Genco

I really wish that there was more about Genco in both the novel and especially the films. If someone had never read the novel they would have almost no knowledge of Genco. Genco would have been very important to Vito's rise to power and in perserving the family during it's struggles. In part II we see more of Tessio and Clemaenza but little of Genco. Hopefully if there ever is a part IV Genco will be featured as a more important role. What are your thoughts on Genco?

A producer and director have to make choices. Obviously, the theatrical release of I&II have far less material than the Saga, etc. So, even though the Saga et al are quite enjoyable, they are a luxury that theatrical releases do not enjoy. Both films were 4 hours. That's quite alot for an audience to bear. To add more film increases the time of the film and the studio doesn't know how well audiences will tolerate that.

I think that Genco's relationship with Vito was adequately explained in GFII. GFI was not retrospective like GFII. Genco was on his deathbed in GFI, so there was nothing contemporary to explore.

I've often wonderered about Vito's "lost years":
The novel says he was 12 when he was sent to America. He "boarded with the Abbandandos" and worked in their grocery store. It's not inconceivable that a 12-year-old would work in a store at that time. But Vito's about 9 when he flees Sicily in the movie, and the next we see of him, he's married, in his late 20's (at least) with kids, and working in the store. It would have been interesting to know what the Andolini/Abbandando connection was, and what Vito did in those "ost years."

But I really don't need to know more about Genco than what I saw in II.

I too would like to see a version of the lost years. I'd like to see them for Michael too.

I imagine the "lost years" were pretty boring for Vito. There was obviously some connection between some family in Sicily who was hiding Vito and the Abbandando family in New York. It would seem Vito was laying low,working in the grosseria, courting and marrying, and saving up enough money to get his own place and start a family. He really becomes transformed when he encounters Fanucci and begins to see his leadership potential. IMHO that is all we need to know about young Vito.

As for Genco, he seemed kind of goofy to me in GF II.How became such a brilliant consigliere?

Don't judge looks, and the color of books my friend dontomasso, Genco was a war time consigliere so he knew his stuff, don't forget it was he who informed Vito about fanucci. Even thou Genco showed cowerdice when fanucci had the knife at the girl's throt, the girl he told vito he loved. Still he made him his consigliere for a reason.

Do we know if Genco was able to keep his girfriend, or did she find someone else that might have defended her?

Just as Vito transitioned at an advanced age, so apparently did Genco. Besides, if her own father would not defend here, what's to be expected of a boyfriend?

With Fanucci out of the way Genco would have been able to pursue and marry his girlfriend, and he would have considered it one of many "miracles" Vito performed for him.

I'll go along with the theory that Genco got tougher as he got older, and I would add that once Vito had Tessio and Clemenza working for him, and as the family started to grow, Vito turned to Genco who had, in effect, been his like a brother. It is clear Genco's father took Vito in, gave him a living and only cut him loose when Fanucci forced him to put his nephew to work.
It makes sense that the one person Vito could trust with everything was Genco who became consigliere.

Vito's trust and his soft spot for Tom Hagen may well have been derived from his own experience, because Tom, like Vito was a virtual orphan who was taken in and raised by a family that was not his own.

Still, it would have been nice to see some actual dialogue between the young Genco and Clemenza and Tessio. Unless that was FFC's intention; to understate the obvious: that Vito kept the three of them at a distance from each other, as any good, albeit paranoid, General would, to keep his underlings from conspiring against him.

He absolutely would have kept them apart. A consigliere only answers to his don.

There was a bit of dialog between them that was short, but revealing:
In a deleted scene from II, after Sr. Roberto makes his clumsy retreat from Vito's office, Genco chuckles and tells Vito that Roberto will probably hide out in the Bronx--it bespeaks a certain brotherly closeness. Then he says, "Vito, Clemenza wants to speak to you..." Clemenza comes in--first doffing his hat and holding it before him--and introduces Vito to the young Hyman Roth, who he says is good at fixing trucks. Clemenza refers to Vito as "Mr. Corleone."
That scene shows a remarkable transition in young Clemenza. Previously, he was the de facto boss--he organized the rug theft and the dress heist. And, in another deleted scene, Vito has to wait in the dress truck while Clemenza dallies with a winsome young woman with whom he's exchanging dresses for sex. When he finally emerges from the building and Vito wants to know what took him so long, Clemenza replies that "she couldn't make up her mind." He then orders Vito to deliver some dresses to "Dadino." But after the Fanucci murder, Clemenza suddenly becomes the humble subordinate.

Yes, TB, the novel expresses the same transition, altough it makes it more clear. In fact, in the novel, both Tessio and Clemenza avoid Vito for the next two weeks knowing that he murdreed Fanucci. Only then do they inform Vito that noone is conducting Fanucci's collections anymore as if they are waiting for Vito to give them the go ahead to start. Clearly, they have placed themselves in a subordinate position. of course, in GFII, it is Vito that sits behind the desk while Tessio and Clemenza are out conducting business.