Who ordered the hit?Why would the hitman say its from Micheal, when it really looked like he would be killed?

This has been exaustivly discussed, check old threads, Turnbull has the most info on this.

Why can't you people ever get poor Frankie's name right? It is Frank Pentangelli.

I'm a little confused by this scene...who were the Rasoto Brothers in this scene and who was the guy that Frankie met out on the street? Who was the guy who actually garroted(sp?) Frankie?

Carmine, the Rosato brothers were a breakaway faction in Frank Pentangeli's family (actually the remnants of the Corleone Family's New York operation). They were at war with Frankie because, as Michael told Frankie in the boathouse during Anthony's party, "Clemenza promised the Rosato Brothers three territories in the Bronx after he died. He died, you didn't give it them." The meeting you described was suggested by Michael as a way for Frankie to "settle these problems with the Rosato brothers," but was in reality an attempted murder ordered by Roth. The guy Frankie met outside the bar was Carmine Rosato. The guy who attempted to garrotte him inside was Tony Rosato.
BTW: The Rosato brothers probably are modeled on the real-life Gallo brothers (Larry, Crazy Joe, Albert), who broke away from the Profaci family (later the Magliocco Family, later the Columbo Family) around 1960. Larry was garrotted in the back of a bar in Brooklyn, but the attempt was thwarted by a cop who happened by--the model for the scene you were wondering about.

It doesn't make any sense to have that line included, but I saw a tv interview with Danny Aiello (the actor playing the guy who tried to garrot Frankie 5 Angels) and Aiello swore he made up that line himself. FFC liked the way it sounded, and decided to keep it in the movie without regard of the impact it would have on the storyline.

BTW - Welcome to the boards, dondi. Is your screen name any relation to the old comic strip?

BTW - Welcome to the boards, dondi. Is your screen name any relation to the old comic strip?[/QB][/QUOTE]
Hmmm...some of us are showing our age here, SC.
--Major Hoople

You're dead right there SC (please excuse the pun). If only Aiello hadn't put in that line! Itjust shows though, that even the actors in GFII were a little confused by the story. Aiello must have misunderstood the script, thinking that Michael had ordered the hit when it was of course Hyman Roth. I prefer to ignore that line because once you remove it, the story makes sense.

They answered this in the movie when Tom said, "Roth played this one beautifully." Roth engineered the attempted hit on Frank Pentangelli, but made it look like it was Michael. Remember, in an earlier meeting, Michael asked Roth for permission to kill Pentangelli. So Roth instructed the button men to say "Michael Corleone says hello" when they attempted to kill Frankie. Even though the attempt to kill was unsuccessful, Roth fooled Frankie into thinking that Michael tried to have him killed. This triggered Frankie testifying against Michael to the Senate Committee.

Why don't we just shut down the boards then, since most everything has already been discussed? Let's just make this one big, fat FAQ...

Or better yet let's just have Turnbull respond to every post...

There's a few things going on here:

1) Roth wished to eliminate Michael, as evidenced by the hit attempt in Michael's home.
2) Roth also sought to eliminate Pentangeli, who was giving his boys, the Rosatos, problems.
3) What Roth "played beautifully", I think, was the "owning" of Questadt, and the revision of both his original plans as mentioned above, into a new plan, dictated by the circumstances (Cicci & Pentangeli in custody), to eliminate both Michael and Pentangeli, albeit through prison rather than death.
4) The "Michael Corleone says hello" line makes no sense in the context of the script. Since Pentangeli was supposed to wind up dead, what difference would it make if he know that Michael was behind his killing?
5) Like SC, I have heard that Danny Aiello ad libbed the line, and I like Don Andolini's theory that perhaps Aiello was somewhat confused by the script. He had a very small role, so it's understandable if he did not grasp all of the script's nuances. Maybe Coppola left it in, though, because it fit well as a reason for Pentangeli's subsequent cooperation with the Senate Committee.

One thing that bothers me here, though, is this:

If it was Roth who ordered the hit on Pentangeli--and Roth admits as much in his "This is the business that we've chosen" speech--how could he have possiblty thought that Michael wouldn't figure this out? Michael knew that he didn't give the order, so there weren't too many possibilities left.

Would it kill you to just, move your damn mouse to the top of the page and click on "Search"??? I learned to do that after a while of being here.

It's "Pentangeli", ShortCake. With one "L"

Thanks Plawrence--

Remember that, when he visited Roth in Miami, Michael said: "Frank Pentangeli is a dead man. You don't object?" But when he dispatched Frankie to "settle the problems with the Rosato brothers," Michael was clearly signaling that he really didn't suspect Frankie in the Tahoe shooting after all--meaning that he might suspect Roth. My theory is that Roth ordered the hit on Pentangeli to prevent Michael and Frankie from working together to cook up mischief against Roth. In Havana, Roth was telling Michael, in effect, that he, Roth, simply did what Michael said he was going to do: kill Pentangeli. And that whole rap about Moe Green was intended to tell Michael that killing Frankie was tit for tat for Michael's killing of Moe.

This question has been brought up many times, and every time, a new theory is started. One that has never come up is a fairly obvious one:

When Roth asks Michael what is to happen to Frankie, Mike says "Frankie Pantangeli is a dead man." Could it be that Roth gave the order to the Rosatos claiming that the order came from Mike? Perhaps Carmine and Anthony Rosato actually thought that they were executing Michael's orders. After all, while they are backed by Roth, Mike is capo di tutti capo , and they would surely follow his wishes.

I know Turnbull will disagree, saying that Mike sending Frankie to patch things up is a sign that he doesn't suspect Frankie, but I disagree. It is entirely possible that because there was never a sitdown between both sides with Mike directly giving his verdict, the Rosatos and Roth may not have any idea that Mike told Frankie to make everything right. For all they knew, Frankie was just here to make a deal.

This is all evident in Roth's face when Mike told him he never gave the order. Roth seems surprised, as if he didn't expect Mike to find out about his plan. For all Roth knew, Michael had been angry enough with Frankie to give an order and wouldn't be mad when he was found dead.

What do you think?

Thanks Mr. Turnbull. As always an excellent reply. I appreciate it.

Nice point Hollywood Hagan, I never thought of anything like that...but it could be possible that the Rosatto Bros thought they were carrying out an order from Michael. Although didn't Roth outrank Michael in the world of the mob?

Outrank? They were not in one collective "Mob". Michael is the capo di tutti capo of LCN, and Roth is an entrepreneur of sorts. Although they are in on a deal to take over gaming in Cuba, they were not partners in one "Mob". Roth was based on Meyer Lansky, who was an integral part in Lucky Luciano's National Crime Syndicate, but there appears to be no syndicate in GFII; just Michael and his Cosa Nostra mob.

This totally makes sense! It coincides with the plot and the dialog. Frankie is worth more alive and angry with the Corleones than dead because of a disagree with small street crimes with the Rosatos. Roth was after Michael, not Frankie. The Rosatos cannot do anything without Roth's appoval.
This is the same point I have made a few months earlier, so natually I am going to agree with you. Its a lot easier for me to believe that improptu lines flows with the plot than not. Actually, I think its ridiculous to ignore lines just because these lines do not coincide with a plot theory, or reading outside information in attempt to understand a scene. Its all there on screen.

QUOTE]Originally posted by Fanucci's Revenge:

Quote

Originally posted by DonFerro55:
[b]This has been exaustivly discussed, check old threads, Turnbull has the most info on this.

Why don't we just shut down the boards then, since most everything has already been discussed? Let's just make this one big, fat FAQ...

Or better yet let's just have Turnbull respond to every post...[/b][/QUOTE]

Fanucci's Revenge,
just ignore people who tell you to check old threads. No one really have the answers, and only a few even have an opinion. Most of the posters just read others and give some sort of approval rating which is really a waste of space than anything else. But if you do have an opinion, I would like to read it. I don't care if 1000 replies are in the search engine.

Quote from Fannuci's Revenve on Quote by DonFerro55:
This is way outta line buddy....

It has been extremly spoken about....

Now lets drop this...you've stopped being friendly...

Quote from Fannuci's Revenve on Quote by DonFerro55:
This is way outta line buddy....

It has been extremly spoken about....

Now lets drop this...you've stopped being friendly...

I've posted this before, so please bear with me:
I also read the story about how Danny Aiello ad-libbed "Michael Corleone says hello." Why did an ultra-careful, fanatically attentive director like Coppola leave the line in (to the eternal bafflement of people like us)? Perhaps because the line was intended not for Frankie's ears (he would be dead in seconds), but for the ears of Richie the bartender, whose place was being used for the murder. Richie is a "civilian," and he's nervous as hell ("Carmine-- NO!," he screams as Carmine draws his gun when the cop walks in). The Rosatos knew he might be squeezed by the cops during an investigation. He wouldn't dare rat out the Rosatos, so they left Richie with a line he could repeat to the cops: "The killer said, 'Michael Corleone says hello.' " That would set the cops to questioning Michael. It'd also be reported in the press, which would further damage Michael's claim to legitimacy.

I doubt the bartender would rat out Michael Corleone. He (the bartender) knew he was caught between a rock and a hard place, and would be in grave danger if he cooperated with the police.

To add to this part of the storyline being "screwy", how come the Corleones didn't find out that Frankie was still alive? They had plenty of cops on their payroll, and I'm sure one of them would have reported that Pentangeli was alive in police custody.

Yes I understand that. I think I should have used a better term than "outrank." It seemed to me that Roth was more powerful than Michael. With the whole talk about Michael being Roth's "successor" (which was of course all BS), it seemed that Roth held more power than the Corleone Family did at the time. I could be wrong however, that was just the impression that I got. I've never seen any explanation of it. I guess then that Michael would be more powerful huh? Did Roth have any kind of organization of his own? Besides Ola, I can't really recall any...

Turnbull will fill ya in on those answers. One thing is certain: That Michel is far more powerful then Roth.

I don't think the bartender is a major player. He just provided an meeting location for the Rosato/pentiangeli meeting.
I think Carmine drew out his gun when the cop began to walk in the backroom to investigate what was on the floor. So I don't think his intentions was to shoot the bartender! Now, if the Rosatos really wanted Frankie dead, why did they kill the relatively unimportant beat cop, along with Frankie, and dump their bodies in another location? The mob killed a NYC Captian, what would a small time beat cop means to them?
Again, I am still unconvinced that Michael is so concerned about legitimacy, or his Public relations rating. In GF I Michael did want the Corleones to be legitimate "all the way", as he said to Tom. But, the ongoing theme of GF II is how deeply corrupt Micheal became.

I believe Roth acted against Michael in self-defense. Roth and Vito had been partners, but only in the Prohibition-era booze business, as Roth pointedly reminded Michael several times. But Michael had been horning in on Roth's non-NY gambling empire even before Vito died. The first business deal we see him in after Sicily was his attempt to buy out Moe Green--and when that failed, he killed Moe, Roth's closest pal. By the beginning of GFII, he has moved his operation to Nevada, owns or controls three hotels, is about to move Klingman out of a hotel Roth owns with the Lakeville Road Boys, and has designs on Roth's Cuban empire. Small wonder Roth might feel threatened. That's why Roth pretended to be MIchael's foster-father, all the while plotting to kill him.
Richie the bartender ordinarily might not have ratted out Michael Corleone. But Michael was about to be killed in Cuba, according to Roth's plan; and if Richie didn't know it, the Rosatos probably did. And anyway, the Rosatos were here-and-now for Richie, a clear and present danger. Michael was far away. As a rock/hard place, Richie might have chosen "Michael Corleone says hello" to "The Rosatos did it."
I, too have wondered: what happened to the Corleones' vaunted intelligence with the NYC police? Hagen tells Michael, "Our people with the New York detectives said Frankie was half dead..." Nice work, Tom, except that you found this out after your client, Michael, had his ass hung out to dry at the committee hearing. A guess: Ever-clever Roth heard first that Pentangeli survived, then set committee counsel Questad, who "belongs to Roth," to telling the committee chairman that he and all the members could get famous by exploiting this opportunity to hang Michael. So the committee leaned on the FBI to get the NYC police to hush up Frankie's survival and turn him over to them, so they could trap Michael into perjuring himself/
Finally: Carmine Rosato was drawing the gun to use on the cop, not on Richie.

I do agree that Roth and Michael were equally playing the concerned the father/son role but in reality was after each others territory by murdering one another.

We can go back and forth with this point but I don't think that the bartender plays this vital role as you seem he does. The "Michael says hello" was not meant for the bartender. If I recall, the bartender physically turned his back on the garroting, so I don't think he heard anything (or at least is meant to hear) anything that Anthony said in the first place.
As Frankie stated, it was a 10 to 1 shot that Michael was taking the fifth. Therefore, the committee was not trying to trap Michael into perjuring himself. No one expected him to answer questions in the first place. Michael should have taken the fifth, expecially after Willi Cicci was flapping his lips about him. You never know what unknowns that are in store.
I don't think Tom can instruct Michael in the first place. So I will not use Tom as an escape goat.
Maybe its just me, the screenplay is not perfect, but I don't think that the plot is as complicated as many make it out to be. if you have more unanswered questions than answered ones, then I believe that you guys are on the wrong track.