Completely disconnected from the previous two films

Rating: 6/10 (1 February 2020)

I was a bit puzzled within the first hour of The Godfather Part III. Never mind the fact that the first hour could have been wrapped up in ten minutes tops, but they stretch it out to a full hour....the party itself is the entire first half hour, for crying out loud! I was puzzled by the behavior of, what was once, familiar characters. I get the sense that Part III was more interested in wrapping the trilogy up, but didn't know how to continue it. So let's use the story line of selling out to the banks of Vatican? And I was puzzled by the questions that had no answers. Why is Kay back with him after, well, after Part II? And tying The Pope into this story? While the entire movie is a snooze fest, I have to hand it to them, they put together one lushly detailed picture here. It's just too bad nothing else works here. The entire film is a huge disappointment, and I stand by my theory, if you wait fifteen years to crank out another installment to your film, its not going to bode well with the rest of your installments. It just doesn't work like that. That said, The Godfather Part III takes forever to take off, and when it finally does take off, certain parts of the film drag out entirely too long, It's almost as if they were deliberately trying to make an hour and a half movie stretch to as close to a three hour running time, just to match the running time of the first two films. Yes, I'm saying they didn't have jack for material here, I think it's obvious they didn't. This final film to The Godfather was promised to be satisfying, but I myself was let down. Let's see how you think this stacks up to the two outstanding films from the 70's.