Francis Ford Coppola - 2020 - USA
Sadly, the curse that’s hung over
the third Godfather film for 30 years is not lifted by the new re-edit
from Francis Ford Coppola. Yes, Coppola was wronged all those years ago. The
1990 film was great, it wasn’t a flop by any regard, and it was nominated for
awards. But it was swept into the vindictive, unenlightened anti-Coppola buzz
that the press whipped up anyway, and for some reason it’s never been able to
recover in the public mind. Speaking as someone who loves The Godfather, Part
III, I was hoping that Coda would make it even better. I wasn’t expecting a
whole new film in the manner of Apocalypse Now Redux or The Outsiders: The
Complete Novel, which were indeed restorations that have become definitive, but
I did hope for some material to be included that Coppola may have been
compelled to leave on the cutting room floor due to the studio’s merciless
production schedule throughout 1990. On the contrary, all I noticed was that at
least half-a-dozen wonderful scenes from the original cut are now gone without a trace; including the haunting opening images of the Corleone house in Lake
Tahoe, the seat of power in Part II, now in disrepair. Aside from such
conspicuous deletions, the only significant changes are the opening scene - the
Michael/archbishop negotiation formerly placed at the beginning of the second
act, and the finale, which now ends a few seconds earlier to make the film’s
subtitle a little more symbolic and ambiguous. Unusual for Coppola, he also now
inserts a needless bit of text after the fadeout regarding the long memories of
Sicilians. I haven’t looked at a comprehensive side-by-side write-up, but in general it does feel like some tightening up of scenes has
been beneficial, as well as little clarifications via subtitles and snippets of
off-camera dialogue. Overall, Coda is an unfortunate missed opportunity because
The Godfather, Part III is one film that is extremely overdue for respect, and
I don’t imagine that anyone is going to be won over by Coda if they never liked the
original version in the first place, except in the sense that this new release
may cause some people to revisit the film for the first time in 30 years, and
perhaps see it with new eyes. That would make it more than worthwhile. As for
me, I’ll be keeping Part III on my shelf and will most likely always regard Coda
as a curiosity that has a few rewards but cannot comprehensively replace its
predecessor. I can’t call it an improvement in any real sense, but it is
interesting as an alternate version.
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