The Don vs. Jesus Christ

Don Vito Corleone is the god father to all of the members of his family and he is the type of man that if you had a problem either with someone or something you knew exactly who to go to. Don was the main man in his family, he ran the family business and he was a very well respected man. Don was asked at the beginning of the film The Godfather to take care of a certain person for Bonasera and when he asked him much money he wanted, Don was immediately offended. Why was the fact that he asked “How much shall I pay you?”? Don has built his empire on respect, everything he does is for people that respect him and people that he respects and taking into account his reaction to the question of how much money he wanted was asked by Bonasera, he is a man that cannot be bought; you have to earn his respect.

When Don was out in downtown New York and he was buying fruit just across the street from his car, he was shot. Sollozzo was responsible for the shooting of Don and he made a second attempt to kill him when he was in the hospital but Michael Corleone made the decision that enough was enough and that something needed to be done and his father could not be treated like this. This is when the meeting with Sollozzo and Captain McCluskey was arranged, this is where they were both killed. When Don was shot, he was not shot once, not three times—he was shot 5 times. At first this seems as just a shooter that does not have good aim but really it means a lot more than it appears too.

There was another man who is seen as the father of all and is a very important figure to most people in the world, either in one form or another, who is this man? Jesus Christ. Jesus was also a figure that was seen as the father of the world and he was someone that was respected by most but still had haters that got the better of his life. He was not killed but he was also killed with 5 wounds. This allusion of both Don Corleone and Jesus Christ being compared in the way that they were killed is a connection between the two.

Was this on purpose or is Coppola a genius by accident? I think this was done on purpose and he has done this to further portray the message of the Don. Don Corleone was a man that had more power and had so much respect from the people around him that he was seen as such a treat and Jesus was also. The allusion that is created to connection the two characters is done in such a way that most people watching the film for enjoyment would not notice. That exactly why Francis Ford Cappola did it, his film is for more than just enjoyment and every movement, noise, and camera angle is done to portray his message and he does it so successfully that The Godfather will forever be a film that can be watched 100 times.