We'll make you an offer you can’t refuse... by inviting you to a special screening of The Godfather to consider its importance more than half a century since its initial release. Adapted from Mario Puzo's novel, The Godfather was the most successful film at the US box office in 1972 (and, for a brief period, the most successful film ever). Though the film's place in popular consciousness rests heavily on a few very memorable lines that have been endlessly referenced and parodied, it is more important than that (not least because of the performances of Marlon Brando as the ageing patriarch Don Corleone, and Al Pacino as his son and reluctant heir to the family business, Michael). The film is keenly aware of its generic lineage, making references to the earlier cycles of Hollywood gangster films released during the Great Depression. As with its 1930s predecessors, it does so with a view to critiquing the ways capitalism corrupts and offering a hideous demonstration (across the trilogy as a whole) of the ideological bankruptcy of The American Dream.
University of Nottingham Lakeside Arts Centre Nottingham, NG7 2RD