Glad this controversy is getting new attention.

Years ago, someone surfaced an earlier script in which Pentangeli was deliberately spared. It was one of many such plotlines ultimately either abandoned or left on the cutting room floor. I think FFC figured that it would have been too much of a stretch for Roth to have engineered that split-second rescue of Frankie. What's more, it was so much more satifying for Michael to have believed Frankie was dead.and then to discover that he survived--after he'd perjured himself.

"Michael Corleone says hello" might have been left over from the same scene shot under an earlier script. That's happened before. Years ago, some sharp-eyed poster noticed Questadt, the Senate lawyer, sitting behind Roth in Havana when the gringo pezzanovanti were meeting with Batista. I think he also found a script version in which Michael was to have met with Questadt in Havana. Obviously FFC abandoned that plot line. So, why was Questadt left in that scene? Either FFC didn't notice it, or he left it in because all of the Cuba footage was shot on location in the Dominican Republic, and he didn't want to re-shoot the scene and go through all that expense. He just thought no one would notice. Of course, that was before this Board was in operation.