The Godfather, directed by Francis Ford Coppola.

Coppola is very patient with the length of each shot, creating tension between the characters and within the audience members; each cut seems to come one frame too late for a scene of such impending doom. The close up of Luca’s hand on the counter, and of Bruno’s joining it initiates a surprise the audience that they were probably waiting for and subconsciously aware of. There is a quick cut to the man pulling his arm back to gain force and another quick cut back to Luca’s hand being pierced and pinned to the countertop. “While Luca Brasi struggles in vain against the silk noose flying around his neck, Coppola’s camera gazes at his protruding eyes like some mesmorized onlooker. The absence of music, and the studied realism of the soundtrack … reinforce the vicious shock of the murder.”  It is a shock because the only reference to Brasi as being the one in danger (the fish) is extremely vague, and other hints at danger are juxtaposed with elements that suggest generally positive images. At the conclusion of the scene the Christmas music resumes and subsequently frames the scene, completing it; Coppola gives the audience a chance to find their comfort zone again. They are not likely to succeed, however, because the shooting of Don Corleone immediately follows.

The positively connoted music comes to a halt again to make way for more danger. Two men emerge at the market with pistols hidden in their pockets. They pick up speed and the audience is left with a feeling of doom after they are shown close ups of both the men’s feet as they run and their guns that are ready to be fired. The shock of this scene is not in the surprise, but in the manner of how the violence is depicted. The men catch up to Mr. Corleone and the camera assumes an overhead position; flames burst from the pistols as the men unmercifully fire at the helpless old man. Throughout the entire film up to this point Mr. Corleone is shown as a relatively respectful man, and even refused to endorse the trafficking of drugs in his territory. He lives a grandiose life of large parties and infinite power, but here he is reduced to a pile of bloodied clothes on the side of the street. The violence in this case does not come as a surprise, but it is shocking in how it shows such a stark difference between the extremes of the gangster’s lifestyle.

In the scene when Sonny is gunned down at the toll plaza a total of 7 men fire at him from all angles with automatic machine guns. The element of surprise is still present, as the men appear out of the car that was traveling in front of Sonny and from inside the adjacent toll booth, but the true shock of the scene is again achieved via stylistic techniques but in this case to show the excessive nature of the violence. This is best exemplified when Sonny has fallen dead on the ground and one of the opposing gang members stands over him. There is a medium close up of Sonny’s body as an array of bullets – enough of them to have killed him in the first place – are shown piercing his clothing and entering his already lifeless body. Presumably the gang wanted to make sure Sonny did not survive the hit like Don Corleone had previously, but that does not account for the realism that Coppola brought to the scene. According to Cowie, The Godfather makes “the original Scarface and Public Enemy tame by comparison. Color, of course, and the dramatic improvement in special effects over the years, contribute to the visceral impact of scenes like … the slaughter of Sonny at the tollbooths.”

The violence in this film is excessive and excessively bloody. Cappola uses deliberate filmic techniques such as mise en scene, music, or location to create a sense of contradicting ideas during moments of looming danger. This creates a sense of “impending doom”, which “sucks his audience, as well as his screen victims, into a trap.” He surprises the audience with not the number of violent scenes, but rather the excessive and over-the-top nature of the violence within any one scene and the way in which each is shown on screen. These techniques are used specifically during scenes of violence, separating them from the rest of the film in a manner that brings its romanticized characters back to the reality of their filmic existence.