Coppola quotes writer Mario Puzo's famous phrase from Part 1, “It’s not personal, it’s just business,” (4") and says that the opening of Part 3 turns this on its head: the real truth is, it’s all personal.  Walter Murch (film editor) persuaded him to start with the family event.   Coppola, who frequently draws parallels between Michael's story and his own life, personalised the film even more by putting his father and also his mother alongside Sophia and his sister Talia Shire (playing Michael's sister Connie in all three films) in the opening party after the religious service. 

This high level of personal involvement is, surprisingly, one key to the films' greatness.  Robert DeNiro observes, “He made the film – the whole style of it and everything – he personalised the original screenplay in a way that he could understand, so it has a warmth, it has a romanticism about it, that’s its trademark almost, you know.” (from The Godfather Family - a Look Inside.)   In his commentary on Part 1, when Connie phones Sonny after Carlo has thrashed her with a belt, we see Momma Corleone in the kitchen taking the call, surrounded by kids.  Coppola tells us:

“I think where my personality had an influence on this picture is just that, you know, of course there was the conspiracy and the men in rooms, making plans, as has gone on throughout history, and I think, you know … I love children and I think in terms of ‘Where are the children when this is going on?’ … ‘What’s the food like when this is going on?’; ‘What’s the music?’

“My own preferences or orientations came to combine with what was the central grown-up adult male part of the story, but I was able to include the things that I love as well and that I think about.”  (111”)

Lest we forget, the first Godfather had introduced Michael as a war hero, the one 'clean' member of the family whom his father Vito and elder brother Sonny both wanted to see succeeding in a legitimate career - politics or industry.  Coppola comments, "Michael was a good man, an attractive and promising man.  And his conversion from a good man to an evil man is more horrible than some (one) who never had a moral idea in his eye." (19")  He was sucked in to the Mafia 'business' to protect his family after his father Vito was shot by another mob.  In Part 3 Michael says, Michael cries out, “All my life I wanted out. I wanted the family out.” (124") 

As we watch Part 3, can we remember this about him?  Or has the unfolding story of his rise to power as a Mafia don made it impossible for us to believe there is any goodness in him?  First let's remind ourselves of some of what he did:   He became a man who expanded a criminal empire, who killed off swathes of his rivals in finely planned and choreographed assassinations, who ruthlessly controlled every other member and every relationship in his extended family, killing off any male member who put the family at any risk, ultimately assassinating his own surviving brother, Fredo.  (That he has Fredo killed on the very fishing boat where Fredo had 'adopted' Michael's son Anthony and shown the boy the practical love and friendship his father could not makes the killing even more foul, a point well made by Kathleen Amen in her fine essay on Godfather Part 2, Everything is relative.)

And he seemed to lose his soul, becoming frozen, living solely to control.  In the first two films we watch him with increasing awe, not because we admire him but because we are somehow both afraid of and fascinated by his power and his single-mindedness.  This is the man we are now invited to forgive.  For Coppola, "the tragedy of The Godfather ... is the tragedy of America.   By the end of Godfather 2, just like America in that period, Michael had become wrapped in self-righteousness and distrusted everyone.”  Pacino adds, “getting more and more like a paranoid person, like a Nixon.”  (from The Godfather Family - a Look Inside)

It is not only his clinical efficiency as a 'businessman' that makes him seem terrible.  He is feared by his family, but seems incapable of love.   This is in marked contrast to his father, Don Vito; and Godfather Part 2 takes us to the heart of the comparison, also suggesting that Michael was always trying to be like his father, and though succeeding in business, always failing as a father and husband.  We become aware that his father, Don Vito (Marlon Brando) was happy and at peace among his family - and we warm to him because of this.  Movie critic Pauline Kael said of this, "Vito had a domestic life that was a sanctuary, but Michael has no sanctuary." (Fathers and Sons p401) 

Indeed, by cutting back and forth in Godfather Part 2 between Vito's early years as a Mafia don (played by DeNiro) and Michael's, Coppola accentuates the gulf between them.  We end up realising that Michael wanted so much to be like his father that he forgot to be himself.  In Everything is relative, Kathleen Amen notes that Coppola uses a slow dissolve from era to era if he wishes to emphasise the similarities between father and son, Vito and Michael, but a sharp jump or black screen if they are in contrast, as they usually are:

The transition after the attack at Lake Tahoe is a slow dissolve from Michael telling his son Anthony good-bye to Vito gazing lovingly upon his first-born infant Santino(Sonny); the similarity of doting fathers is obvious.

We do not know at this point in the film, however, that this scene with Anthony is the only time that Michael will interact with either of his children in a positive way.  Vito, on the other hand, is often seen carrying a baby or talking to a toddler. The fact of having children is important to Michael, but the actual raising of them seems low on his list of priorities, and this lack of real involvement in the lives of his children can be seen as one of the reasons for his ultimate emotional impoverishment.

After Vito has killed Fanucci, he goes home to sit with his young family on the steps outside his apartment, and tells the baby Michael how much he loves him. The tableau is drenched with irony, certainly, since Vito has just killed for the first time, has set in motion the accumulation of power and influence that will doom his son's humanity. But it is a scene of sweet, rich domesticity, especially as contrasted with the home to which Michael returns. There everything is covered with snow, with Anthony's new car abandoned in the yard.

The sharp cut from Michael and Kay's fight to the Corleones' trip back to Sicily emphasizes the difference between the latter's extravagantly romanticised view of family unity and the disintegration of Michael's family. With cinematography as lush as the music on the soundtrack, we see the extended Corleone family in one gorgeous setting after another. It is impossible to imagine Michael and his family making such a trip together, even before he and Kay become separated.

Coppola comments, “Michael seems to understand that it (the way of violent response to violence) has to end. You just can’t keep outsmarting your enemy in this back-and-forth, Orestia-type violence begetting violence.  To do that is to sacrifice your youth, because ultimately it will destroy the future.”  (77")

Initially, Michael only knows one way to seek redemption - buying it.  Coppola comments, Michael’s charitable vision was to “pay back the enormous amounts of money, to undo the way they were earned - to pay for his sin.” (15 & 18")  Michael tries to get out by buying Vatican support for his legitimate attempt to buy the multi-national company Immobiliare.  In a telling scene, Michael's lawyer B J Harrison (George Hamilton IV) puts the bid on the table:

HARRISON
The Corleones are prepared to deposit 500 million dollars in the Vatican bank at such time as Mr. Corleone receives majority control of Immobiliare.
MICHAEL
Immobiliare could be something new -- a European conglomerate.  Few families, have control of such a company.
ARCHBISHOP GILDAY
It seems in today’s world the power to absolve debt is greater than the power of forgiveness.  Six hundred million dollars.
MICHAEL (smiles)
Don’t overestimate the power of forgiveness.

Still a businessman first and foremost, then.  Notice that Michael doesn't say "Don't underestimate the power of forgiveness," though it's easy to think he does.  He is resisting the Archbishop's greed, dealing for six, not five, hundred million dollars; the bittersweet irony is that we know he does also want some form of forgiveness.

Even though he hands over control of the Corleone business to his nephew Vincent (Andy Garcia), he finds that other Mafia groups make such a concerted attempt to wrest power from the Corleones that he must stay involved.  In exasperation Michael cries out, “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!” (64")   Meanwhile in Italy he meets new levels of intrigue from the Italian white-collar Mafia in the mysterious real-life network P2.  We gradually realise that the most powerful men in Italy are orchestrating all the attacks, in the US as well as Rome and Sicily.

When Michael seeks counsel from his trusted Sicilian mentor Don Tomasino, the advice calls him back to the Sicilian way:  “Your enemies always get strong on what you leave behind.”   The Sicilian view is that Michael can’t let go, he has to stay in there, fighting.  So even when one wants to begin again, to let go the mistakes of the past and start a new, good life, one is still at the mercy of other people ... and 'other people' aren't often very merciful!  Coppola identifies personally with the character of Michael at many points on this journey in search of redemption:

“The past is always having a war with the future, I find. I try so hard to be in the future and think of new things, new thoughts, and always I’m pulled back by the past … I find just as Michael wants to get on with his life, to mature and try to be a better man, but you get pulled back into something of your youth.” (62")

6  Beginnings of forgiveness

If there is to be any forgiveness, it will not come through Michael's effort - although it is important that he tries.  None of us can obtain it for ourselves ... but the seeking is profoundly important.  The effort Michael makes signals to other people, more merciful people, that he is more receptive to what they can give him.

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