Home Entertainment: ‘The Godfather Trilogy’ 4K review

The Godfather is considered to be a masterpiece; one of the greatest films ever made, and absolutely the definitive mafia story brought to the screen by Francis Ford Coppola back in 1972. The first film celebrates its 50th birthday this year and, following an arduous five years restoring the trilogy from the original negative, Paramount Pictures, Coppola and his company American Zoetrope release the movies on the Ultra HD format in their greatest presentation to date.

Presented across five discs, this box-set includes all three films; The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, and The Godfather Part III in all of its various versions; the theatrical and 1991 cuts, as well as Coppola’s reimagined version from late 2020, The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone. The films tell the epic story of the Corleone family, and their rise and fall over generations.

We’ve reviewed the films many times on the site over the years, including ‘Coda’, which we generally preferred to the original version – the infamous weak link in an otherwise perfect saga. Instead, we’re looking at this new bundle, the remastered first two movies, and the brand new extras that come with the 4K release.

At around £80, this is no cheap purchase, but after playing the first two movies in their entirely, we can tell you that just by marvelling in the delicious, crisp new restoration of arguably two of the greatest films of the 20th century, is worth the box price alone. According to the press notes, restorers opened 300 cartons of film to find the best possible resolution for every frame of all three films; 4,000 hours were spent repairing film stains, tears, and other anomalies in the negatives, and 1,000 hours were spent on rigorous colour correction to ensure the high dynamic range tools were respectful of the original vision of Coppola and cinematographer Gordon Willis. And it’s all there to see before your very eyes if you’ve got the home system to fully display this gorgeous new transfer.

There is also the new extras which delve into the process of the new restoration. The first is ‘Full Circle: Preserving The Godfather‘ where this process is examined and detailed by the people that undertook the mammoth task. Split screen displays show off the before and after images of the restoration showing off just how much care and attention has been made in bringing the best possible versions of these movies to the Ultra HD format.

Perhaps our favourite new bonus feature is one that focusses on special photographer Steve Schapiro, and the extended featurette ‘Capturing the Corleones: Through the Lens of Photographer Steve Schapiro’ which is an intimate look at the stills the photographer captured on set. He details how he first got the gig, getting the magazine Life to promise a front cover featuring Brando and the movie. His stories and intimate – and perhaps never before seen images – are a joy to take in, and a true bite into cinema history.

There is also ‘The Godfather: Home Movies’ – never before seen 8mm movies – essentially BTS footage from the film’s Staten Island set, edited to music and made available for the first time on this new release.

For those wanting to delve deeper into the restorations, there is a further ‘Restoration Comparisons’, more Bbfore and after highlights offering more of the extensive picture quality improvements to The Godfather.

That’s it for new features, but Paramount has also thrown in a Legacy Features section where more content is included which has been seen on previous releases and anniversary editions.

This new presentation is an absolute must for those who don’t own the iconic movies and have the right gear to get the best out of the new transfers. The final product is evidence of thousands of hours of care and respect that has been put in to ensure that these iconic films can be viewed for generations to come. As anniversary editions go, they don’t come much better or gleaming as this.

The Godfather Trilogy available on 4K UHD and Digital now