corleones

Considering his passing last week, I figured that I had to choose a shot by Gordon Willis this week. But with so many iconic images in so many iconic films, which would it be? I’m betting that when it comes to this movie that many of you would have selected a different moment, but for me this shot says a lot.

To truly appreciate the image, we need to remind ourselves what has just happened in the story. Moments ago, Vito Corleone made a power-grab by killing The Don of his part of New York City. He did it because he didn’t believe in the way The Don worked. He did it because he believed he could do a better job. He did it by first earning the Don’s respect. He did it in cold blood. He hid in the shadows outside of Don Fanucci’s door on the day of a festival and killed him without warning.

There’s a saying about what’s fair in love and war that probably applies here.

But that brings us to this moment. After the deed is done, Vito doesn’t run and doesn’t hide. He calmly walks away…as if he’s killed a rodent that has been bothering a neighbour. From Fanucci’s door, he calmly takes the scenic route back down to the festival below. There he rallies up with his family on the stoop where they are watching the celebrations. He joins his wife Carmella (quick show of hands – who actually knew that was her name?), and his three sons Santino, Fredo, and Michael. Behind them, musicians play along with the festivities. Around them, the community is gathered in joy.

Vito Corleone has just snuffed out a human life – one that will greatly impact the people gathered on the street this day – and here he sits like nothing is wrong.

Perhaps that’s the trick to killing in the name – you have to be able to convince yourself that it doesn’t matter. Perhaps that’s the reason it became such a big part of the way America was built – something that is winked at with the flags Santino and Fredo are playing with. In this moment both parents’ faces are hard to read. Carmella looks somewhere between concerned and confused. If we’re to go on what we know about Corleone Family Business, we should suppose that she doesn’t know what her husband has just done. That look though would suggest she knows something. She has to – she would. As great a liar as any man thinks he is, there are tells that a wife can pick up on. So Vito might be telling himself that what he has just done was “strictly business”, but I’d suggest that Carmella already knows that isn’t true.

But even if it was “strictly business”, that doesn’t look like something Vito is comfortable with yet. His expression is very numb, very distant. He can’t revel in the celebrations happening around him, and can’t look his wife in the eye. All he can do is hold on to Michael and lose himself. Is he hoping that Michael won’t one day have to do what he just did? Is he worried that he will have to teach him? If he is, then these hopes and worries are already too late. He has sealed his family’s fate. They are destined to become a powerful piece of the landscape in his city, and likewise his country…and it’s a destiny that’s been mapped with bloodshed.

Vito fled from Sicily to escape a man who had no reservations about killing not only his enemies, but his enemies’ family members. Now here he sits in his adopted homeland…well on his way to becoming the very man he came there to run away from.

 

Here’s three more from THE GODFATHER pt. 2 for the road…

 

young vito

visitor

you broke my heart

This series of posts is inspired by the “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” series at The Film Experience. Do check out all of the awesome entires in their series so far

6 Replies to “Freeze Frame: THE GODFATHER pt. 2

  1. Great analysis of such a key moment in the entire Godfather saga. I wish that I had the time to revisit the series (well, at least the first two parts). It’s easy to forget just how well-crafted those films were when you go beyond the scenes that everyone remembers.

    1. Yep – it’s those “moments in between” that make the films so incredible. Plenty of films can make their mark when you remember the beautiful goals they scored…it’s their play away from the puck that truly cements their legacy.

      /metaphor

  2. Reading your analysis really illuminates the parallel, I think, between this moment and the end of “Mystic River”, which I hadn’t considered before. Or am I crazy? And also a good reminder that Willis’s camera could capture humanity’s essence as well as shadow and darkness

    1. Jesus, why didn’t I think about MYSTIC RIVER!!?? It takes this whole narrative arc and up’s the ante by bringing the killer’s wife into the fray too! Dammit – now I want a re-write…

      The darkness of these films is what I will always love about them, and also why I’m loathe to switch them to blu-ray (where more detail has been pulled from the darks). There’s so much uncertainty in those shadows, so much of the characters’ personal darkness being evoked.

  3. That is a great analysis of a very poignant scene. It’s one that showcases what Vito has done as the life that he once had as a hard-working Italian-American is no more as it would be a world that he now has to be a part of. Yet, there’s also a fear considering that his children will be part of that dark world as I think the film is also about Vito Corleone’s rise and how he tries to balance his life as a family man and ensure that they don’t take part in the world he’s in. At the same time, it’s about Michael Corleone’s descent into paranoia and distrust as he would lose his family and have his own brother killed.

    1. Thank-you sir…I was afraid for a moment that I was wandering well out on to a limb with this particular selection.

      I gotta believe that emphasis on the family is underlined by the children playing with those flags. Neat little symbolism of the culture they came from, and the culture they will grow-up in.

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