Much to positive regarding the mafia.

Rating: 6/10 (10 October 2009)

In my opinion, "The Godfather 2" is much to positive regarding the mafia, even sympathetic to it.
With the two layers of the narrative, the rise of Vito Corleone, caring and with a loving wife, cut against Michael Corleone, struggling and living in disharmony, the movie actually portraits the changes to society that had taken place between the pre-war and post-war society and between Sicily and America as something bad. It follows a "The Good old times "clichÃ©, which is in itself already ideology of the mafia.
This motive is already present in the first movie, but more subtle: Michael finds his true love in an uneducated, maybe underage Sicilian women, that is pimped by her parents to this mighty man and he only returns to the educated, working girlfriend in America because a) his true love has been killed and b) after 1 year he found no other option in the USA.
Especially the portrait of Michael's wife shows a huge anger against women, who are not completely obedient to their husband: This women performs an abortion, because she does not want to give another air to her husband.
This is the same kind of stuff the trials against witches of the middle ages are made off: it is pure hatred and an attempt to link independence of a women to wickedness and insanity.
So in my opinion, the movie is poisoned by the material it tries to put on screen - and this is a warning to every cinematographer, that the subject of a movie is not to be taken easy, the subject might dominate. If it is about power like with the mafia, it might taint the whole result.