pretty amazing

Rating: 9/10 (18 October 2009)

You're not allowed to dislike this film either. This is a massive achievement in every possible sense. Indeed, there is little that rivals these two films in opulence or production scale.
Coppola doesn't shy away from trying new things. Michael Corleone's story-arc is more realistic, more ambitious than anything in the first film. The scale of crime is upgraded. And I had never expected to see that scene between Michael & Kay, where she tells him of her departure, "because of this 2000-year-old Sicilian thing." Vito Corleone's backstory follows the earlier, more conventional combination of style and myth. Actually, Coppola makes Vito's arc too obvious, as though he's following a checklist. But again its very tastefully done, so you enjoy it.
I guess what this film lacks is a simpler plot and the phenomenal pacing of the first film. Also missing is the magisterial presence of a certain Marlon Brando. It is easier to appreciate this film when you place it together with the first, as one single epic of the rise of one Mafia generation, followed by the decline of another.