The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone

Well, they wanted to establish that Mary was young and naive, and attracted to the bad-boy type, and that Vincent was a horndog hothead like Sonny. That could be done in 10-20 minutes screen time.

The trick is, I don't think they want to "retcon" anything from the original theatrical cut of GF III out of existence. But they definitely need to shift the focus off the extended coverage of the kissin-cousins romance.

 

I just listened to the Ringer “Rewatchables” podcast of III. They noted that it was fairly well received at the time, and Ebert actually singled out Sofia as a “breath of fresh air”.

Apparently the studio was committed to making a third movie. Coppola was broke and needed the money. Winona showed up on set and was a mess.

They hardlined Duval even though the movie made a killing. Too bad nobody went to bat for him. How you go from Duval to Hamilton is a mystery.

The Vatican banking scandal was very hard to follow, and less interesting the Barzini-Tattaglia.

 

I think Hamilton was deliberately cast to type as a pretty boy suntanned lawyer -- the opposite of Tom Hagen's gritty NY street kid become a ruthless legal enforcer.

While Hagen had been the consigliere to both Vito and Michael, it's pretty clear throughout III that BJ Harrison is "out of the loop" on how the family really operates. He's never included in any of the discussions of the "family business," only in formal discussions with Michael over "legitimate" business.