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An indication of the continuing influence of Francis Ford Coppola's Godfather films (The Godfather, The Godfather Part II and The Godfather Part III) can be gleaned from the many references to them which have appeared in every medium of popular culture in the decades since the film's initial release. That these hommages, quotations and satires continue to pop up even now shows clearly the film's enduring impact.

Contents 1 Film 2 Television 3 Music 4 Books 5 Video Games

[edit] Film

• In 1990, the same year that The Godfather Part III was released, Marlon Brando parodied his famous portrayal of Vito Corleone in a comedy called The Freshman. In the film, he plays a wacky (but still dangerous) mob boss with the same looks and persona as Vito Corleone, who takes a first-year film student (Matthew Broderick) under his wing and makes him his protege.

• In the film Natural Born Killers, the insane warden (played by Tommy Lee Jones) is named McCluskey.

• The assault on Corleone's life is imitated in a nightmare Hugh Grant has in the movie Mickey Blue Eyes.

• The same scene (assault on Corleone's life) is imitated in a nightmare Billy Crystal has in the movie Analyze This. In this nightmare, Robert De Niro, who plays the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather II, is seen as playing the role of John Cazale from the original movie. Later when Crystal talks to De Niro about it, De Niro asks him "I was Fredo? I don't think so."

• The last part of the film, where the family bosses are murdered while Michael is serving as his nephew's godfather, is mimicked in George Lucas's Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith, where Anakin Skywalker slays separatist leaders on Mustafar while Palpatine heralds the advent of the Galactic Empire. Lucas worked as a cinematographer on The Godfather, and was responsible for shooting the original 1972 baptism sequence. He mentions this comparison in the DVD commentary for Revenge of the Sith.

• That sequence is also imitated in Michael Moore's documentary Roger and Me. A scene in which General Motors chairman Roger Smith gives a Christmas speech is intercut with scenes of Flint residents being evicted from their homes as a result of the closing of GM factories.^[1]

• The Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs II shows heavy influences by The Godfather. In the film, triad boss Kwun Ngai is murdered, and his son Hau Ngai replaces him. Like Michael Corleone, Hau is originally legitimate and aims for a career in politics, but is dragged into his father's business. Halfway through the film, Hau has the five Triad bosses responsible for his father's death murdered in a montage sequence very similar to the end of The Godfather, where Michael Corleone murders the heads of the five other families.

• A parody movie called The Godthumb was also made by director Steve Oedekerk of Kung Pow fame. It is one of six parody movies in the "Thumb Collection."

• At the beginning of Rugrats in Paris, Angelica is shown acting like the Godfather, due to having watched the movie the previous night.

• Requiem for a Dream features a man peeling the orange, as well as an orange truck in the scene where the characters go to receive a new shipment of drugs. The oranges not only indicates their next destination — Florida — but also serves as a nod to The Godfather films, where the presence of oranges indicated disaster.

• In the film You've Got Mail, Tom Hanks's character ( Joe Fox) references The Godfather when talking with Meg Ryan: "Leave the gun, take the cannolis."

• Indian film director Ram Gopal Varma made an adaptation of The Godfather in 2005 titled Sarkar. The film was more a tribute than a direct adaptation, and various elements were changed. Amitabh Bachchan reprised the role of Don Vito Corleone, Kay Kay Menon took over Sonny's role, and Abhishek Bachchan, Amitabh's real life son, played Michael.

• In the movie Clerks 2, Dante tells Randal that their boss, Becky, is pregnant by him, and threatens harsh brutality should Randal say anything. When Becky comes outside and sees the two of them, Randal blurts out "May your first child be a masculine child!" — the same line uttered by Luca Brasi when he is thanking Don Corleone at the wedding.

• In the movie Set It Off, Vivica A. Fox portrays Don Vito Corleone, while Queen Latifah, Kimberly Elise, and Jada Pinkett-Smith portray the other "Dons," as they plan their first bank heist while they are at work.

• In Training Day, the scene in which Alonzo (Denzel Washington) is killed, is in the same fashion as the murder of Santino Corleone.

• In Mel Brooks' "Robin Hood: Men In Tights" there's a scene where Filthy Luca (Steve Tancora) says the same wishes to the Sheriff of Rotingham (Roger Rees) as shown in "The Godfather", where in the similar scene Luca Brasi is wishing to the Don. In this movie the Don character is Don Giovanni (Dom DeLuise), who is present at the scene. Also, he imitates Marlon Brando's voice and after being asked from Sheriff of Rotingham about the strange accent, pulls out a piece of cotton from each cheek (which also make his cheeks a bit fuller) and says that he was at the dentist.

[edit] Television

• The Sopranos pays homage to The Godfather in a humorous episode where they discuss the feasibility of bootlegging copies of the DVD. Paramount returned the favor by including this clip as an Easter Egg on The Godfather DVD Collection.[1] Moreover, characters in The Sopranos sometimes discuss The Godfather and The Godfather Part II as both favorite films and images to live up to in the less-glamorous real world of organized crime. In the series premiere of The Sopranos, Silvio Dante (Steven Van Zandt) says, "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!"—a line from The Godfather Part III. Often, the characters will refer to the movies as simply "One" and "Two."

• In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "The Nagus", Quark (Armin Shimerman) briefly becomes the leader of the Ferengi. In one scene, he appears in his quarters with the window having blinds on it. He also strokes a pet while talking to someone who has asked him for his permission to undertake a business venture. Quark also asks the Ferengi questions like Brando does. He also says "Yet, now you call me Nagus". The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion notes that a personal copy of the episode possessed by director David Livingston actually has The Godfather theme on it.

• In the animated series Kid Notorious, Robert Evans writes a "ghetto" musical version of The Godfather.

• In the soap opera One Life To Live, Lieutenant John McBain uses the line "Leave the gun. Take the cannoli."

• The title of the season one final of Showtime's Weeds is called "The Godmother," an obvious reference to The Godfather. A scene in which Nancy goes outside — where her 'partners' are waiting with a gift, and the maid closes the door while the Italian music plays in the background — is nearly identical to the closing scene of The Godfather, in which Al Pacino's character becomes the Godfather.

• The film and its sequels have been repeatedly parodied and referenced on The Simpsons. For example, the "horse head" scene is spoofed in the episodes "Lisa's Pony", "The Telltale Head" and "Guess Who's Coming to Criticize Dinner?". In the episode "The Mook, the Chef, the Wife and Her Homer", Fat Tony's son Michael is named after Michael Corleone (Fat Tony himself has a similar voice and demeanour to Vito Corleone). The closing scene directly parodies the final scene of the film. In the episode "Moe Baby Blues," Moe entertains Maggie by telling her the plot of The Godfather. The orange-wedge gag used by Moe and Fat Tony in the episode is a reference to how Don Corleone scares his grandson in the garden, moments before his fatal heart-attack. In the 2003 episode "Strong Arms of the Ma," Marge gets mugged and develops agoraphobia, and begins to lift weights. She later confronts her attacker, and the fight scene that ensues closely mimicks that of Sonny beating Carlo in front of a Brooklyn Row home with a trashcan lid while the fire hydrant sprays in the background.

• The sequence involving Sonny's brutal murder is also parodied in several other episodes — the scene in "Mr. Plow" where Bart is repeatedly pelted by snowballs in a revenge ambush for Homer clearing the snow on the way to the school, a more blatant parody is featured in an episode where James Caan, playing himself, drives up to a tollbooth on the Springfield outskirts with Cletus's girlfriend, Brandine, in the car beside him (whom he has run off with, much to Cletus's disliking). After Caan proclaims that he hates tollbooths, a large group of yokels appear from either side with tommy guns, and shoot Caan to death in an identical fashion to his infamous scene in The Godfather. After being shot and kicked in the face, Caan simply says: "That's it!! Next time, I fly!"

• Similarly, in an episode of Clerks: The Animated Series, Jay and Silent Bob beat up Charles Barkley in exactly the way as Sonny beats up Carlo Rizzi (including the punch that misses).

• In The Sopranos, Uncle Junior tries to have Tony killed just after Tony buys a bottle of orange juice.

• "The Bris" episode of Seinfeld has a final shot that parodies the final shot of the movie. Other references to the movie are also made during the course of the episode, such as when Jerry is named a godfather of a newly-born child, he does a Marlon Brando impersonation.

• In an episode of Phil of the Future, Pim Diffy explains a notorious plan to frame their cousin. Pim is dressed like Don Vito Corleone, and talks in his voice while they remake the famous scene where Michael murders Sollozzo, even with the character Phil dropping his 'weapon' in the same fashion Al pacino dropped the gun.

• In Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus, Fiendish Five member Muggshot, during his childhood, was inspired by a movie entitled "The Dogfather," an obvious parody of The Godfather.

• The Blue Devils Drum and Bugle Corps 2006 show was comprised entirely of theme music from The Godfather. The show, entitled "The Godfather: Part Blue," took third place at the Drum Corps International World Championships in Madison, Wisconsin.

• In Dr. Dolittle 2, Eddie Murphy's character is brought to "The Beaver," head of the forest's Mafia. Several lines of the movie are parodied.

• On the 2006 Thanksgiving episode of Late Night with Conan O'Brien, while talking about how turkeys are prepared in New York compared to the rest of the nation, a sequence is shown depicting mock turkeys being killed in the same manner as the mob bosses during the iconic christening sequence. Some of the comedy involves how dead-on the depictions were, as well as the absurdity and violence portrayed.

• In The Fairly OddParents, Wanda's father, Big Daddy, is a parody of The Godfather, even finding a horse head in his bed (although it's actually a pillow).

• In an episode of Hannah Montana, Miley asks her brother Jackson for a favor, and he is seen dressed up as Don Vito in the film's opening scene. He even quotes lines similar to those spoken by Don Vito to Bonasera in the film's opening scene. Jackson even asks to be called "Godbrother."

• In an episode of Arrested Development, Michael wakes up to find the handlebars of his bicycle in his bed, parodying the "horse-head" scene

• In the episode of The Boondocks (TV series), "The Story of Gangstalicious," Riley goes to visit Gangstalicious in the hospital. Much to the wounded rapper's surprise, no one is guarding his room. He was set up in identical fashion to Don Vito after his assassination attempt.

• There are several references to The Godfather in episodes of My Wife and Kids. "Jury Duty" shows the main character, Michael, trying to avoid jury duty in order to watch a weekend marathon of the film on TV. Another character Frankiln quotes Michael Corleone's lines "Just when I thought that I was out they pull me back in" whilst playing the piano.

• In one episode of Smallville, Clark, Lana and Lex quote several lines from The Godfather.

• A sketch on Saturday Night Live featured John Belushi as Vito Corleone in group therapy. Accused of "blocking," when he refuses to elaborate on (or even acknowledge) his pain at his son being murdered by the Tattaglias, he expresses his feelings by making fake teeth from orange peel and mimicking a monster to the other group members, before clutching his chest and collapsing.

• In an episode of Family Guy, Peter Griffin's family is upset when he tells them that he did not care for The Godfather. He claims "It insists upon itself" as the reason for his disdain. In another episode, Peter is forced to befriend a mobster named Big Fat Paulie in order to call off a hit on Lois. Big Fat Paulie is later killed in a drive-by shooting parodizing the first assassination attempt against Don Vito in The Godfather. The wedding scene at the end of the episode is a parody of the beginning of The Godfather.

• In an episode of South Park, the boys toilet-paper the art teacher's house. Music from The Godfather plays as Cartman takes the other boys out into the middle of a pond to try to kill them, because they are going to confess.

• In an episode of Adult Swim's Harvey Birdman, the main character takes on the case of Fred Flintstone (The Dabba Don), who acts like Don Corleone. As a parody when Fred threatens Harvey, he imagines himself waking up to find different heads of creatures in his bed. In the end, it is known that Barney Rubble is the real leader.

• In Season 3 of Las Vegas (TV series), in the episode "Down & Dirty," James Caan's character participates in a promotional video for the Montecito casino. The disappointed film director asks Deline if he has ever seen the scene where "Sonny was talking to his brother in The Godfather," to which Caan's character ironically replies: "Never saw it."

• In the TV Movie Rugrats in Paris. The beginning wedding reception has a parody of the Godfather. Chuckie is seen asking the Angelica the "Godfather" for a mother. Also, Phil and Lil show Angelica a rocking horse head that was found in their crib because they left their boogers on Angelica's Cynthia doll. In the end of the movie Chuckie is seen portraying the Godfather

• Skateboarder, Bam Margera's uncle, Vincent Margera, is nicknamed, Don Vito, on and off of the television show, Viva La Bam.

[edit] Music

• Mike Patton's avant garde group Fantômas did a cover of Nino Rota's main theme on their album The Director's Cut — an album of film soundtrack covers. Whilst a large portion of the cover remains faithful to the original in terms of tempo, mood, and instrumentation, it also segues into the thrash metal that the band are more well known for.

• Satan's Pilgrams have also covered the main theme, which is a surf-music version.

• Guitarist Saul Hudson, better known as "Slash" of the rock group Guns N' Roses, is apparently a fan of the films; he played his own adaptation of the film's theme song at live shows during the Use Your Illusion World Tour.

• German Oi! Punk band Broilers[2] cover a song from the movie on their second full length release "Verlierer sehen anders aus."

• The Westlake High School Regiment (see Westlake Regiment) did their 2002 field show based on The Godfather, entitled "The Godfather Trilogy: 30th Anniversary Celebration."

• The Blue Devils, a Division I Drum and Bugle Corps performed a show modeled after the music of The Godfather for their 2006 season. They placed third in their division that year.

• The intro to Destiny's Child's album The Writing's on the Wall has Beyoncé Knowles portraying Don Corleone as she speaks to the other "Dons" Kelly Rowland, LeToya Luckett, and LaTavia Roberson about relationships and men.

• Long Beach Rock Band "Brand New" named one of their songs " Luca" from their album "The Devil and God are raging inside of me" In it they sing "No one can save you now, unless you have friends among fish"

[edit] Books

• Take the Cannoli: Stories From the New World, a collection of essays by Sarah Vowell, is named after a famous line from the movie ("Leave the gun, take the cannoli").

[edit] Video Games

• In Pokémon Fire Red and Leaf Green at Nugget Bridge, a Team Rocket member "makes an offer" that the player "can't refuse."