'Our careers are over': Al Pacino reveals how he and Diane Keaton felt while shooting for 'The Godfather'
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: ‘The Godfather’ is one of the greatest films of all time and modern filmmakers watch the title mentioned above to understand how to make a movie. Impeccable casting, background score, storytelling, and breathtaking cinematography are some of the reasons why it is considered to be a masterpiece. The movie laid a strong foundation for an actor who would go on to become one of the most legendary names in world cinema. Yes, we are talking about Al Pacino and even though he garnered worldwide recognition with the aforementioned title, his first day at the shoot made him believe that his acting career is “over.”
Based on the novel of the same name by Mario Puzo, the movie chronicles the journey of the Italian-American crime family Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) from 1945 to 1955. It is a story of how Vito’s youngest son enters the Mafia business and becomes involved in the inevitable cycle of betrayals and deaths. As he draws more profound into the business, he starts losing grasp on his personal relationships and emerges to be a ruthless mafia boss.
A lot of people believed that the movie would turn out to be a huge success, but Pacino didn’t really know what exactly they were doing when he and other cast members started shooting their scenes. In fact, he got so confused that he, along with his co-star Diane Keaton, started feeling that their acting careers will be over once the movie releases in theatres.
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Pacino and Keaton felt 'The Godfather' was the beginning of the end for them
While speaking in an interview with ‘The Hollywood Reporter’, the 82-year-old actor noted that he and Keaton got drunk after the first day of shooting ‘The Godfather’ and started thinking that this movie is going to end their careers. He added, “Diane Keaton and I got drunk and thought, ‘This is it, our careers are over. This is a mess.”
However, we all know what happened after the movie was released. The movie quickly became one of the highest-rated movies of all time and film institutes keep this movie in their libraries so that they can teach young filmmakers about filmmaking. The film was nominated for 11 Oscars and went on to win three, including Best Picture.
The ‘Hunters’ star also opened up about why he didn’t attend the Oscar ceremony that year and said that there are a lot of rumors swirling around on the internet. For the uninitiated, a lot of reports claimed that Pacino was really annoyed that Marlon Brando was nominated (and won) the Best Actor while Pacino was nominated in the Supporting Actor category. The superstar quashed all the rumors by saying that he was shocked when such things were being said about him. He vehemently denied all such rumors and noted that he “was not upset” when Brando received the best actor nomination.
Pacino feels 'The Godfather' is better than 'The Godfather Part II'
Pacino also made it clear that ‘The Godfather’ is better than ‘The Godfather Part II’ because of its epic storytelling. He said, ‘Godfather I’, I saw it recently, it’s always got two or three things going on in a scene. You’re always in the story, you’re going. You don’t know what’s going to happen next, it’s storytelling, and it’s really storytelling at its best.
Al Pacino never looked back after ‘The Godfather’ and become one of the most influential names in the world of cinema. Meanwhile, ‘The Godfather’ is still considered to be a landmark of the gangster genre and there are only a handful of movies that even come closer to this masterpiece. A lot happens in the movie and by that we man, a lot of talking happens, but also features an extraordinary story and brilliant performances.
