Originally posted by Jimmy Buffer:
It doesn't make any sense to me. If Barzini and Sollozo needed help from someone inside the Corleone Family, don't you think they would have had that person actually do something rather than just call in sick?
You raise a good point, Jimmy. And I think it hasn't been raised before.
I think the first reason for Paulie's betrayal is to support drama in the film. It helped Puzo and FFC to make the point that, even in "peacetime," Vito was in constant danger from his own people--a nice message about the Mafia. The shooting was dramatic enough by itself, but Paulie's betrayal set up all the drama that followed: the conference in the Don's office; Michael's initial involvement ("Alright, smart college boy, whose head do we blow off?"); the dead fish; that nice interaction between Clemenza, Rocco and Paulie in the car (and Clemenza giving the contract to Rocco in a deleted scene); Paulie's death.
As a practical matter, Barzini/Tattaglia/Sollozzo would have found it helpful to have someone like Paulie on the inside to tell them about the Don's routines, as Peter_Clemenza posted. Paulie couldn't be present because he would have been even more of a prime suspect if he failed to "protect" the Don in an attack. He probably told them that, with things peaceful, the Don wouldn't think much about having a real bodyguard replace him--just Fredo. That bit about Paulie calling in sick three or four times previously probably was a trial run to see if Vito requested another real bodyguard. Of course, Paulie was crazy to think he could get away with it, but greed does that to people.
BTW, movie fans: In GF and many, many other movies either the bad guys or the good guys have contacts in the phone company who "trace calls" and give them the conclusive proof they need to nail someone. Phone companies
don't and
never did keep records of local calls--only "toll" calls that are outside a local calling area, or are to another state. Local calling was on a flat-rate basis in those days. Calls from pay phones to local numbers also were flat-rate: they cost five cents in 1945, and a record would be made only if you spoke for more than three minutes. So, there's no way that Sonny's contact in the phone company could have "traced" the calls from the phone booth outside the Don's building to Paulie's home.
