10 Best Movie Trilogies Ever Made

Sergio Leone was actually Paramount’s first-choice director when they acquired the rights to The Godfather, Mario Puzo's bestselling novel about organised crime as witnessed through the lens of the Corleone family. The studio wanted a strong Italian influence and while Leone passed, Italian-American Francis Ford Coppola eventually took on the project. And soon regretted it.

Coppola has since referred to the production as "just non-stop anxiety and wondering when I was going to get fired" as arguments over casting, location, budget and the final edit threatened to consume both film and director.

So naturally the end product is one of cinema's finest exponents, with Marlon Brando, Al Pacino and the rest of a stellar cast delivering some of their best work.

The Godfather became the highest-grossing film of 1972 and talk of the sequel that would arrive two years later quickly followed. This time Coppola was handed full control and recruited Robert De Niro to play a young Vito Corleone; a role that would see him collect his first Oscar. The Godfather: Part II is frequently cited as the best sequel ever made – a claim no one has made, ever, about Part III.

And therein lies the rub: had The Godfather: Part III even come close to matching the quality of its predecessors, The Godfather saga would surely be considered the best trilogy of all time, bar none.