The Godfather Part III

The Godfather Part III went in really with quite the colossal task. It needed to somehow live up to its predecessors, which already had garnered its reputation as an undisputed masterpiece. That was not alone. There was even a bit of hazards, common to sequels, where for example the key cast member of Robert Duvall had to be written out, and it would seem so many of the character arcs were at an end in the first film. Where was there to go? Well only down this time, as with film trilogies third time is very often not the charm. I should say the Godfather Part III isn't a horrible film, it's just not a very good which is a problem when you come after two films deemed masterpieces by almost all. There are parts of it that are pretty horrible though. A few of the action moments, particularly a helicopter attack don't belong anywhere near a Godfather film and seem far more fitting to a generic crime thriller. Sophia Coppola as Michael's daughter is as a bad as the reputation suggests. Her wooden turn not only burdens every scene she is in, she ruins what is suppose to be a moment of sheer emotional devastation through her all time horrid line delivery of only a single line. Her "dad" is truly a marvel of bad acting. Her father really needed to find an actor for role as his daughter lacked the talent in that area. Also the film has one of the all time worst makeup jobs for a mainstream big budget film in whatever they slapped on Pacino for the last scene of the film ensuring the last shot of The Godfather as a whole was a laughable one. Those are the parts of the film that are horrible, the middle parts are more of just not anything special. The film retreads material from the first two films while rarely really expanding or continuing on it in interesting ways. We get just new Michael with touches of Sonny to come in, we just get a new evil don to take down, we get a new potential intrigue with a relationship with the church that doesn't really go anywhere, and we get a final sequence of death that try yet fail to come close to either of the finales of the first two films. Having said that there is just a touch of the old Godfather greatness to be found amidst a great deal of mediocrity. This mostly is in the exploration of Michael's regrets of his past mistakes. These scenes do capitalize on what came before in natural way and the scene where he confesses to the cardinal over the murder of Fredo is genuinely moving. These scenes though are few and far between. This is not an awful film however it is worthy for the distinction of one of the biggest disappointments of all time.
2.5/5