The first one, which most people mention, is the acting. I've barely left myself room to talk about the good points. But by the time the climax rolls around, the whole has more of an arbitrary feeling-this is especially clear in the dénouement, which seems to just end. The scenes, except for the fat that needed to be trimmed, are excellent in isolation. The film begins to feel more like a couple seasons of a television show that Coppola tried to cram into a 3 and a half hour film, or worse, a collection of deleted scenes. The Michael Corleone story has a lot of fat, including much of the Cuba material (for example, sitting around the table with the President, laboriously passing around a solid gold telephone), the Senate hearings (which go on far too long to make and provide the dramatic points), and so on. Instead of taking good advice about where to trim fat, the artist decides to just leave much of it in, and they now have the clout to override any dissenting and more sensible opinions. That happens when an artist becomes successful enough that they can fire or ignore their editor(s). Coppola appears to have been suffering from what I'd now call "J.K.
There's also a lot of sprawl in the Michael Corleone segments. The prequel, at least, would have been a solid 10. It begins to feel like we're toggling back and forth between two films, which is the track that should have been taken. As good as they are, they go on far too long, and happen far too frequently, to sustain the momentum of either the Michael story or the Vito-as-a-youngster story. This is maybe first evident in the flashbacks. But let's talk about the main plague of the film-sprawl. For my money, these were the best scenes of the film, although maybe that's a bit of my bias creeping in, as I'm a huge De Niro fan. Coppola and Puzo also treat us to many extended "flashback" segments, and I mean way back, to Vito as a boy and young man, played by Robert De Niro. There are bit too many characters who aren't well enough presented or explained. During the middle section of the film, which goes on for hours, we also have a hint of a problem that plagued The Godfather-a bloated cast. Rather than feeling like a clever set-up, it starts to feel like slightly muddled writing. This may have all been part of a grand scheme to set up the responsible parties, but one of the flaws of the film is that Coppola doesn't convey Michael's underlying thoughts about this very well, not even later, and not through his actions. He accuses different people of involvement in the attempted hit depending on whom he is talking to. This launches a complicated sequence of events that has Michael, who is now living in Nevada, traveling to Miami, Cuba, New York, and so on. Michael believes that someone on the "inside" was involved with the hit. After the party is over, there is an attempted hit on Michael, and we quickly learn that not everything is rosy in the Corleone's mafia world. Perhaps during this segment, perhaps a bit after, we realize that maybe the beginning wasn't so clever after all, because the structure of The Godfather Part II parallels The Godfather from a broad perspective, as if Coppola and co-writer Mario Puzo used the first film as something of a template to create this one. Like the first film, the party consumes a lot of time while we get to know some of the principal characters. We see Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) "in the role" of his father, Vito (Marlon Brando), from the first film, accepting prostrating guests while a party is going on outside. Director/co-writer Francis Ford Coppola cleverly begins the film with parallels to The Godfather. Because it should have been a 10, and most other reviews will tell you about the positive points at length, I may pick on more things in my review than you would think I would for a 9, but rest assured that even with the flaws, The Godfather Part II is still essential viewing. The bad news is that this should have easily been a 10, but overall, it is so sprawling and unfocused that I can't possibly give it more than a 9, which it only earns because the assets transcend what's basically a mess overall. The good news is that The Godfather Part II has many amazing qualities, including fantastic performances from a superb cast, sublime, unprecedented visuals that no one else has been able to capture since, and very engaging stories. This is a direct continuation of that story.
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Series note: It is almost unthinkable to watch this film without having seen The Godfather (1972) first.
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