American Dream
The Godfather trilogy in the history of cinema tends to be a defining film. It tends to introduce a filmmaker, who is legendary, and various acting greats, in the narration of an Italian American dynasty, which tends to be undone by the circumstances of their criminal exploits, which are tragic.
The Godfather film commences with Bonasera saying, “I trust in United states of America.” America tends to have made his fortune and he raised his daughter in the American fashion. We learn that he gave her freedom, but trained her not to humiliate her relations. She later initiates a boyfriend, which was not an Italian one and decided to watch with a film. However, the film took long than expected hence she delayed. She stayed out late but he did not protest. He decided to drive and show her around, two months ago, with another boyfriend who made her drink whiskey. In the process, they wanted to take benefit of her but she resisted and kept her honor. As a result, they beat her up. Then he said to his wife that for justice they visit Don Corleone for the chief purpose of solving the case.
He wanted Don Corleone to render justice on the two American boys who had beaten up his daughter and furthermore gotten away with a suspended sentence only. These words tend to link the crime the boys committed to the failure of the American justice system that tends to be considered legitimate. As a result, this statement tends to be a robust condemnation of the society he has moved to. Bonasera tends to request Sicilian justice, meaning murder, after the American justice failed him.
Bonasera’s words make it clear that an immigrant community is being dealt with. Regardless of the characters being powerful and rich, they still endure the equivalent challenges that all the immigrants face each day. It is evident from the case of Bonasera’s daughter that assimilation is not easy where the immigrants molested, as they are unaware of local customs. This tragedy makes Michael’s loving, genuine relationship with the American Kay Adams seem remarkable. When the film commences, Michael is presented as an assimilated Italian-American but later on when he becomes the Godfather, he becomes carried away with the thought of construction the family to a legitimate level. This is a euphemism for assimilated in a sense. He intends to disown the family relation, and takes crime out of the family for the main purpose of the Corleones being as American as the rest.
Michael, on his return to America, after some period of deport in Sicily, searches for his old girlfriend, Kay with the intention of proposing. He has changed ever since he met Kay and he tries to inform her about what happened to him during the interim. At the beginning of the film, he was wearing an army uniform but now wears a pinstriped suit and a bowler hat of a Mafioso. He had been unable to tell Kay he loved her but now is able.
Michael has also begun working with his father that is becoming a Corleone Mafia member. This tends to show that Michael is defending the mafia life and his father unambiguously and an introduction of a broader American culture. The comparison of a gangster life to the head of America tends to show the manipulation of meaning and language and Coppola’s intention is of the viewer to contemplate on the comparison. The timing of the release of the Godfather was when there was the warfare between the Vietnam and Michael’s cynicism concerning the politicians was common at the time. It is evident in The Godfather that it is a hope from Vito that Michael would become a senate or even the president someday.
In Godfather Part III, Michael says that he was pulled back in when he thought he had gotten out. This shows that he became aware that he was not in a position to evade the mafia life even when he tried to live an honest life. Michael, when growing up did not expect to be absorbed in the family business and neither did his brothers and father. They hoped that one day, he was to arise and lead others. When he began working for, and Corleone family, and taking it over in The Godfather, he tended to intend to make the business legitimate. In the early 1950s, he proposes to Kay and seeks a period of five years to make obsolete changes to his family. Kay ends up leaving him in the 1959 for not keeping his promise, and in 1979, he still had not completed his transformation.
According to Michael his principle failure is failing to make his family legitimate. Several questions concerning legitimacy have always been related to integration rather than just crime. There tends to be an American and a malicious of accomplishing duty way and Michael’s dream was to ensure that his family adapted to the American lifestyle. Consequently, the quotation tends to touch on the theme in the trilogy’s opening remark by Bonasera. There is an acknowledgement, from Michael’s single sentence, that the Corleones did not get to achieve full integration into the American society. There is also no indication of escaping from the cycle of violence when Vincent takes over and does not show any concern for legitimacy.
Works Cited
Jake. Not Just Movies. 18 January 2010. 23 October 2012 <http://armchairc.blogspot.com/2010/01/godfather-part-ii.html>.
