The Godfather Part II

So much for that debate. In my humble opinion, The Godfather Part II doesn't even compare to its predecessor. It wasn't terrible. It wasn't even bad. In fact, it was really good. But for a film that is widely considered one of the greatest of all time, it disappointed me a bit. And it's not like I was expecting too much, or the wrong kind of movie; I just saw the first one last night. The first movie depicted a crime family and their inner circle. It was interesting to see different people step up and shy away as time went by and changes occurred. This time around, the film is split into two stories. One is that of a young Vito immigrating to America and making a reputation for himself. The other was of Michael continuing to run the Corleone family in the late 1950s. It seemed to me that the two stories - which had nothing to do with each other at all - could have easily been split into two separate movies. This move also would have knocked back the running time from its three hours and twenty minutes. Robert De Niro won an Oscar for best supporting actor for his role as young Vito, but I don't really see why, to be honest. He's on the screen for less than an hour and though he speaks in Italian for the majority of his time, I didn't really see any great emotional range from the guy. Al Pacino was slightly better, but even he didn't blow me away. And that's strange because many people have called his performance here one of the greatest of all time. I knew going into this pair of movies that I wouldn't come away regarding them as new found favorites, but at least after the first one I nodded and said, "yeah, I can definitely see what all the fuss is about." This time? Hardly. For whatever reason, I just didn't love this movie. On the bright side, I still have the much-maligned third one to watch, and I'm bound to go in with low expectations. Could I come away from that one nodding with approval? We'll see.