There's a few things bothering me about the end of GF1

1. What happened to the five families after the five bosses were killed on michaels orders?

2. Didn't some remnants of the families start a further war?

3. Who took over their businesses?

Thanks

Well according to the book, after the hit, many of the important Capos from both The Barzini and The Tattaglia families went over to the Corleones. One would have to infer that the other families still existed, but that they no longer were as powerful as before. The Corleone Family rose straight back to the top, regaining the wielding power that once was theirs.

I also think that The Godfather Returns novel addresses these exact questions.


Don Cardi

As I have said before, and will always say:

The answers to any questions addressed by GFR are no more valid, have no more credence, and should not be regarded any more highly than those expressed by any of us who are at least as familiar (and very likely more so) with the book and films as Winegardner.

And I agree. But I just wanted to let the person know that someone, even if that someone's book stunk, did address his question in a book.

Don Cardi

I haven't read Godfather Returns, but I have seen all the movies and read the book "The Godfather". The impression I always had was that the assassinations basically crippled the other five families. Remember what Hagen says at some points in the movie, "If the old man dies, we lose half our contacts, half our strength." I would assume the same would be true of the other families.

As DC said, the novel addresses most of your first question, Capodi. Part of the answer to your second question is contained in a deleted scene from GFII. In that scene, Neri tells Michael that he's located Fabrizio, who he says came to America in 1956, "sponsored by the Barzini family." Since Barzini put Fabrizio up to bombing Michael's car in Sicily years earlier, we have to assume that someone in the Barzini family was still in power in 1956, and influential enough to make good on Barzini's years-old debt to Fabrizio. Since that action was hostile to Michael, it seems that the Barzini organization wasn't totally decimated or subordinated after Barzini was killed.

Yeah, I understand that.

It just annoys me (I guess because I expected so much from GFR and got so little) that Winegardner wrote should be given anymore credence that what you or I or anyone else writes just because he put what he wrote in a book.

Big deal, so the guy wrote a book.

Hey, I just got a great idea. Seriously. I think that all of us here should collaborate on a book called "The Unanswered Questions About Mario Puzo's and Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather".

We could take all of the questions we discuss here, summarize the valid points and arguments from each thread, and put the whole thing in book form.

I'm not kidding. And I bet we'd sell more copies than that piece of crap that Winegardner wrote.

Not necessarily, Turnbull.

Fabrizzio could have been imported immediately after the attempted hit in Sicily while the Barzoni family was still powerful, and simply not been located for several years until long after the Barzini family's demise.

I say that because I always felt it would have been too dangerous for Michael to leave the Barzini family intact after killing Emilio, even if was under new (ostensibly picked by Michael) leadership.

There still would have been too many Barzini loyalists around, concentrated in one group, which would have left open too many possibilities for treachery.

The safest and wisest course for Michael would have been for him to break up the Barzini family entirely, or, at the very least, scatter its top guns throughout the rest of the Corleone organization and replace them with men of his own choosing.

So I doubt that by 1955-56 there was anyone left in the Barzini family that was still powerful enough to make good on any promises made to Fabrizzio years earlier.

Even if there were, it would have been awfully risky for them to do so. They worked for Michael now. Why risk their life to make good on a promise made to a Sicilian sheepherder years before?

So what do you think of the book idea? Seriously.

Logic is on your side, plaw. But in the deleted scene, Neri clearly says, "He came over around 1956, sponsored by the Barzini family."

I forgot about that deleted scene.

But as you say, logic is on my side and it makes Neri's statement sound a little silly, dontcha' think?.

I mean, certainly with Barzini dead for several years, you would think that Michael would have had the "Barzini Family" pacified by 1956.

Yes Plaw, he probably did. As I posted, the book says that most of the important capos from the Barzinis and Tattaglias came over to The Corleones after their bossses were executed. Surely such moves like that had to weaken those families immensly.


Don Cardi

I always believed that FFC was trying to make up for his own flaw in GF, where he leaved out for no reason the killing of Fabrizzio, as it happened in the novel in the most natural way, with the rest of Families heads.
He was just trying to justify in that deleted scene the fact that the revenge was to take place so much later. But it was so goofy that even his self-assurance was not enough to leave it in the movie.
We'll aggue to no end! Just imagine the chapters about "Did Fredo know" and "Justification of GF3 existence" etc.
But the idea is good. Find a publisher .