Where to find it: Paramount+ on Amazon Prime
Length: Ten 1-hour episodes
Synopsis: Tall tales about the making of The Godfather
Recommendation rating: 3/5
What I like about it: the acting, sometimes the writing
What I don’t like about it: ten hours?! it’s not fuckin’ Shoah…
Review:
It must be hard to justify having your own streaming service when your only bankable franchises are Star Trek and Spongebob Squarepants, so Paramount turn to making movies about Paramount making movies. Godfather producer Al Ruddy has been telling his version of events surrounding the making of that film and, like any Hollywood producer, he doesn’t let the truth ruin a good yarn. All the more lurid elements of his story – Frank Sinatra having Mickey Cohen try to kill him, Joe Colombo having him over for homemade dinner on the eve of his public shooting, his debt to Joe Gallo being called off last-minute by Gallo’s murder – involve people too dead to sue for defamation, while those still living are kept conveniently unaware of these elements by the selectively-truthful Ruddy.
The acting steals the show in this one with Miles Teller channelling Tony Curtis in the lead role to great effect. The actors get lost in their impressions of real-life counterparts; their Coppola, Pacino, Brando and Robert Evans are all remarkable and really help to generate interest in this ultimately uninteresting series. The writing is sometimes good, especially when taking advantage of parallels between scenes in The Godfather and circumstances supposedly involved in making it, and sometimes risibly overwrought “we don’t make movies, we make magic!” stuff.
Content notes (may contain spoilers): drugs, violence