Long and laborious, and so very cold and pointless... how is this a classic?

Rating: 1/10 (14 May 2006)

I'm a modern type of movie viewer, but I can appreciate classics, like "Annie Hall", "Midnight Cowboy", "Forrest Gump", "Casablanca", etc. I simply do not understand what people see in "The Godfather" To start with, I'm not really into the whole crime mob Italian Sicilian Naples mafiosi family thing, so it didn't have my attention at that. The acting was good, but Marlon Brando was annoying--his weirdy voice is infamous, but I couldn't understand anything he said! It sounded very flaccid and emotionless, too.
The story itself seemed very pointless... Michael Corleone kills a bunch of people, mob hits, his father gets shot or something, he becomes the new Godfather or something. Nothing had shown itself much changed or resolved. Didn't serve a purpose other than to show a bunch of cursing and killing. With thick accents.
The mood was also very very cold-hearted. There's a general complaint about Steven Spielberg's "Munich" that it's very cold, too, that the characters don't have a warmth to them that you can identify with. "The Godfather" characters are like this too. You can't identify with any of the characters because they seem so heartless and cold, not even with a hint of charm to them to make you like them, except maybe Marlon Brando, who seemed like a crazy old grandpa who's half-senile.
I can't see the classic status of this movie. If it were released today, would it receive the same praise?