crime drama and its 1974 sequel are among American cinema's finest achievements since the Second World War. The production problems are well documented — how Paramount wanted a quickie, how Francis Ford Coppola came cheap and how he turned the picture into an epic success, a box-office hit that was also an artistic triumph. His first masterstroke was casting Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall and Diane Keaton, four relative unknowns and one known risk; his next masterstroke was to keep cool under fire, like Michael Corleone himself, turning Mario Puzo's pulp novel into art and showing how capitalism and crime go hand in hand. It's thrilling, romantic, tense and scary — a five-course meal that leaves you hungry for more.
Halliwell's Film Guide
A brilliantly-made film with all the fascination of a snake pit: a warm-hearted family saga except that the members are thieves and murderers. Cutting would help, but the duller conversational sections do heighten the cunningly judged moments of suspense
Time Out
Theres plenty to object to in Francis Ford Coppolas insistently insular approach to Mafia life, played out here...