{"id":59932,"date":"2020-09-03T22:26:00","date_gmt":"2020-09-03T19:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/francis-ford-coppola-making-new-godfather-part-iii-cut\/"},"modified":"2020-09-03T22:26:00","modified_gmt":"2020-09-03T19:26:00","slug":"francis-ford-coppola-making-new-godfather-part-iii-cut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/francis-ford-coppola-making-new-godfather-part-iii-cut\/","title":{"rendered":"#Francis Ford Coppola making new \u2018Godfather Part III\u2019 cut"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Francis Ford Coppola making new \u2018Godfather Part III\u2019 cut<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Francis Coppola has long wanted another crack at \u201cThe Godfather Part III,\u201d looking to shorten it in places, and strengthen it in others, and change the title. He has been tinkering with that for awhile, as he re-cut versions of other films including \u201cCotton Club.\u201d But he always said he needed Paramount Pictures\u2019 blessing. Today, the studio announced it will release his new edit and restoration under the title Mario Puzo\u2019s \u201cThe Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone.\u201d The picture will be given a limited theatrical release in December, marking the 30th anniversary of the film\u2019s release. It will then find its way to digital home entertainment platforms.<\/p>\n

This means Coppola has now restored the films of his he believed could be improved, and his fervent desire is to get the chance to make the epic \u201cMegalopolis,\u201d which was close to a production start before it was derailed by the tragedy of 9\/11.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Mario Puzo\u2019s The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone\u2019 is an acknowledgement of Mario\u2019s and my preferred title and our original intentions for what became \u2018The Godfather: Part III,\u2019\u201d Coppola said. \u201cFor this version of the finale, I created a new beginning and ending, and rearranged some scenes, shots, and music cues. With these changes and the restored footage and sound, to me, it is a more app<\/a>ropriate conclusion to \u2018The Godfather\u2019 and \u2018The Godfather: Part II\u2019 and I\u2019m thankful to Jim Gianopulos and Paramount for allowing me to revisit it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The third installment pales in comparison to the first two installments, considered among the best American films ever made. Still, the picture was nominated for seven Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director as it followed a 60-ish Michael Corleone as he seeks to free his family from crime and find a suitable successor to his empire in a storyline that was Vatican heady.<\/p>\n

\"Francis<\/img>
Francis Ford Coppola in October 2019<\/span>Corbis via Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Coppola and his production company American Zoetrope worked from a 4K scan of the original negative to undertake a painstaking, frame-by-frame restoration of both the new \u201cMario Puzo\u2019s The Godfather,\u201d \u201cCoda: The Death of Michael Corleone\u201d and the original \u201cThe Godfather: Part III.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMr. Coppola oversaw every aspect of the restoration while working on the new edit, ensuring that the film not only looks and sounds pristine, but also meets his personal standards and directorial vision,\u201d said Andrea Kalas, senior vice president, Paramount Archives.<\/p>\n

In a lengthy interview he did for Deadline\u2019s Disruptors Issue for the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, Coppola discussed how turning 80 made him want to see versions of his great films that pleased him the most. Here is a lengthy track in which he discussed his recut versions of \u201cApocalypse Now,\u201d \u201cCotton Club\u201d and his fervent desire to do a better version of that final Corleone installment. It\u2019s a bit sprawling, but who doesn\u2019t like reading about his recollections on the great films he made? Coppola felt emphatic that the performance of his daughter Sofia would be vindicated in the new version. You\u2019ll recall that he cast his daughter in her screen debut after Winona Ryder dropped out:<\/p>\n

You recut and re-released <\/strong>Apocalypse Now<\/strong><\/em> once before. Why did you do it again now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

So what happened with \u201cApocalypse\u201d is, they said it\u2019s too long. Now that I\u2019m 80, I see a lot of this differently, but the first time, they all said it was too long and I was this scared kid. Now, often when a movie is too long, taking out time doesn\u2019t necessarily help, and sometimes putting more back makes it feel less long to the audience because they understand it better. But I was scared, so I said, \u201cWe\u2019d better shorten it,\u201d and we did it as much as we knew how to when everyone said it was really weird. \u201cIt\u2019s not like those big war movies<\/a>,\u201d they said. I said, \u201cBut the Vietnam War wasn\u2019t like those kind of previous World War II movies.\u201d Whereas war films usually had a New York sensibility\u2014there was always a guy from Brooklyn or Nick Conte played a G.I.\u2014Vietnam was a Californian war. It was surfers and drugs and rock\u2019n\u2019roll and The Doors.<\/p>\n

\u201cApocalypse\u201d was the first movie to tackle the Vietnam War, but it took so long to cut that \u201cDeer Hunter\u201d came out before us.<\/p>\n

\"Martin<\/img>
Martin Sheen in 1979\u2019s \u201cApocalypse Now.\u201d<\/span>\u00a9 United Artists\/Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Did coming out second in the marketplace, after The Deer Hunter, help or hurt you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Honestly, I don\u2019t know the answer to that question. \u201cThe Deer Hunter\u201d not only came out but won the Oscar, and, of course, I was the one who presented it to Michael Cimino. I liked Michael Cimino very much and I was happy for him, but I didn\u2019t know what awaited me because my film didn\u2019t come out for another year. The film that won at the Oscars our year was \u201cKramer vs. Kramer,\u201d which was wonderful in that it introduced Meryl Streep, but it was a more conventional movie.<\/p>\n

That must have been awkward: you were presenting because you\u2019d won the previous year for \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d not knowing if following that staggering movie was going to hurt yours. Was it a mixed feeling for you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, it got further complicated by the fact that, before I gave the award, I improvised a little statement that was ridiculed at the time. I said the cinema was going to be changed completely by a new technology<\/a> that would involve digital and satellites and electronics, which would forever change the face of the cinema. People were laughing and saying, \u201cWhat is he smoking?\u201d Everything that I said in that statement came true. Now it is used as my prescience<\/a> but the truth is I was very embarrassed by that off the cuff thing I threw in.<\/p>\n

I remember Ali McGraw was the co-presenter and she was looking at me with an astonished look of, \u201cWhat is he talking about?\u201d At that time, my life was such a jumble. I was basically very scared, for good reason because I had a very unusual movie, which of course may or may not have been accepted. And all that debt I didn\u2019t know how I was going to pay and which was going to wipe me out.<\/p>\n

A couple of years later, I was in some relatively cheap hotel in London and \u201cApocalypse Now\u201d came on television. I always liked the opening: the helicopter, the napalm, the guy in the hotel room\u2026 I thought I\u2019d watch that part and turn it off but I watched the whole thing, and it was a big moment because I\u2019d realized by then that the movie is less weird now, like those avant-garde paintings that a few years later become the wallpaper in peoples\u2019 houses.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, there\u2019s all these other sequences and footage. I had so much footage. Distributors were saying, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you make a version of \u2018Apocalypse\u2019 that has everything in it?\u201d I had these Betamax tapes. I had all this material, so we did this long version, put everything back in, and that was \u201cApocalypse Now Redux.\u201d When the film was going to have its 40th anniversary at Tribeca, they asked, which version did you want to show, the original or \u201cRedux\u201d? I said, \u201cI would love to do my own \u2018classic\u2019 version, which would be something in between those two.\u201d There are some sequences in \u201cRedux\u201d that aren\u2019t interesting and I\u2019d wished I would have taken them out. So I used those Betamax tapes and made the third version. It will be released as \u201cApocalypse Now: Final Cut.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018I was basically very scared, for good reason because I had a very unusual movie.\u2019<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Why did you recut \u201cThe Cotton Club,\u201d which you\u2019ll have ready for this fall?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cCotton Club\u201d was a very strange endeavor. I didn\u2019t get along with Bob Evans during \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d at all. He was so tough on me. I was seriously on the verge of getting fired maybe on three or four occasions. Had I not won the Oscar for \u201cPatton,\u201d I would absolutely have been fired from \u201cThe Godfather.\u201d<\/p>\n

But didn\u2019t Fox hate your Patton script, until George C. Scott forced their hand?<\/strong><\/p>\n

True. They were talking to Burt Lancaster and he very much didn\u2019t like my script\u2014especially that beginning scene. He felt that it was totally anticlimactic that I started the film with this portrait of Patton. So I was basically replaced because of the opening. Then, years later, when Lancaster was not going to do it and they brought in George C. Scott, he wasn\u2019t crazy about the new script. A man named David Brown said that there was a young guy that did a much more strange script. It was David Brown who resurrected my script. I wasn\u2019t around so I didn\u2019t know that, but that\u2019s how that happened.<\/p>\n

Why weren\u2019t you there to accept your Oscar?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Because I was in New York, about to get fired from \u201cThe Godfather.\u201d In fact, the night of the Oscars, I watched the show with Marty Scorsese and he said to me, \u201cHow are they going to fire you now?\u201d Because he knew I was in deep, deep trouble.<\/p>\n

What didn\u2019t they like about \u201cThe Godfather\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n

They hated my casting ideas. They hated the Al Pacino idea. They hated the Brando idea. They hated the fact that I decided to set it in New York and they fought it. Of course, their reasoning was logical. There was a movie made in New York called \u201cMister Buddwing\u201d and what followed was a big to-do about how inhospitable New York was to movies, how expensive they were. So there was a sort of boycott on New York and when I suggested it to Paramount for this little $2.5m version of this book they bought, \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d they wanted to make it in St. Louis. And set it in the \u201970s.<\/p>\n

\"Salvatore<\/img>
Salvatore Corsitto with Marlon Brando in the 1972 classic \u201cThe Godfather.\u201d<\/span>Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Why?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Because it was the \u201970s, and if a movie is set in the \u201970s then you don\u2019t have to get special cars, or hairdressers and clothes. A period picture adds a big cost. So I was not popular, wanting to make it in New York and set it in the \u201940s, which is when the book was set, because I felt that that was a big part of the story. The fact I survived is a miracle to me, to be honest, because I had no clout, no big, successful movies. The only thing I had going for me was that I was Italian-American.<\/p>\n

I was young, which meant that the thought they could push me around, and they did push me around. And also I was pretty much considered a good screenwriter, and they definitely needed a free rewrite of that script, so that\u2019s why I got the job. How I kept it, I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n

It was helpful that every major director they went to turned it down. Kazan, Costa-Gavras, everybody turned it down because there had been a mafia picture called \u201cThe Brotherhood\u201d starring the wonderful Kirk Douglas that flopped. So the idea of an Italian gangster picture?<\/p>\n

The book was taking off, though, so they thought if they could make it for $2.5m with this young director, who maybe could direct actors\u2026 Peter Bart had seen this movie I made called \u201cThe Rain People\u201d and he thought the acting in it was presentable. So he thought maybe that would be OK. Where were we going with this?<\/p>\n

You were talking about making The Cotton Club after you almost got pushed off The Godfather by Bob Evans\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

So, when \u201cThe Godfather\u201d fooled everyone and was this colossal success, they came to me and said, \u201cOf course we want to make \u201cMichael Corleone Returns,\u201d because it made money.\u201d I said I didn\u2019t want to have anything to do with Paramount Pictures or Bob Evans. I didn\u2019t want to have anything to do with gangsters. I could say that because I now had a couple of bucks.<\/p>\n

Finally I said, \u201cHere\u2019s what I will do\u2026\u201d I loved Mario Puzo\u2014he was a wonderful man and I really liked working with him. I said, \u201cI\u2019ll work with Mario, and we\u2019ll make a script for a second \u201cGodfather\u201d movie, but I don\u2019t want to direct it. I\u2019ll help produce it and I will choose a young director that I think would be great and you could have what you want.\u201d<\/p>\n

I had this crazy idea of a movie that would be two time periods that would tell the story of the father and the son when they were the same age. You would see Michael when he was a mature young man and, of course, the father, who would have been already dead. It was far out but I liked it. When the time came, I went to them and I said, \u201cWe have a script and I\u2019ll tell you the director who should do it.\u201d Everything I tell you, to my knowledge, is true. \u201cThis young director, I think is a fabulous talent\u2026\u201d They said, \u201cFine, who is he?\u201d I said, \u201cMartin Scorsese.\u201d They said, \u201cAbsolutely not. That\u2019s outrageous.\u201d So I told them to forget it. Goodbye. Then the whole deal was off.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t know that.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not many do. He\u2019d done \u201cBoxcar Bertha\u201d and \u201cWho\u2019s That Knocking at My Door.\u201d So that was where it was left. Charlie Bluhdorn himself calls me up, with his Viennese accent. \u201cFrancis, you are crazy. You\u2019re not going to do it? You have the formula of Coca-Cola. You\u2019re not going to make more Coca-Cola?\u201d I said, \u201cCharlie, my opinion of Bob Evans, he has talent but he was so tough on me and he\u2019s so second-guessing of me, it\u2019s such a struggle, I don\u2019t want to go through it again.\u201d<\/p>\n

But I said, \u201cOK, here\u2019s my deal. One, I want a million dollars. That\u2019s to write and direct it.\u201d That to me was like asking for a great fortune. \u201cNumber two, I want Bob Evans to have nothing to do with it. I don\u2019t have to talk to him. He doesn\u2019t read the script. I don\u2019t get his opinions. And number three, I don\u2019t want to call it some stupid sequel. I want to call it \u2018The Godfather Part II.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

They pushed back. They said, \u201cYou can have the million dollars. You can have nothing to do with Bob Evans.\u201d He was already in a little trouble I think with Paramount with some other stuff, but they gave him up like that. \u201cBut we can\u2019t call the picture \u2018The Godfather Part II.\u2019\u201d I asked why not. They said, \u201cBecause our marketing department tells us that if we call the movie \u2018The Godfather Part II\u2019 everyone\u2019s going to think it\u2019s the second half of the movie they already saw instead of a separate movie.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Robert<\/img>
Robert Duvall and Al Pacino in \u201cThe Godfather Part II.\u201d<\/span>Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Really?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I swear to God. It\u2019s so ironic, because now if I have any bad standing in the movie business it\u2019s because I don\u2019t want to do a movie that\u2019s built to have a lot of sequels. I\u2019m the one who started the title stuff that led to films like \u201cRocky V. Godfather II\u201d was the first movie with that name. I got into another big argument with them 16 years later because I absolutely didn\u2019t want to call the third one \u201cGodfather Part III.\u201d Mario and I had a title for it.<\/p>\n

What was it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll get to it, but I have to do this in order. I didn\u2019t have the clout 16 years later because I was in all sorts of financial mess. So it was called \u201cPart III,\u201d which was a mistake because it was never conceived as a Part III<\/em>. It was conceived as an epilogue to comment on the first two movies.<\/p>\n

What about \u201cThe Cotton Club\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n

So I get a phone call out of the blue a year later and it\u2019s Bob Evans. His voice is almost trembling with emotion, sadness. He says, \u201cFrancis, this is Bob Evans.\u201d I said, \u201cOh, hi, Bob. How are you doing?\u201d He said, \u201cI\u2019m not doing well. I\u2019m a little scared. You\u2019ve got to help me with my child.\u201d I said, \u201cOf course, I\u2019ll do anything.\u201d I knew he had a boy. Is it an accident? Is it drugs? He says, \u201cI don\u2019t mean my son. I mean my movie.\u201d Because he had announced a movie called The Cotton Club. It was to star Richard Gere and the great Gregory Hines, and he was going to direct it. I asked him what was wrong with it. He said, \u201cI\u2019m going to direct this movie \u2018The Cotton Club\u2019 but I need your advice. It\u2019s very complicated. Can I bring Richard Gere and Gregory Hines to see you?\u201d I said sure.<\/p>\n

So Richard only signed his deal on the strict condition he would not play a gangster. In fact, Richard Gere can play the cornet and he wanted to be a musician. I said, \u201cLet Richard Gere be a musician in \u2018The Cotton Club.\u2019\u201d He says, \u201cHe can\u2019t, all the musicians there were black.\u201d There was not ever a white musician in \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d Only white people could be in the audience, but only black people were the performers and they had to go in through the back door.<\/p>\n

Bob said, \u201cI need a story idea that will enable Richard to be a jazz musician.\u201d I think about it, do some research, and get the idea. You remember George Raft? He was a dancer and entertainer but he was also hooked up with gangsters. Eventually he became a movie star, but he had come from that world. I thought, What if the Richard Gere was like that? In other words, he\u2019s a jazz cornetist or something but he sort of knows gangsters and then he goes on to be a star, like George Raft. I wrote up two sentences, sent them to Evans, and said, \u201cI hope it helps.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Richard<\/img>
Richard Gere in the 1984 film \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d<\/span>(c)Orion Pictures\/Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Meanwhile, I was trying to write my dream script. I was always trying to write my dream script \u2014 \u201cMegalopolis.\u201d
<\/br>
\nEvans says, \u201cIt\u2019s brilliant but only you can write the script.\u201d So I write a script and my idea is, I take two men, Richard Gere and Maurice Hines, and their families. The idea was to have a movie that was sort of like \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d that crisscrossed between the white family and black family. That was the way I wrote the script. And since there\u2019s so many African-American people and white people in it, I thought the theme of it ought to be slavery, which is not just slavery as we know it in our country but for anyone, even in the mob. If you become beholden to a gangster then you become, in a way, his slave. I thought that was an interesting theme.<\/p>\n

So I send the script to Evans and I say, \u201cThank you so much, I\u2019m done now. Goodbye!\u201d He said, \u201cIt\u2019s brilliant. It\u2019s great. It\u2019s the best script I ever read but I have only one problem, Francis. Only you can direct it.\u201d I said, \u201cBob, I thought this was all about you making your directing debut. You have a lot of good ideas and a lot of good opinions. Maybe they don\u2019t always agree with me, but that doesn\u2019t mean they aren\u2019t good. You should do it.\u201d He said, \u201cWell I don\u2019t feel I\u2019m up to this script. This script is so beyond my capability.\u201d I said, \u201cI\u2019ll tell you what, you do it, and the first week I\u2019ll go and I\u2019ll sit in your corner and if you\u2019re scared or if you\u2019re nervous or anything I will be there for one week but I don\u2019t want a credit. I don\u2019t want a job. I just will do that for you.\u201d He asks me to come to New York, with my wife and little Sofia, who was 14, to meet the talent. Lonette McKee and Gregory and Maurice Hines are there and all these great tap dancers and Cotton Club type girls. They were all wonderful.<\/p>\n

You ended up directing it, of course.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I made the deal. It was lock, stock, solid, final cut control and I went and began. That\u2019s how I got to do \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d When I got there, there\u2019s only one piece of casting that had to be mutually approved, which was the young lady. Richard Gere was already cast. So for the young lady I wanted Diane Lane. He agreed, and we cast her. So then I cast Bob Hoskins, rest in peace. Bob Hoskins and Fred Gwynne as the two gangsters. Evans hit the roof. He was furious. He said, \u201cYou cannot hire Fred Gwynne to be Frenchy!\u201d I said, \u201cWhy not? He\u2019s a wonderful actor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Evans said to me the classic line: \u201cI forbid it. I will not have a Munster be in my movie.\u201d I said, \u201cBob, you forget. We made a deal. This isn\u2019t \u2018The Godfather\u2019 where you can do this to me. I make the choice. I want to cast Fred Gwynne.\u201d He said, \u201cI forbid it.\u201d I said, \u201cWe\u2019ll see.\u201d We call my lawyer, Barry Hirsch, who made the deal and said, \u201cOf course you can cast who you want.\u201d<\/p>\n

So then Evans started getting at me through these other ways. I was working with the team he assembled and eventually I had to forbid him from coming on the set because it was turning into The Godfather all over again. So the movie was made under this war, and when it got really heavy\u2026 I discover the reason he wanted me to direct it was that he didn\u2019t have the money, and he thought that if he could present me\u2026<\/p>\n

The money would materialize.<\/strong><\/p>\n

And it did but the money came from some very strange places.<\/p>\n

\"Francis<\/img>
Francis Ford Coppola and Gregory Hines on the set of \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d<\/span>Orion Pictures\/Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Las Vegas guys?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, yeah, but not only that. They went to see Barry Hirsch and said, \u201cWhat is this stuff about Evans can\u2019t come on the set and so on?\u201d This is a true story, I wasn\u2019t there but he told me this. He said he had the contracts on the desk saying all of what I\u2019m just saying\u2014they swept it off the desk and they say, \u201cNow it\u2019s off the table.\u201d And the next thing that happens is that a guy shows up. I\u2019m not going to say his name but he was sent by that group. He shows up, and he\u2019s sitting on a chair next to the producer Barrie Osborne, so I know the guy is there. I\u2019ll just call him Joey.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m a courteous guy. I\u2019m not going to say, \u201cGet off the set,\u201d or anything, but I get it that he\u2019s been sent and he\u2019s just watching. He doesn\u2019t say anything for three days. By weird stroke of luck, don\u2019t tell me how this happened, he realized that I was not in the wrong. I was just trying to do this movie and they were interfering with it. So, little by little, he started to protect me.<\/p>\n

This is very hard to explain. This Joey fellow was pretty bright and, whatever his past was, was pretty nice. I never, during all of \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d I never got to know anyone \u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026 In organized crime?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was always advised by Mario Puzo, who did everything from research. He said, \u201cDon\u2019t even be friends,\u201d and I wasn\u2019t. But now Joey was there and he started protecting me. I was a little scared about the fact that he was protecting me. So ultimately, he weighed in. There was lots of trouble with the Evans side wanting to get the footage, and then when it was being finished, during the edit, there were lawsuits\u2014and there was a murder. I mean, what went on behind the scenes of \u201cThe Cotton Club\u201d is a novel. There was a murder connected with the financing. They tried to seize the print, and we would hide the print so they couldn\u2019t get it, and Evans sued me. They even sort of co-opted my own CEO, who I later learned was in debt to them for gambling. There was a big lawsuit about who had the right to determine the cut of \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d All this is going on while we\u2019re trying to finish it. So it was utter warfare.<\/p>\n

Then [Evans] and his guy said to me, \u201cIt\u2019s too long. There\u2019s too many black people and there\u2019s too much tap dancing.\u201d Well, it\u2019s \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d What we did was, we preserved all those wonderful \u201cCotton Club\u201d performers who now, as we speak, are mostly all dead, but it\u2019s all in that movie.<\/p>\n

The picture came out. It was received OK. Of course, Evans damned it. Everyone was expecting \u201cThe Godfather.\u201d It was never that.<\/p>\n

\"Francis<\/img>
Francis Ford Coppola on the set of \u201cThe Cotton Club.\u201d<\/span>Orion Pictures\/Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So you took another cut at it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I always felt that the movie got cut down; there was 25 or 30 minutes taken out and a lot of the black story got cut out. I found the Betamax of the original cut. I don\u2019t think in the release version of \u201cThe Cotton Club\u201d you really understand what\u2019s happening between the black folks and the white folks and the gangsters. You don\u2019t quite get it because it\u2019s been so truncated. So I asked MGM, the distributor, \u201cWould it be OK if I made a new version?\u201d Because I didn\u2019t own anything. And they said no. This was two years ago. It was Gary Barber, who just left and was terrible. His position was, \u201cThe picture hasn\u2019t done anything. We won\u2019t help you.\u201d<\/p>\n

You did it anyway?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fortunately, there was a little window before he closed the door, and I had to say I would put up $40,000. They gave me access to the materials and I got them. To my horror, the 25-30 minutes that was taken out, no one knew where the negative was. It didn\u2019t exist anymore. We searched and searched and finally found a good enough print. If you have a good print you can copy a good print and then, with a lot of expensive CG, you could bring it up. I ended up putting up pretty much all the money, about half a million dollars.<\/p>\n

I said, \u201cIf you come out with it again, which this version that I technically own, would you let a little stream of the income pay back my half a million dollars?\u201d Gary Barber says, \u201cNo.\u201d I don\u2019t know why. He\u2019s not there anymore, thank God. I guess he felt he had me because I didn\u2019t own anything and I had already committed to some of it. When we showed it, I was amazed that the movie could have been transformed so much. What had been a little disjointed and out of balance and not even totally clear and maybe repetitive, just blossomed.<\/p>\n

We showed it once at Telluride and I got the same reaction, which made me feel I wasn\u2019t crazy. It was a new birth for the film. I said, \u201cLet\u2019s call it \u2018The Cotton Club Encore.\u2019\u201d There\u2019s Gregory Hines, Bob Hoskins, Fred Gwynne\u2014all these people who are gone now. I restored the original ending. I think it\u2019s great and Lionsgate agreed. It\u2019s only been shown three times so far, but they\u2019re going to release it in theaters and show it at the New York Film Festival.<\/p>\n

So the \u201cApocalypse Final Cut\u201d version and this version of \u201cThe Cotton Club\u201d are the best version of those movies and there\u2019s logic to why. I\u2019m older and I\u2019m less frightened and I\u2019m less easily bullied. What have I got to lose?<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve left your \u201cGodfather\u201d trilogy alone? There was a chronological version that wove together the first two parts and added some footage. It was quite good \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

That was a favor to Charlie Bluhdorn. The idea was that it was going to be shown twice on NBC only and never again, and then they just went and put it out.<\/p>\n

The intercutting between Michael Corleone in Vegas and his young father in Italy is classic. Did Robert De Niro really almost make himself ineligible because he was going to play Don Corleone\u2019s bodyguard in the original?<\/strong><\/p>\n

He did. He was going to play Paulie Gatto, but he got the part after they got Pacino out of \u201cThe Gang That Couldn\u2019t Shoot Straight.\u201d When De Niro was being auditioned for that he said to me, \u201cI don\u2019t want to lose the part of Paulie Gatto but if I could get the lead in that\u2026\u201d I said, \u201cI\u2019ll hold the part for you. If you don\u2019t get the lead the part\u2019s yours, but if you do get the lead, God bless you,\u201d and he did get it.<\/p>\n

\"Al<\/img>
Al Pacino with Marlon Brando in \u201cThe Godfather.\u201d<\/span>Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It\u2019s remarkable how close that opportunity came to not happening, and also how you had to fight to get Brando, even secretly making a screen test to show to Bluhdorn.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s all true, but Brando was probably one of the smartest people I ever knew and he knew what I was doing. I went to his house at, like, 7am. I\u2019d heard that he didn\u2019t like loud noises and that he wore earplugs. I had two young guys with me, and I said, \u201cLet\u2019s not talk. Let\u2019s do ninja signals.\u201d We went to his house, set up very early. I had brought Italian cheese and a little sausage and little Italian cigars and I put them around. We were all ready when all of a sudden the door opens and out comes this beautiful\u2014he was 47\u2014guy in a Japanese robe with long, blonde hair and he looks around and he sees what\u2019s going on.<\/p>\n

He rolls up his hair, takes some shoe polish and makes his hair dark. He says, \u201cThe character gets shot in the throat so maybe he talks like this\u2026\u201d He puts some Kleenex in his mouth. He did it all himself and then he took the little cheese and he nibbled it. I remember, he took the lapel of his shirt and he sort of creased it. \u201cTheir lapels are always creased,\u201d he says. I\u2019m sitting there, astonished, and then the phone rings. He picks up the phone and he starts talking like the character. I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat the hell? Who was that? What did they think?\u201d<\/p>\n

When I had this whole transformation of him into what you saw in \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d I took a wild chance. I went to New York because I knew, whatever Charlie Bluhdorn said, that all the guys would fall in line because they were afraid of him. I went to his office and he came out to the conference room where I had put a machine. He said, \u201cFrancis, what are you doing here?\u201d I said, \u201cCharlie, I just want to show you something.\u201d He looked at it, he saw the door open, and then Marlon Brando came out, with the blonde hair. He said, \u201cNo, no, absolutely not.\u201d He kept watching. \u201cThat\u2019s incredible,\u201d he said. And that\u2019s how Brando got the part.<\/p>\n

And they fought you on Al Pacino, whose slow build of Michael Corleone from war hero to steely mob boss was superb, even though you cast him thinking there was only going to be the one movie\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, they first wanted Ryan O\u2019Neal. And then Redford. I said, \u201cThe guy ought to really look Sicilian.\u201d They said, \u201cSicilians are blonde and blue-eyed because they were occupied by the French for many years. So there could be a blonde, blue-eyed Sicilian.\u201d What had happened is, I had met Pacino before, so when I read the book I just pictured him. When you do that it\u2019s very hard to get that out of your mind. That\u2019s why I was so persistent.<\/p>\n

You think of all that could have gone differently on this film and I wonder, do you believe in the movie gods?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I believe that once and a while you get lucky. I\u2019ve been unlucky, but in the case of \u201cThe Godfather\u201d I think of how lucky I was. Even with the first Godfather not only was I lucky to have this unbelievable cast but this unbelievable director of photography, Gordy Willis. This unbelievable art director, Dean Tavoularis, this unbelievable costume designer, Johnny Johnstone, who did \u201cOn the Waterfront\u201d and taught me so much. Then the most luck of all was, the audience seemed to be ready for it because the audience isn\u2019t always ready for the movie you\u2019ve made. They may not be ready for 10 years, or maybe they were ready for it 10 years earlier. To have all those things happen right, once in your lifetime? Let\u2019s face it, \u201cThe Godfather\u201d made me.<\/p>\n

The first two were hard to measure up to when \u201cThe Godfather Part III\u201d was made.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I want to try that again, and I\u2019ll ask Paramount because in a few years there will be the 50th anniversary of the first film. I want to use a title I tried to but wasn\u2019t allowed to, one that came from Mario Puzo. It\u2019s \u201cCoda: The Death of Michael Corleone.\u201d But \u201ccoda\u201d means epilogue. In other words, you got part one and part two and then the epilogue.<\/p>\n

Why didn\u2019t the studio like that?<\/strong><\/p>\n

They probably wanted a \u201cGodfather IV\u201d and \u201cV.\u201d There\u2019s a cut I want to make that would be 14 minutes shorter. Usually, I go back and make them longer. This would be effective, and it makes the ending break your heart. Jim Gianopulos is the head of Paramount. An extremely nice man. And so what I want to say to them is if you allow me this, you won\u2019t have to pay me.<\/p>\n

Why all this looking back?<\/strong><\/p>\n

All I know is maybe I\u2019m older, maybe I\u2019m more circumspect. I want to show Sofia a new version, because she is so beautiful in it and so touching. She wasn\u2019t an actress. But she was the real thing, playing that 19-year-old Italian girl in love with her own cousin. \u201cGodfather III\u201d as \u201cThe Death of Michael Corleone\u201d is doubly painful because at the end he doesn\u2019t die but he does worse than die. He loses everything he loves\u2014and he lives. There are certain things in life that are worse than death.<\/p>\n

\"Sofia<\/img>
Sofia Coppola and Andy Garcia in a scene from \u201cThe Godfather Part III.\u201d<\/span>\u00a9Paramount\/Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

You took some heat casting your daughter Sofia, who has become a fine filmmaker in her own right. Was it right to put so much pressure on her, when she was untested?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, I felt betrayed by a journalist by the name of Peter Biskind. And Tina Brown. I was asked if a journalist could come to the set and report on the movie, but Peter came in with a story all ready to write because he knew that there was a controversy about the fact that I had cast Sofia. He\u2019s the one that came out with the article first that sort of greatly criticized her performance and started that whole trend, that I had cast my daughter when Paramount didn\u2019t want me to.<\/p>\n

Why did you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was in a tough position on that matter because they wanted me to put actresses in the role that were much more mature. My idea of the character was, an 18 or 19-year-old who had a crush on her cousin. That\u2019s why I had cast Winona Ryder. But she didn\u2019t say, \u201cI can\u2019t do it.\u201d We kept waiting for her and she kept stalling and we kept delaying. I had shot absolutely anything I could without the girl and only then did Winona tell me she was dropping out. I had no choice but to close down the picture.<\/p>\n

Paramount had all these actresses who were like 27 to 30 and I felt that that would destroy what I was trying to do. Sofia didn\u2019t want to be an actress. She wanted to be a painter at the time, but every time I had put her in a movie as a little girl, her natural personality always came through for me. I always put my kids in movies because I had them around. I always took them out of school to be with us, wherever and whenever we went on location. Sofia did that for me and I believe if I do this new cut that her performance will be very touching as a little 19-year-old girl. That\u2019s one of the things that can be so improved.<\/p>\n

I felt that the plot of \u201cGodfather III\u201d was that they were coming for Michael but they got her. And [in the press] they were coming for me but they chose Sofia. I don\u2019t have malice against anyone at this point in my life, but, to this day, it upsets me that Peter Biskind was the one who was given access to the set and he used it to damn my daughter. I believe that in a new version of \u201cThe Death of Michael Corleone,\u201d Sofia\u2019s performance will vindicate her.\n <\/p><\/div>\n

\n

If you want to read more Entertainment News<\/a> articles, you can visit our General category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Francis Ford Coppola making new \u2018Godfather Part III\u2019 cut” Francis Coppola has long wanted another crack at \u201cThe Godfather Part III,\u201d looking to shorten it in places, and strengthen it in others, and change the title. He has been tinkering with that for awhile, as he re-cut versions of other films including \u201cCotton Club.\u201d But…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":59933,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[64232],"class_list":["post-59932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-francis-ford-coppola-making-new-godfather-part-iii-cut"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}