JeffTheAlpaca

It would be like saying Return of the Jedi was better than Empire Strikes Back but compared to other movies Part 3 was not horrible but in the godfather trilogy it looks inferior since 1 and 2 were two of the best movies of all time and it would be impossible to make a third movie as good as the first two when part 3 came out decades later.

Maybe if Coppola did Part 3 in the 70's and had a LOTR or Back to the Future 2 and 3 experience where he filmed 2 and 3 in the same time period maybe it would have been better?

Josh Z

That's exactly how my kids feel about the Star Wars movies. Of course, they're only 6, so they have an excuse.

DWilson

[QUOTE=JeffTheAlpaca;13819051

Maybe if Coppola did Part 3 in the 70's and had a LOTR or Back to the Future 2 and 3 experience where he filmed 2 and 3 in the same time period maybe it would have been better?[/QUOTE]

It definitely would have been different. Much like other directors who have said "This is how I always intended it", things change so much with time. Just follow all the talk and ideas that followed in the years since the first two films, and you'll see a lot of different ideas were considered. Obviously, Coppola was a much different director in a much different position when he made the third one.

Decker

I think it has way more to do with the regrettable decision not to pay Robert Duvall rather than the time elapsed. The Michael/Tom dynamic was so crucial to the story of the first two and to just arbitrarily replace him with George Hamilton of all people was just disastrous. As was the decision to kill off Tom with a single line of dialog. This is Michael's brother and consigliere, not just Clemenza. It was crucial to keep the dynamic of those two going.
And not to pile on Sophia, but yes, she really stunk up the place. It seems like he should have been able to cast someone with some previous acting expecience in the role.

Josh Z

Well, he tried. But Winona Ryder had a nervous breakdown and dropped out just before filming started, leaving Coppola in a bind with no time to recast. His daughter was the right age and he thought he could coach her through the necessary line readings enough to get by. Unfortunately, he was wrong.

Hazel Motes

This x 1000.

GoldenJCJ

I was just a kid when Godfather III was made so I don’t know the ins and outs of the casting but that seems like an odd excuse to me. You’re telling me that no other actresses were available for the final chapter of one of the biggest trilogies of all time? I would think there were a thousand actresses who would have gladly taken the role at the last minute of given the opportunity. Winona Ryder is fine but she’s not exactly the end all be all actress to fill that role.

OldBoy

Wow. Glad I got that $14.99 Amazon original price. This just went to $22.99!

Why So Blu?

Indeed, but on the bright side of things, He cast her in Dracula. He could have held a grudge, but didn't. Dracula is awesome.

Josh Z

The movie had already started production and was actively filming in Rome. Ryder was supposed to play the role but her scenes had to be rescheduled a number of times due to delays on production of Mermaids. When Ryder finally showed up on set, she was reported to look exhausted and ill. She was seen by a doctor who diagnosed her with "nervous exhaustion" and advised that she return home. Although Laura San Giacomo and Annabella Sciorra had both auditioned and were willing to step in, contract negotiations for either of them would have pushed production of the movie even further behind schedule. Both actresses were also very busy that year (each has three film credits in 1990), making scheduling very difficult. With a firm Christmas release date looming, Coppola made the decision to put his daughter in.

Believe me, I'm not saying it was the right decision. It clearly wasn't. But Coppola claims that the character was partially based on Sofia, and that she knew the dialogue because she'd done line-readings during pre-production to audition some of the other actors. He thought he could coach her through it, and that doing so would keep the movie from falling too far behind. As we've already said, he was sadly mistaken. Nevertheless, he was neck-deep in the middle of a difficult production and that was the call he made in the moment, which he would come to regret.

GoldenJCJ

^ That’s informative. Thanks.

It sounds like FFC was in a tight spot with that. Sofia wasn’t great but I’ve said before that she wasn’t as bad as her reputation makes her performance out to be. Aside from her terrible death scene, she was mostly passable. Not great but passable.

I agree with other posters that not bringing Duvall back was the bigger sin.

JeffTheAlpaca

Sofia redeemed herself when she became a director.

Maybe Reese Witherspoon was too young or not Italian enough for that role.

I knew she blew the audition to play the daughter in Cape Fear.

orangerunner

In defense of MR Round's opinion, I remember film critic Roger Ebert gave Godfather Part II a *** rating in 1974 and gave Godfather Part III a ***1/2 rating in 1990.

OldBoy

more than redeemed. And it’s not like she made the movie bad. It was already bad, imo. She was just included in the badness for a little bit.

Hazel Motes

Ebert has a long history of suspect ratings. I guess thats what happens when you see a movie before everyone else and it goes on to be a bonafide classic.

rocket1312

I won't go as far to say part III is better than part II, but I find II to be somewhat overrated. Part III at the very least moves the story forward. Part II is completely redundant and doesn't tell us a single thing about Michael we don't know the second Kay gets shut out of the office at the end of the first movie. Don't get me wrong, part II is better in just about every other conceivable way, but I at least find the idea of part III more interesting.

Why So Blu?

It's back to $14.99 on Amazon.

Bluelitespecial

It's being planned for the 50th Anniversary of The Godfather in 2022. I found this news on Digitalbits today.
https://thedigitalbits.com/columns/m...ts/101220-1400

Cartload

Read this as well! A bit nervous at the prospect of HDR with this one especially with Gordon Willis having passed.

I still want to see Coda ASAP so I’ll keep my preorder.

orangerunner

Roger Ebert mentioned he was always opposed to the star-rating system but obliged because the newspapers liked the format. He preferred the simple yes/no recommendation while allowing the text to speak to what degree he enjoyed the film.

There were instances where a few films in his top ten list were given three 1/2 stars when a couple of four-star reviewed films from that same year were left off.

Josh-da-man

One thing that bugged me about Godfather III was that if looked and felt like a movie set in 1990, not 1979.

So much of the aesthetic (sets, clothes) felt like more like late 80s yuppie excess than the late 70s swing you would expect.

And the helicopter scene seemed really out of place, like it was from a Rambo movie or GTA.

JeffTheAlpaca

This came out only 3 months after Goodfellas came out in Sept 1990 and that could have diminished the impact of this movie though both got nominated for best picture that year but lost to that turd Dances with Wolves.

orangerunner

The fall of 1990 had Goodfellas, State of Grace, Miller's Crossing and then finally The Godfather III. I think audiences were maybe a little burned-out from the genre by the time Godfather III came out. Arguably Godfather III was the fourth best of the bunch.

Josh Z

Godfather III was actually the highest grossing of those four movies by a wide margin, with 2.5x the box office of the other three combined. That said, all of them underperformed expectations.

State of Grace - $1.9 million
Miller's Crossing - $5 million
Goodfellas - $46.8 million
Godfather Part III - $136.8 million

I think audiences were not as much into gangster movies that year as the filmmakers were. The name recognition value of the Godfather franchise was the biggest draw for viewers.

dex14