Module 3 Overview & the PPT PDF on the Godfather 1/Goodfellas
Death:
Sicilian wife, brothers, many mobsters.
Portrayal of female characters
Key (naïve): Anglo-Saxon teacher, somehow involved with Michael. Aware of the family business, but pretends not to know; "willful suspension of disbelief" (Coleridge) and always takes Michael back.
Different worlds of men and women.
Mafia = man's world, doors close in their face.
Transition from Old World "values" to the new
Mafia driven primarily by capitalism.
US Mafia Film Clichés: Godfather I
Mario Puzo, The Godfather, 1969: Saga about Don Vito Corleone's family and crime empire and Coppola was 29, no previous knowledge or experience with the mafia. Won 3 Oscars.
Flawed heroes / anti-heroes:
Michael = war hero; kills the person who tried to kill his father; a flawed hero.
Thematics • Justice / morality:
Michael never wanted to be part of the family business.
Techniques
New genre of mafia film; unorthodox approach of combining realistic content with formalistic storytelling.
By the end of this module, students will be able to:
Objective number 1: compare and contrast the reception of Italian and American Mafia in the cinematic representation of organized crime in the works studied.
The American dream:
Vito coming to the US.
Stylized storytelling deliberately avoids resemblance to Coppola's epic portrayal.
Voiceover assumes a new and fundamental role: Henry is our guide through the underworld, in a distortion of Dante's guide Virgil in the Inferno.
Course Objective 2
Analyze iconic Mafia films The Godfather and GoodFellas.
Anthropological Study of the Mob: Goodfellas
Based on the non-fiction book Wiseguy (1985), but a NY crime reporter Nicholas Pileggi.
Observation: we observe.
But Henry also observes, often as an outsider. He can never "be made", not fully Italian.
Desire for respect and legitimacy:
Don Vito wants better for Michael; Michael wants to go completely legitimate.
Organized crime identified with Italian ethnicity.
Ethnically authentic scenes, weddings, dances, conversations in Sicilian.
Henry drops out of school and becomes involved with a local crime gang led by Paul Cicero, he becomes friends with Jimmy Conway and Tommy DeVito.
He climbs through the ranks, commits murder, robberies, drug trafficking, and finally gets a 10-year prison sentence, he also sells drugs in prison, and after he is released his life quickly spirals out of control.
Scorsese was reluctant to make another mob movie, until he read this book.
He wanted it to be much less glamorous and epic, and instead a more documentary day-to-day portrait of the lives of ordinary low-ranking mobsters, including the tedium, the minutia of everyday operations.
He is arrested again, and having lost all the drugs he had in a police raid, he decides to turn state's evidence, and goes in the witness protection program.
He was eventually kicked out of the program for numerous drug-related arrests, and he died in 2012.
Goodfellas, cont.
The film chronicles the life of a real-life mobster Henry Hill from 1955-1980.
From the PowerPoint PDF
This here section is about the Godfather I, Francis Ford Coppola, 1972 AND Goodfellas, Martin Scorsese, 1990.
Faustian elements; a deal with the devil
an arrangement in which an ambitious person surrenders moral integrity in order to achieve power and success.
Parallel editing at the end of Godfather I:
baptism, new life, acceptance in the Christian family, and death of the four heads of the NY crime families; Michael becomes Godfather, literally and figuratively.
Innovative content:
gangsters at the street level.
Connie (spoiled, hysterical, bullied, abused):
gets everything she wants for her wedding, without questioning where it comes from, her husband is abusive, causes her brother's death, she knows her brother killed him, but never betrays the family, ideal mafia wife. and some character development.
Good and evil within humanity:
glamorization of mobsters who help and kill at the same time.
Mamma Corleone never questions her husband:
has no dialogue with other characters, she is content to serve her husband, always tranquil and smiling, happy in her role; no character development.
From the course on the Mafia in American Films...
here are the learning objectives.
Father - son relationship:
how Vito relates to his sons.
Corruption:
people, politicians, police.
Importance:
portrayal of mafia operations in the US, but glamorizes the idea of the mafia, the lifestyle, giving mafiosi a certain type of morality that they were completely deprived of.
Goodfellas Themes
seduction
Mafia world dominated by
sense of danger and uncertainty.
Themes cont.
social mobility
Linear structure:
speeds up gathering intensity (especially the murders).
Anthropological study of
the mob at the ground level.
Iconography:
use of superstars of Hollywood, well dressed, soft spoken, cultured, gentlemen.
Documentary elements:
voiceover, titles with dates and locations of events, forward-tracking shots. Both Henry and Karen have voiceover parts, paradoxically contributing to the film's realism.
Crucial points built around religious ceremonies
wedding, funeral, baptism.
