The Godfather was directed by an Italian-American director Francis Ford Coppola. This almost three-hour long, gangster saga film won three Oscars: Best Picture, Best Actor and Best adapted Screenplay, as well as the other seven nominations. This film shows viewers the Mafia world from the inside by two storylines going through the film. Lighting and colour play a very important role to make the audience feel the Mafia world’s violence, ruthlessness and bloodletting. The choice of actors and characterisation is successful in this film, especially Marlon Brando’s perfect performance.
   In this film, the story unfolds chronologically and the plot is a straightforward narrative. There are two storylines going through this film: the major one is Don Vito Corleone’s family Mafia business filled with horrific violence, murder and vengefulness, and the transfer of power from Vito to Michael: Vito change from a wise powerful godfather into a playful old grandfather, while Michael develops from a young man who is not part of the family business to a new Mafia leader; the other one is the bittersweet romantic home life and their experiences as a family, such as Connie’s wedding and Michael’s Sicily wedding, kitchen cooking, Christmas shopping and a baptism. These two storylines are intertwined and give audiences very strong images. The Godfather successfully shows the audience not only the relationship among all of the family members, but the connections between business and personal affairs as well.
    Lighting and colour establish the atmosphere of a film. It can communicate an atmosphere of happiness, fear or sadness. Generally, soft and bright lighting makes the audience feel comfortable and relaxed while hard and dark light make the audience feel unease and fear. At beginning of this movie, at Connie’s wedding, with a very bright lighting, under the nice warm sunshine, everyone is dancing and singing. The audience can tell the characters are very relaxed and really enjoy the wedding. Back in the godfather’s office however, in a dark, grim and stuffy room, they are talking about business. The use of a dark lighting technique expresses the darkness and violence of Mafia world. In this movie, killing and murder generally happen in dark areas or in the evening, such as when Vito Corleone is in the hospital, and then when Michael shoots Sollozzo and McCluskey in the small restaurant. Michael’s Sicilian life is so different compared with the whole story. With nice soft music, it shows the audience that Michael is walking on the hills under the warm and bright sunshine and sheep are running around him. In Sicily, he falls in love at the first sight with Apollonia, a nice Sicilian girl. After they get married, they live a short happy life there until Apollonia is murdered in car explosion intended for Michael. By the extreme change of circumstances, the audience get very strong visual contrast.
   As a part of narrative, the dialogue is very important for the audience’s understanding in this film. In the first scene of this movie, a man comes to ask for punishment for his daughter’s rapist and the godfather asks him why not come to him immediately. “I went to the police like a good American,” the man says calmly at the beginning. But when he mentions the judge’s sentencing in the court case, he becomes anger and loses control. Later Don Vito Corleone replies “Why did you go to the police? Why didn’t you come to me first? What have I ever done to make you treat me so disrespectfully? If you’d come to me in friendship, then this scum that ruined your daughter would be suffering this every day. And if, by chance, an honest man like yourself should make enemies……then they would become my enemies. And then they would fear you.” This almost three-minute long dialogue not only gives the audience the first impress of the godfather, but also supports the whole movie and makes the story more acceptable. Without doubt, the dialogue plays a very important role in this movie. For example, during Connie’s wedding, Michael tells Kay that he is not a part of the family and he is going to marry her, but when Michael saves Vito’s life by removing his bed into another room and whispers to the unconscious man:”I am with you now.” Here is the whole story’s turning point. The most important thing to the family is loyalty, which has been said many times in the film. Another commandment spoken by Michael is “Don’t ever take sides against the family.”
     In the extremely long film, there are many characters and their relationships are very complex. However, by the end of Connie’s wedding, most of the main characters have been introduced and the audience can even recognise their personalities. For example, the traitor Paulie who betrays the godfather shows up three times during the wedding and we already can tell his personality clearly. The first time, when he sees Clemenza dancing and tries to be obsequious to him, his boss just tells him to do what he should do and he gets unhappy, so we can tell he is not satisfied with his present position; the second time, he speaks to himself after he sees Connie putting money into her handbag, and we can tell he is very greedy for money; the last time, after Sonny throws the photographer’s camera on the ground, Paulie goes ahead and kick it, which means he want to show his boss his loyalty, but generally this kind of people is not loyal. So that is why he will betray the godfather later.
 “The Godfather” himself is the central character at the beginning the movie. When he is shot and his older son Sonny is killed, this position starts to go to his youngest son Michael. After the Don retires, Michael takes over the family business and becomes the godfather. The rest of the characters are also very important, such as Tom Hagen, as the godfather’s adopted son and a lawyer; Jack Woltz, a Hollywood star; and Luca Brasi, the loyal killer. The casting of this film is well-picked and successful. The good choice of actors bolstered the potential of the film. An outstanding performance by Al Pacino and a strong characterisation by Marlon Brando both show the audience a powerful Mafia leader. Marlon Brando’s performance is so skilful that he does look and sound the part of the old Don Coreleone by using wheezy and whispery voice, and the deliberate lack precision movement.

 “The Godfather is an insightful sociological study of violence, power, honour and obligation, corruption, justice and crime in American.”(Tim Dirks, ). I think that is why it is so successful. The Godfather has such strong appeal because the audience can see so many things from this movie, such as human virtues, and an immigrant family’s American Dream.