Family above all other values

Rating: 9/10 (15 August 2013)

The Godfather is about the idea of family above all other values. It goes about letting us experience this idea with three plots. The main plot is the external plot to Save the Corleone family. Supporting plots include the external plot of Michael becoming an insider of the family and an internal plot of Michael's morality.
Michael starts out an idealistic young man who looks down on the dirty deeds of the family business. In the end, Michael save the Corleone family. But in order to do so, he has become the ultimate insider (the Don) and loses the values he had held so dear at the beginning.
It's a classic story that can be argued to humanize a criminal family by making us a member of it through Michael's transformation. The stakes are laid out such that we have to believe the ends justify the means. This idea, to protect the family at any cost, is taken to its logical extreme in the sequel, The Godfather: Part II and then the pied piper comes calling for payback in the finale The Godfather: Part III. But Part I is what stands apart from its distinctive internal arc of Michael. In the other two movies, Michael's determination and moral center never wavers, we just see the external world's consequences of his moral choices.
My Story Chart of the movie is at storycharts.ca.