"The Godfather" sold us a pretty lie (video)

Ronald K. Fried (The Daily Beast); I. Rony, Pfc. Sandoval, Ashley Wells (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Marlon Brando would always come to no good (Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty)

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For 50 years The Godfather has sold us a beautiful lie

POISON AT THE SOURCE

You're not God. - I'm the Father!

As Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece hits the half-century mark, it’s time we stared a little harder at the MEN the film celebrates. Because heroes they’re not.

They do love The Godfather, those men — and it’s almost all men — who quote the film’s well-worn lines, as if Francis Ford Coppola and Mario Puzo’s masterpiece of movie making, is also a darkly comic guide to creating and wielding power in America.

I once interviewed a “former” mobster — if such a person can exist — who described seeing The Godfather with a group of fellow criminals, who were so pleased and excited afterward that they felt compelled to go out and hijack a truck to celebrate.

Myth maker Martin Scorsese (Getty Images)

Well, of course they loved The Godfather: It reinforces every sentimental cliché held dear by the members of a cult devoted to criminal enterprises performed by sociopaths, who destroy lives and spread corruption...y'know, fun stuff.

Wait, there's a book?

As the torrents of reverential prose praising the film upon its 50th anniversary flood newspapers across America, it’s instructive to look at the individuals who inspired the film, their self-serving myth-making, and the ways The Godfather perpetuates those myths.

In his preface to the 1996 re-issue of his [penis size obsessed] novel [which inspired the movie], Puzo wrote, “Whenever the Godfather opened his mouth, in my own mind I heard the voice of my mother. I heard her wisdom, her ruthlessness, and her unconquerable love for her family and for life itself….” That explains a lot. More

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