10 Dead Movie Franchises That Hollywood Must Revive

I’d always be wary of messing with the heavyweight perfection of The Godfather and The Godfather Part II. These are films that make up some of the pantheon of Hollywood’s greatest ever cinematic achievements, along with Raging Bull, Schindler’s List, Fight Club and George Clooney. Imagine making a long-awaited sequel that didn’t measure up: or, worse, actively screwed the pooch.

However, since Francis Ford Coppola has already done that job for us with The Godfather Part III, we’re quids in and ahead of the game. Let’s do this. Let’s make The Godfather Part IV.

Al Pacino is seventy-six years old and making toxic waste like Misconduct: he’s pretty likely to be up for a cameo as Michael Corleone, but in flashback to shortly before his death, naturally. Ridiculously, they’d need to make him look a little younger to match the terrible ‘old age’ make-up from the last scene of the third movie.

The action would take place immediately following that scene, in scenes of chaos at the hospital and at Michael’s villa as doctors pronounce him dead. Intercut with preparations for a wedding in the present day. It’s 2005, a quarter of a century since Michael Corleone passed on, and Don Vincent Corleone (a returning Andy Garcia) is the same age that Michael was in Part III, and has just been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. As the film begins, his daughter is getting married, but - never the best judge of character - he’s a man who’s surrounded himself with sharks, and they smell blood in the water…

Really, plot has to be secondary here to the one overriding objective in making a fourth Godfather movie: don’t f*ck it up. Don’t cast non-acting members of the family. Don’t dress up Catholic guilt and self-pity as a belated sense of morality. Don’t overcomplicate matters to the extent that exposition is your default storytelling mode. Definitely, absolutely, don’t base the narrative of a two-and-a-half hour movie around a protagonist who’s desperate to do nothing as quietly as possible.

Arrange for the same gorgeous production design, the same sweeping cinematography and a cast of heavyweights to keep the more portentous dialogue flowing (it’s a Godfather movie. There has to be portentous dialogue). Above all, don’t let this be the same crushing, miserable disappointment that the third part was. Do all of that, and - whether Coppola returns or not - The Godfather Part IV could be the triumph that Part III never was.