There are some reviews for Francis Ford Coppola’s remake of The Godfather Part III, which means that a few fans actually saw it. The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone was Coppola’s gift to fans on its 30th Anniversary but most of us missed out and for a very good reason.
When the third installment of the legendary trilogy came out in 1990, it made over $6 million on opening weekend and went on to gross $136 million worldwide. As the 30th Anniversary approached, Francis Ford Coppola got a bright idea to redo the story and reviews say that it’s totally different, which is phenomenal because he didn’t go back and shoot more scenes with a much older Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, Andy Garcia, and his own daughter Sofia Coppola. Nope. He pulled the cut film off the editing room floor and pasted together an entirely different take on the story to give us a whole new movie. Now, how did we miss such a miraculous thing?
I tried calling my contact at Paramount to see how many viewers had actually watched the new version because I knew that news of it had somehow missed me. The people at Paramount Pictures itself gave me a very specific answer, which was they didn’t know. So, they forwarded me to Paramount Plus to ask them but I got my subscription department for some reason. The menu on the phone was limited and it wouldn’t give me access to Francis Ford Coppola so I decided to go on the Paramount Plus website to have a chat with a representative. All I wanted to know was a general answer. They didn’t have to give me an exact number, which they weren’t about to do anyway.
They apologized for not being able to commit to any specific answer, which only means one thing to me. The number is low. It has to be because when a film has good numbers, the production company will brag about them. If the numbers are low, it’s best not to give an answer. But I did find something.
Someone on Wikipedia had a few stats, “Upon the release of the recut version, The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone…made $52,000 from 179 theaters. In total, the film made $95,000 domestically, and $71,000 in four international markets.” The credit for these stats was given to an article from IndieWire.
This information contributes greatly to that lingering question. Why did we miss it? Some people did get to see it, but those numbers say that it wasn’t viewed by many. How could that possibly be for such a legendary film on such a special occasion?
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When you do the math, you discover that 30 years after 1990 was…2020! That’s right! It was released the same year we were dealing with Murder Hornets, the death of Eddie Van Halen, the West Coast caught on fire, and about a hundred other things. Not to mention, we had a PLAGUE!
News stories were teaching us how to wash our hands like we were five-year-olds. The world shut down. We were locked in our homes. And people kept buying up all the toilet paper. It was the year from hell!
Probably not the best time to release a new movie. How five people managed to learn about the new release is beyond me. But now that you know, you can catch it on Paramount Plus, and here’s something you can do if you’d like. Watch the 1990 version first to refresh your memory before watching the 2020 version. Critics say it’s an entirely different movie and I’m going to have fun finding out how.
