New American Cinema: THE GODFATHER, Frances Ford Coppola

MY NOTES
When” THE GODFATHER” debuted at the end of 1972, it wasn’t hard to see why it created a stir among almost all Americans.  It exposed a very real American tradition of concealing the truth that you obtained your success through crimes   In viewing the Godfather, the audience is transformed into voiceless Corleones from the inside out. Americans loved to be invited into this hidden secret, sympathized with every atrocity.   Tolstoy wrote “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”  The Corleone family by all measures should have been happy.  They were unhappy.”  The Godfather set this phenomenon up:  The audiences of Godfather, Part Two swallowed this whole.