Does anyone understand exactly how Paulie sold out Vito to Barzini by simply calling in sick? I know it's very minor, but it's always kind of bothered me the way it is presented. 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? I would think it would make more sense to actually have the betrayer there. If Paulie hadn't called in sick that day, he would have been the only one there with Vito, so why have him call in sick? By Paulie calling in sick, they knew Vito would have had to get another bodyguard, one who could have possibly thwarted the asassination attempt. If anything, Paulie calling in sick would seem to make their attempted hit more difficult.

Godfather experts, am I missing something that would make Barzini's plan seem more sensible, or is this just one of those instances where it's a movie so not everything has to make sense?

The film never really shows us that Paulie did betray the family (I've never seen the deleted scenes. Do they go further in implicating Paulie?). My guess is that the Corleones are not big believers in coincidences. Besides, if Paulie had been in on it, and was on duty, he would have remained suspect if he hadn't taken a bullet himself, or at least taken out one of the hit-men.

Although Barzini/Tattaglia/Sollozzo was running a risk with a different bodygaurd, they probably knew that the Corleone's would highly suspect a skilled shooter such as Paulie completely missing Don Vito's two assassins.

Seeing as Vito found out about Paulie being missing on short notice, they mightve assumed he would just go without another bodygaurd. Just some thoughts.

Paulie Gato did not only miss four days of working for Don Corleone - He "fingered," as the Corleone Family would put it, Don Corleone for Virgil Sollozzo's gunmen.

Elaborate on "Fingered" please.

I will use an obvious example. Paulie Gato informed Virgil Sollozzo's gunmen of Don Corleone's daily routines, e.g., where he was between 08:00am and 12:00pm.

Here is the diolague (the script version) from a deleted scene that explains how they knew it was Paulie :

SONNY :"All right, Mikey...who do we have
to hit, Clemenza or Paulie?"

MICHAEL : "What?"

SONNY : "One of them fingered the old man."

Michael didn't realize that the men waiting outside were on
trial for their lives.

MICHAEL : "Clemenza? No, I don't believe it."

SONNY : "You're right, kid, Clemenza is okay.
It was Paulie."

MICHAEL : "How can you be sure?"

SONNY : "On the three days Paulie was sick this month, he got calls from a payphone across from the old man's
building. We got people in the phone company."
(he shrugs) "Thank God it was Paulie...we'll need Clemenza bad."


Don Cardi

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.