Francis Ford Coppola didnt intend to make the Godfather films into a trilogy - instead there were supposed to be two parts and an epilogue. He wanted to name the epilogue The Death of Michael Corleone, but the producers didnt want that. The final result? The Godfather Part III (1990). It didnt meet the high expectations set by the first two Godfather films, which led it to become a target of angry and negative criticism. The most confusing difference to its predecessors is its more obvious focus on Michael instead of the entire family. The biggest offender for most of the fans was casting Sofia Coppola, the director's daughter, as Mary: her performance is rather terrible.
The film's content is fine as it is: it is a great character study of Michael. As an "epilogue", it doesn't need to be anything else. The ending, however, is a mess: after the great build-up, the ending is awfully forced and disappointing. And not to forget the very last scene which just ruins the rhythm of the entire film.
The film's form is nice although sometimes it is rather plain when compared to the first two films. However, the whole opera sequence at the end of the film was a masterpiece of editing and photography. It's a stunning achievement - not least as a sequence which builds enormous amounts of tension.
While Sofia Coppola's performance was god awful, the other "newcomers" were more or less awesome. Andy Garcia seemed irritating at first, but after a while I realised how brilliant his performance was. Joe Mantegna was also great as the smug Joey Zaza.
In overall, the film is a little unbalanced, but it has a few pros worth mentioning.
Score: 7 out of 10
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