Want to create an interactive transcript for this episode?
Podcast: New Books in Popular Culture
Episode: Jon Lewis, "The Godfather, Part II" (Bloomsbury, 2022)
Description: Francis Ford Coppola's "The Godfather, Part II" (1974) is a magisterial cinematic work, a gorgeous, stylized, auteur epic, and one of the few sequels judged by many to be greater than its predecessor. This despite the fact that it consists largely of meetings between aspiring 'Godfather' Michael Corleone and fellow gangsters, politicians and family members. The meetings remind us that the modern gangster's success is built upon inside information and on strategic planning. Michael and his father Vito's days resemble those of the legitimate businessmen they aspire or pretend to be.In his book The Godfather, Part II (Blo...