So in case you can't tell, I've been reading various unfilmed Part III scripts. I read Dean Riesner's 1979 script, which was horrible, and followed it up with Coppola and Puzo's Part III script which is available here, along with the Riesner script:

http://www.mypdfscripts.com/screenplays/the-godfather-part-iii-1989-05-10-draft

First off, and I found this very strange, is that Rocco Lampone appears in both Riesner and Puzo/Coppola's unused scripts. The final decision to not use him in III was a good once since we were left with the impression that he was killed when assassinating Roth at the airport. I really don't know what they were thinking bringing him back for Part III.

Second, Tom Hagen is in the unused script by Puzo and Coppola. I do believe that Part III would have been much better had Duvall played Hagen, but there was really nothing major added to the script with Hagen there. He just handles some of the charity stuff and is more involved in the church swindle than Harrison was.

Thirdly, I liked the continuity of having WIllie Cicci take the place of Joey Zasa, but they don't really make any mention of Cicci working for Pentangelli or being investigated by the senate, so it almost doesn't even feel like the same character. And wouldn't Michael cut all ties with Cicci or have him killed after he snitched on Mike and the family in Part II? Add to that, the Russo brothers, who work under Cicci. Michael at one time tells the Russos that he kept them around because they were loyal to Hyman Roth, which I found odd, since Roth wanted to kill Michael, but Michael seems to have some loyalty toward Roth in keeping the Russos around. Also, it felt like the Russo Bros. should have been the Rosato Bros. So that was a bit confusing as well.

And finally, in this version, Michael dies. I doubt this would surprise many people here since they already know about it, but it was a much weaker ending than the one they eventually used. Michael's ultimate punishment is losing his family. Having him die gives him an easy way out. Thankfully, that ending was changed to the one that exists.

Other than those major differences it is largely the same movie, with many of the scenes word for word as they are used in Part III. While reading these scripts I noticed the apparent laziness that Puzo and Coppola had while writing this script. LIke I mentioned above, there is a lot of disconnect from Part II in the original script, and it also exists in the one they eventually filmed, despite more characters from Part II appearing. Also, gone are the little moments of intrigue, like the Hagen/Neri struggle for power and Mike's resentment of Hagen. In the unused Part III script all seems well between all of them.

So I can kind of rest assured knowing that the Part III that exists is the best possible Part III that could have ever been made, short of Duvall not appearing in it and Sofia Coppola playing Mary. In any case, it was a very interesting look into the minds of Puzo and Coppola. I only wish the script or notes for the rumored Part IV they were rumored to be working on would somehow be released in the same form.

So what does everyone else think? Has anyone read this script?

Yes, I looked into it. I agree with you're statements so there isn't much to add to that.

What is also pretty bad is the way one of the Russo Brothers who had turned states was intercepted by the Corleones in the middle of the city, while being under heavy protection. That was totally out of proportions and wouldn't been plausible to say the least.

The one scene that I did enjoy was the raid on Altobello's compound by the police. One of the Russo brothers was caught carrying a weapon. When he was interrogated he claimed he had a weapon with him because he was scared of bears. I would see a mobster using such an excuse.

That was really Puzo's kind of humor.

Yes, wasn't there a similar raid that took place in the 60's in upstate NY at some mafia convention?

1957. Apalachin.

OTOH, I never bought Michael being the kind of person who'd vegetate in despair for 17 more years. Even if his new-found religion prevented him from blowing his brains out, he was still seriously ill and should have died quickly once he no longer had a reason to take good care of himself.

Either that or he should have found some other motive to hang on, which would have resulted in a different death-scene. So, even apart from bad make-up, making him old in the scene of his death rang somewhat false for me.
One of the many problematic decisions Coppola made because he actually wanted to cash in on part III _and_ IV, which was thankfully never made.

And re: question of family and losing family, I always felt the absence from the equation of Sonny's real kids and even more so of Connie's kids, to be completely unnatural. They were all half-orphans growing up on the Tahoe estate and Michael would have been some sort of father-figure to them.

And unlike Vincent, those kids could have had a lot of dramatic potential and human connection to the family.



Best possible? Surely not. But it is clear that it could have been much worse.
OTOH, that's not saying that much. I mean, GFI was supposed to be made "contemporary" back in 1972 and feature hippies, among other things, so it could have been outrageously bad too.

The one thing I liked about this first Coppola script is the lack of the ridiculous helicopter massacre. Suspension of disbelief, much?

Excellent analysis, DBC.

Some of these posts don't add up. Michael was surely in his 80s when he died. Thus, he lived with his torment for decades. How's that an easy way out? And why should he have died quickly? When one dies is a huge variable. He was diabetic, but apparently had excellent medical care. So, what was false about it?

Sonny and Connie's children were, for all practical purposes, invisible to viewers. They would not have made an effective foil for the audience. Sonny's and Lucy's affair was hugely prominent in the novel and film and stuck with audiences. That neither the novel or film hinted at a progeny from that affair only registers with viewers academically. Vinnie's manifest of Sonny's temperment early in the film is meant to remind us of Sonny. Also, it provides a contrast with the leveling of Vinnie's temperment later in the film once he became fully enmeshed in the machinations of power politics and crime. That might very well have been Sonny's evolution had he lived. Sonny's and Connie's children gave FFC nothing to work with.

"Temper like his father."

Sonny may very well have matured had he lived. People usually mellow out with age. But he was probably destined to die young anyway. You can glean from the novel that from when he was a kid all he ever wanted was to be a killer like his father. So, you know . . . live by the sword and all that.

FFC could have done something with Connie's kids. Her second son Michael Rizzi was in the center of the baptism sequence, and her eldest son was referred to when Michael said he was caught stealing in Reno.

So Connie's grown up sons could have played a same role as Vincent in Part III. Especially because Connie was extremely close to Michael during those years so she would be a vital link between Michael and her sons. And Michael was responsible for ordering the death of their father.

The "interesting" kids for GF3 would have been Solozzo's children, come back for vendetta against Michael. It would have made for a heck of an action film.

:-)

Seriously, I don't really know what any GF3 could add to the story. GF was a full tragedy. It unfolded in GF2 by comparing the lives of Vito and Michael and by showing how Michael isolated himself more and more until he became a lonely man who lost everything, first of all his family. And the family was the reason why he joined the crime business.

Of course, we're Godfather fanatics, we'd even watch a Godfather TV series, as long as Al Pacino played Michael Corleone. We'd watch a prequel, etc.
GF3 adds some political stuff to the story. But I can get that from the newspapers too. And yes, he loses his daughter physically. But he had lost already every-one at the end of GF2.

Yes, but in GF3 he was trying to get everyone back together. He even thought he could try and ask Cardinal Lamberto to get Fredo back!

I do believe that they should have somehow showed or mentioned the fates of the Vito's other grandchildren in Part III. But it would have had little impact in the overall arc of Michael's story. It would have been the same as the few lines they added about Hagen's death, just referencing some previous characters to bring some closure.

Now if they had decided to do a Part IV, maybe you could work in some of the legit children to fill in the script with familiar names and make them part of a story, post-III.

I always thought a Sonny, Jr vs. Vincent power struggle could have been interesting.

Pretty much agree completely, although I think Tom Hagen's presence is a bit more prominent than you suggested, and would definitely have helped the finished film.

The Vincent/Mary subplot in this script is even messier & less credible than what we ended up with - they have a sudden meeting at Vincent's HQ & the romance starts. I had to go back & check to see if they'd met at the party or anywhere else, but no.

It's a very rough draft that needed a lot of work, you're quite right about it being 'lazy'.

I also got a kick out of how they named every character in the script, but kept calling Theresa "Tom's wife". Maybe they forgot she actually had a name?

The script is also an interesting look at what became of the Mike/Tom relationship. There were no remnants of Mike's manipulation of Tom from Part I or II. Maybe Mike had changed a little and stopped dicking Tom around.

Eh, on the contrary, IMHO. Vincent came from nowhere _and_ one of biggest shortcomings of his character was lack of shared history with and emotional connection to the core characters.
This resulted in Coppola coming up with the ultra-lame romance with Mary to give Vincent some tie besides pure self-interest.
Ditto completely unbelievable rise of otherwise unremarkable hood to Michael's confidant and criminal heir within a few months, as well.
All things that really marred GIII, IMHO.



Indeed. Particularly since there would have been a certain amount of "sibling" jealousy and conflict between them, who'd have been close to Michael because of Connie - surrogate children craving his approval, and Anthony, the beloved prodigal son who distances himself and throws it all away.



Absolutely!There was such a mine of good drama there, that GIII completely wasted! For instance, it was always clear that Michael and Mary were Vincent's meal tickets. There was no good reason for him to want Michael killed (Michael was the money-maker and the one who'd have needed him long-term) or for the conspirators to trust him.

Now, Victor, after somebody told him the truth about his father's death? That would have been a completely different story.

More should have been done with Michael's children. If Mary's death was supposed to be the central tragedy, then she should have been an appealing and memorable character in her own right, one whose death was a loss beyond the mere general fact that she was young.
And no, I am not talking about the actress here, but about the role/text, both in this draft and in the film. It is utterly lame. She is a stupid bimbo.

Also, now that I have seen Scarface - talk about plagiat! Almost everything involving her is cribbed from there, only done much worse in GFIII.

Ditto Anthony. His clash with Michael should have been about something significant, not a thing that doesn't even make sense.
For instance, he could have told Michael that he was going to become an assistant DA and particularly concentrate on fighting organized crime .
Or, publicly called the hypocrisy of naming huge charities after Vito.
Or called Michael on Fredo's murder. Etc.

And yea, Sonny's kids should have been mentioned too. In fact, even with GIII as is, I never understood why, once the thing with Duvall didn't work out, Coppola didn't replace Hagen with one of Sonny's legitimate sons as a new family lawyer and a counter-point to Vincent, rather than putting in another emotionally unconnected and completely flat figure.

Previous films perfectly interlaced human drama with criminal machinations, which made them great, in GIII it is all so separate and piece-meal...

Nicely said, Celebel, I agree. To this day I don't understand why the Vincent character was created in the first place, while there already were plenty of potential "legitimate" characters to use.

If you ask me, it was all about cashing on GF franchise not just with the III, but also with the thankfully never realized IVth installment.

Vincent was a failed attempt of fan-service, IMHO. Sonny was a popular character (certainly more so than Connie), so let's give the viewers his son as a post-Michael anchor man.

And let's make him illegitimate to use a bad pun about how Corleone family business can never be legitimate, since it started in crime. Sententious and unrealistic, but whatever.

Oh, and presumably the whole bastard thing was supposed to make Vincent choosing the life of crime more sympathetic. Except that if he was known to Corleones and regularly invited to family parties, then it is clear that he had more options than run-of-the-mill person anyway, so it didn't work at all, IMHO.

The irony here being that going with solid dramatic potential, rather than shallow marketing tricks not only would have made GFIII much better, but GFIV possible and even desirable. Oh, well...

Well said, Celebel, and welcome!

It's hard to argue those points. However, I do believe it's logical to think that Sandra would have whisked the kids away following the death of Sonny and protected them from the family. However, Sandra is there in Part II's early script, having her daughters seek Michael's approval and having an affair with Tom. So Puzo and FFC never intended for that to happen.

It could have fit in because, as the novel states, Sonny did not leave an estate. Thus, Sandra would have been dependent on Corleone generosity for her financial well-being.

Well, I have been off the boards for several months, but on a couple of the other threads I have partial scenes for a possible GF IV which would have made extensive use of Michael Francis (Rizzi) Corleone, as well as a revamped role for Anthony Corleone, eventually becoming embroiled in a power struggle against Vincent for control of the Family (Santino Corleone Jr. would also return to a role in the family -- there would definitely be friction between Sonny's legitimate and illegitimate sons.)


IMO Connie would have gotten over the murder of Carlo very very fast indeed (in fact, she appears to have done just that in GF II), because Carlo beat the living crap out of her, and also betrayed her older brother Sonny, who she idolized, and led to his death.

After her first explosion of anger at Michael at the end of GF I over Carlo's murder, Connie figured out real quick Carlo had been a danger to the whole Corleone Family, including her, and realized she was much better off without him.

She always identified herself as a Corleone more than anything else. IMO she would have had the kids drop the Rizzi name and just go by the Corleone family name. Plus, she ultimately wanted to gain influence and eventually power in the Corleone Family. The way to do that would not be to hang on to the family name of a traitor who had to be rubbed out 30 years ago.


IMO the main problem in GF III was that throughout GF II, things were setting up an ultimate conflict and test of loyalty between Michael Corleone and Tom Hagen. (Remember of course the scenes near the end of GF II where Michael very openly questions Hagen's loyalty).

So any eventual production of GF III which included Robert Duvall playing Tom Hagen, but only in a slightly-modified version of the B.J. Hamilton role, and not a full-fledged test of betrayal and loyalty against Michael Corleone, would have been almost as much a disappointment as what we eventually got anyway.

I have to disagree with some of this - I'd like to have seen Connie hold the grudge against Michael forever, however irrational and impractical it was. It just would have identified her as a true Corleone. I never really bought her implicit acceptance of Fredo's murder, given how she begged Michael to forgive him, & the love she clearly felt for him.

I don't mean it's something she would necessarily have taken to extremes, like plotting to kill Michael, but it could have been interesting for her to have brought it up subtly now & then to hurt Michael & remind him of what he'd done, particularly in GFIII, when Michael is somewhat weakened and genuinely attempting to redeem himself.

Had her son been featured, it could also have been something that got out of control, another potentially explosive plotline.

I just saw an episode of "Decoded" with Brad Meltzer about The Vatican and the mysterious death of Pope John Paul The First. Seems he only lasted 33 days as Pope after dying in his sleep in 1978. Word was that he was ready to expose major corruption in The Vatican Banking system, corrupt Cardinals and connections to the Mafia. Sounds a lot like the final GF3 plot?

I agree. There is no trace of any Mike/Tom tension in the unused Part III script that has Hagen in it. Perhaps in his softening, Mike is able to see how cruel he has been to Tom over the years and makes amends for it. Who knows, maybe they got stuck in a van in the Pine Barrens and came out better for it.