If you ask a room full of people what the greatest film of all time is, chances are The Godfather will be among the first few films mentioned. That’s at least what my dad promised me when he sat me down to watch Francis Ford Coppola’s 1973 opus for the first time. I am a self-proclaimed movie buff, and I do my best to approach anything I watch with a critical eye. My first reaction was sheer surprise at how modern the film felt. Despite—or perhaps in part due to—its age, the film is absolutely dripping with sultry style, moving from intimate scenes to epic set pieces and back, with a razor-sharp and infinitely quotable script to match.
More than 50 years on, this film is still influential and thought-provoking, raising questions about family, responsibility, the American dream, and personal morality. The new Audible Original podcast aims to further raise the bar on Godfather analysis. Host Rebecca Keegan dives into the series in a never-before-heard way, probing the deepest trenches of Coppola’s work and presenting exclusive insights from the legendary cast, including Al Pacino, Robert Duvall, Robert De Niro, and Talia Shire. I reached out to ask some of my most burning questions about the Corleone family and the series’ legacy on the silver screen.
Seth Hartman: It’s been over 50 years since the release of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather, but as this podcast explores, the film’s ability to continue captivating audiences has not diminished half a century after its initial debut. Why has the film endured for you personally?
The big ideas and the little details are what make The Godfather endure. The biggest idea in it for me is to ask the question of who really gets to live the American dream. In the case of The Godfather, you’re talking about first-generation Italian Americans after World War II trying to build a life in a new country and hold onto themselves. It’s something I think any group of people who feel like outsiders in a culture can relate to, no matter the year or the location, and that’s why you’ll meet Godfather fans all over the world, from all kinds of different demographic backgrounds.
And the little details in The Godfather are what ground that big idea—the beauty of the tomato garden where Vito dies, the tenderness of the mafia men making meatballs together, Clemenza needing to pick up cannolis for his wife. As I’m writing I’m realizing a lot of these details have to do with food and food is hugely important in this movie. It’s part of how people connect in this family. Part of the reason the movie and the characters feel so real is because the food is so specific and so carefully chosen.
The saga of the Corleone family is often compared to the plays of William Shakespeare. Do you think this is a fair comparison? And, if so, which work of his most closely resembles The Godfather?
I’m pretty sure 99 percent of Best Picture winners owe some debt to Shakespeare as a storyteller, and The Godfather is no exception. There’s surely some in Vito Corleone, as an aging leader trying to pass on his empire to his children. And there’s some in Michael and Kaye, as two young lovers who are tragically star-crossed.
There are a lot of visual motifs throughout The Godfather, such as the sight of oranges on screen warning viewers about an upcoming death. What are some lesser-known filmmaking flourishes that Coppola utilized in order to inform the storytelling of his series?
Coppola’s cinematographer, Gordon Willis, was known as the “King of Darkness,” and he earned that title from the very first frame of The Godfather, where Marlon Brando is in a dark room, lit from above, in a way that communicates this quiet power. This idea of using light and shadow to reflect a character’s state of mind is something we might take for granted today, but it was groundbreaking for a studio film in that era. Studios were making movies bright so that people could see them clearly at the drive-in theater, and here was this filmmaker saying, actually, what you can’t see is just as important to the story. It made the audience lean in.
If The Godfather were to be remade or expanded upon today, would you want a prequel, sequel, or limited television series? And what characters would you most want to follow?
Part of me would love to see a limited series of The Godfather from Mama Corleone’s point of view. Think about it. She immigrates from Italy as a young woman. Marries this sweet, handsome guy. One day he’s bringing her home a pear from his job at the grocer, the next he’s presiding over a criminal empire that will eventually suck in her children. How much does Mama know about Vito’s job? What does she want in life? For herself or for her kids? There’s a lot of untapped potential in the female characters in this series.
While some viewers consider the story of Michael Corleone to be a cautionary tale of power and greed, others see it as a great American success story. In your opinion, what is the most potent thematic undertone that the film series delivers?
For what it's worth, I am staunchly in the cautionary tale camp. In his quest for power, Michael gives up everything that really matters. He loses the people who are important to him, he loses his sense of self. One of the questions The Godfather movies pose is whether what Michael does as the emerging head of a crime family is so different from what a politician grabbing for power does. The first two Godfather movies came out in theaters as the Watergate scandal was unfolding in the US and the country was losing its faith in its government. I think skepticism about power infuses the whole series.
Do you have any personal favorite film-focused audiobooks or podcasts that you’d recommend to listeners after they’ve finished The Godfather: A Film We Can’t Refuse?
I’m a huge fan of audiobooks, especially for my long LA commute. I’m currently in the middle of listening to , Griffin Dunne’s wildly entertaining family memoir, which has a lot in it for people who love both Hollywood history and tragicomic family sagas.
One of the many colorful characters we talk about in our podcast is Paramount studio chief Robert Evans, and his memoir, , is a classic in the genre. Evans, who died in 2019, narrates the version of the book that’s on Audible, and listening to it feels like you’re in his den having a cocktail with one of Hollywood’s greatest raconteurs.
Amy Nicholson, one of the key, critical voices in our podcast, has a film podcast called , which she cohosts with comedian Michael Sheer. They watch classic films to see if they’re as good as they remember and the Godfather episodes in particular are excellent listening.