Still resonates after all these years

Rating: 10/10 (11 August 2008)

Wow, this is a great film. Repeated (and I do mean repeated) viewings have not changed its power to fascinate and enthrall after all these years. Like the great Greek tragedies, Godfathers I and II just speak the essential truth about humanity and familial relationships in a way that everyone can relate to and can use to understand their own lives. Great art has the power to do that. All of the elements - screenplay, cinematography, acting, music - come together just about perfectly. Perhaps it is because of an accident of time and place and circumstance, like Casablanca, but it is hard to imagine this film being done any other way, or being remade by anyone else, with another cast. Truly one of the essential movies in the cinematic canon.