63rd Academy Awards (1991)
Nominations: 7
Wins: 0
This year we waited until there was less than half a fortnight until the Oscars to start our annual review series, so welcome to Oscars WEAK: a week of reviews of best picture winners and nominees. For my part, I’ll be starting with 1990’s The Godfather Part III, or, more specifically, the recut version director Francis Ford Coppola put out in 2020 for its 30th anniversary: The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone. It’s the end of a journey that started late last year when YouTube started randomly(?) showing me clips from 2022 miniseries The Offer, the Miles Teller-led streaming prestige project about the production of the first Godfather (and how ultimately it was just as important as The Longest Yard). Intrigued by the amusing voices the entire cast seemed to be doing, I eventually caved and watched the whole thing, and, naturally, after those 10 episodes I had to rewatch The Godfather and then Part II. And you know what, they’re still pretty good.
I have always stopped at Part II. I’ve seen both movies a few times each, most recently a decade ago when HBO released the uncut The Godfather: The Complete Epic 1901–1959, one of the famous chronological edits that is weird and definitely worse than just watching both movies in order. But even after going through all of that – and being an established Sofia Coppola fan – I never bothered to try Part III. I guess the biggest reason is that everyone has been upfront that it was a cash grab: Coppola is on the record that he thought the story was over with Part II and he only made this because he was hurting financially after a couple of flops and casting took a decade because everyone coming back wanted a big payday. I, however, am not getting paid. So if the story is already perfect and done, why weigh myself down with knowledge of a disappointing sequel? Plenty of other New Hollywood directors have led me down this path before.
But the rerelease caught my eye because it had that new title. It’s not “Part III” anymore, it’s a “coda.” This isn’t the next act in Michael Corleone’s epic saga, it’s an epilogue where we see the chilling consequences of his actions and decisions. Now, I did get the blu ray for Christmas five years ago so I still wasn’t in *that* much of a hurry to watch this, but I’m glad circumstances finally coalesced for me to sit through this last chunk of the saga. And you know what? In the new context Coppola created for it, the one he and series creator Mario Puzzo always intended it to be seen in, it works. It isn’t in the same league as its predecessors, but I liked The Godfather Part III. Let me tell you about it.
It’s 1979 and Michael Corleone (a cosmetically aged-up Al Pacino) is getting ready to retire. The guilt of his bloody rise to power and the alienation he’s experienced because of it has left him resolved to spending his final years quietly, subtly trying to atone. He donates millions to charities and is closer than ever to his goal of taking his family completely legitimate by going into business with the Vatican Bank. His closest advisor is his sister Connie (Talia Shire), who by contrast has become more ruthless and cunning in the decades since her husband and two of her brothers died. It is Connie who brings Vincent Mancini (Andy García), Sonny’s illegitimate son, into Michael’s orbit, asking the godfather to step into the conflict between Vincent and his rival, Joey Zasa (Joe Mantegna). Michael tries to broker a peace, but Vincent can’t resist biting a part of Zasa’s ear off. Upset but reluctantly impressed, Michael begins grooming Vincent as his heir.
And Michael for sure needs a successor after being let down but his actual children. He’s divorced Kay (Diane Keaton) and their two children take more after her than the Corleones. Anthony (Franc D’Ambrosio), their son, is dropping out of law school to pursue a career in opera and wants nothing to do with the family business. On the other hand, their daughter Mary (Sofia Coppola) wants exactly the worst possible entry into the Corleone life: she’s got a crush on Vincent. Her first cousin. Yeah, did you guys know about this? That there’s a whole incest thing? Michael’s opposed to their relationship but it feels like its more because he wants her to avoid sharing the fate of his first wife, Apollonia, who was killed in an attempt on Michael’s life back in the first movie. You’d think he could just be like “no dating cousins.” Of all the things for Al Pacino gets to overreact to in this movie, somehow cousin love didn’t make the cut.
Anyway, despite being a “coda,” The Godfather Part III does not shy away from being as epic as its predecessors. The film weaves together all these family dynamics with perplexing papal politics, with the Corleone deal hitting snags due to cardinal meddling as well as some classic double crossing and in-fighting, as Joey Zasa takes his shot at Michael’s throne. This movie has the series’ most insane action set piece as well as some of its most brutal kills. It even introduces an unstoppable world-class assassin who never misses his mark and dresses up like a priest. Is the grandiose stuff at odds with the more humble story of regret and atonement? Sure but you gotta give the people what they want.
Except for the main thing I wanted, more Robert Duvall! Tom Hagen, Michael’s adoptive brother and family consigliere, is one of the most interesting characters in the first two movies. Allegedly, when he was invited back for the third movie, Duvall demanded that he make at least half of what Pacino did. Instead, they wrote Hagen out of the movie, adding in a new nothingburger of a family lawyer character and showing off Hagen’s successful son for no reason. It’s weak stuff and you can just tell they are vestiges of a meaty Hagen plotline that we missed out on. How would Tom interact with Sonny’s son? How would the decades have changed the most even-keeled Corleone compared to Michael and Connie? I would have liked to know.
The Godfather Part III was nominated for seven Academy Awards, making it the first cinematic trilogy that all its installments were nominated for Best Picture (an honor now shared with The Lord of the Rings). But it didn’t actually win any of them, and for the first time Al Pacino’s Michael Corleone wasn’t nominated for an Oscar – just when they thought he was in, they pulled him back out! Sofia Coppola did win two Golden Raspberries though. A bit of context I didn’t know and maybe you didn’t either: The part of Mary originally went to Julia Roberts, who dropped out due to scheduling conflicts. Then it went to Winona Ryder, who started filming but also quit after a few weeks due to nervous exhaustion. At that point, the bankrupt Francis Ford Coppola cast his daughter Sofia in the role to keep the production on track. This is a last minute sub, not a star-making turn. So a 19-year-old nepobaby wasn’t in the same league as some of the finest actors in the history of the medium reprising their most iconic roles – big deal! I’m calling sexism on this one fam… maybe it’s the cut I watched, but Mary’s part wasn’t nearly as big as the hype had me ready to believe. Maybe Roberts or Ryder or someone else make more out of the part, but there’s a lot more going on here. We need to spend less time being horrible to women and more time celebrating the scene where Michael drinks orange juice and eats candy.