The one film I would bring to a desert island

Rating: 10/10 (4 September 2019)

A unparalleled statement in cinema on almost all fronts.
"The Godfather" (1972) is directed by Francis Ford Coppola, and co-written with and based on the novel by Mario Puzo. It tells the tale of The Godfather, alias Don Corleone, and originally born Vito Andolini, he is the leader of the Corleone mafia family. As an ageing patriarch, Don Corleone wants his youngest son Michael to take over the family affairs, but he seems uninterested. From then on, the film centres on the increasing tensions between the Corleone and its rival mafia families in the search for power, integrity and honour.
I first saw "The Godfather" when I was around 14 or 15 years old, and that was truly when I fell in love with films. As a young boy, I could not attribute it to anything specific, but as I grew older, I realised that its grandeur was to be attributed to the numerous levels that Francis Ford Coppola excels at making the perfect film. From the formidable screenplay, to the precise direction, beautiful integration of the awesomely impressive cast (will there ever again be so much acting talent in one film), the perfect score by Nino Rota, the masterful cinematography by Gordon Willis, and the flawless editing by William Reynolds and Peter Zinner.
To focus on perhaps the film's most impressive element, Brando. His pure artful talent shines through in an ever-immersive performance, where he inspired all of his juniors, including Al Pacino and Robert Duvall. His performance in "The Godfather" perfectly exemplifies, why they and so many others of the greatest actors (Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman, Gene Hackman, Martin Sheen, the list goes on) hail Marlon Brando as the greatest in the history of the acting craft. He exemplifies how he was capable at portraying all human emotions with such depth and range, and he contributes to making this perfect film shining even more.
The very definition of a seminal work and a masterpiece in cinema!