Movies That Stayed With Me: The Godfather
/When I was in my late teens and early 20s, I felt completely lost. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life, but I knew two things—I loved movies and writing. One of my professors at my community college taught a TV production class and always talked about TV and movies. His enthusiasm infected me and as my advisor as well, we’d end up talking about different movies. He suggested that I watch The Godfather.
I remember talking about movies with my dad and mentioned The Godfather was something I’d never seen and he echoed the sentiment that I should watch it. That was enough for me.
I don’t remember how I got my hands on a copy—maybe I rented it, or maybe I bought it from the movie store where I worked. But I do remember sitting in front of my 27-inch Sony Television in my 12x15 bedroom and watching The Godfather for the first time.
“Leave the gun. Take the cannoli.”
When I saw it was almost three hours, I wasn’t sure I was going to make it through. I was expecting a slow, old movie, but what I got was wholly different. It might have been the longest movie I’d ever seen at that point, but it never felt slow.
I grew up with an older brother who loves Arnold and Stallone, so most of the movies I saw were what he rented. I grew up with 80s action movies, so The Godfather was a huge departure from that. My only other experience with a gangster movie was watching Goodfellas at my uncle’s, and I can’t say I cared for it ... but I was 12 at the time.
“I have a special practice. I handle one client. Now you have my number, I’ll wait for your call. By the way, I admire your pictures very much.”
I was absorbed into this family’s life. Brando was stellar. The simple things like a movement or a look he’d give during a scene said so much. Michael’s time in Italy could have felt like a detour in any other movie, but here, it felt completely natural.
Watching The Godfather—along with other classics at the time—opened my eyes to what a movie could be. While there was no Stallone-like action, the tension between characters made up for it. The Godfather reshaped what a gangster movie was. The dialogue stood out, and there are so many lines I still quote to this day. It made me love story and characters and showed me it’s okay to get lost in make-believe lives.
“I’m gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse.”
The Godfather kicked off a whole other point in my life. It wasn’t just a phase-I had a list of classic films I wanted to watch. I made a list that included Casablanca, The Shining, Apocalypse Now and others. But it was The Godfather that stayed with me. The Godfather wasn’t just another movie on my list—it changed the way I saw storytelling. I used to own the collector’s set on DVD, and now I have the Steelbooks for all three films. Decades later, it’s still with me, just like it was the first time I pressed play.