Very good thread. It makes us cope with the inner reasons we like this movie so much. For one thing is sure: this is not just a great movie. Not just a movie masterpiece. It's not just oustandingly excellent script, direction, setting, acting, music score, even though all these things together would be enough to make it special. There are many other movie masterpieces, but hardly they have the same impact on us, after more than 30 years, through the generations, as we may easily see in this very board. This is special. This is different. I agree very much with that sort of "identification process" DC explained so well in his detailed and bright post. But this "identification process" is part of every movie, theatre play, painting, poem, sculpture, music or other human genius expression whatsoever that deserves to be called "art". It's part of the artistic process. It's what is called "the cathartic process" art involves inside a receptive spectator, from Greek theatre on. So it is to be said that this identification is not uniquely pertinent of the GF saga, even though very powerful, for the psychological reasons DC so smartly explained. Personally I think that this film has such a strong effect on us because it let us identify with characters (Vito, Michael) who on one hand are criminals and on the other are heroes. They are both killers AND healers. They use power both for their profit AND to restore justice. They embody all greatness and misery of human condition and at such an extent that few ordinary men could ever stand. That's why we cannot help but admire them, even though we know they are criminals. The tragic ending (Michael's innocent daughter's death) is the right punishment for choosing (but was it a real choice? Did Michael have a real choice? I don't think so) that lifestyle. This makes our admiration morally bearable. When "the end" appears on the screen, the lights turn on and GF is over, we feel it was the obviuos ending. Yet it hurts.