Ok i have a couple of questions, and hopefully you guy can help.

1st= How come Tom Hagen didnt succed Vito?

2nd= Why didnt the 3 oldest children fail to succed there father, but Michael was a success?

3rd= Can someone explain, why when the Corleone's tryed to become a legit company, the government dissapproved of it because the family was corrupted at the beginning, but the government lets companys that dont have a past history of organized crime set up shot, but there more corrupt than the Corleone's were.

4th= What do you think the purpose of Puzo was when he wrote the Godfather. Also why do you think he wrote it?

what i think to question 4 is its showing the connections and the ability of using someone can corrupt te world and the people around. Please giv me your thoughts. Thank you.
Chris

Here's my tuppence worth Qckrun:

1. One of the mistaken perceptions that people pick up from the GF film is that when a Don died or retired he was automatically replaced by his eldest son. Puzo points out in the novel that this was not necessarily the case. It was usually whichever member of the "Family" hierarchy was strongest at the time, sometimes this was a son, more often not. Puzo and FFC saw GF as the story of a king with three sons, hence the family succession thing.

2. Sonny was dead, Fredo was weak and stupid and Tom wasn't Sicilian. As FFC said (and I parapahrase here) "One son had his (Vito's) passion and aggression (Sonny) one had his sensitive side (Fredo) and one had his cunning and ruthlessness (Michael)".

3. Haven't a clue.

4. Puzo freely admitted that he wrote the GF to make money and pay off debts (rumoured to be gambling debts).

He wasn't his natural son. He wasn't even adopted. He just sort of lived with the family and then went to work for them. Plus, he's a "kraut-mick".

I'm not quite sure what you're asking. Sonny *did* succeed Vito for a short time, but was killed. Fredo was just too stupid. It fell to Michael to continue the Family business.

The trials in GFII were modeled after the RL mob trials of that time. The Corleones, as an affluent mob Family, were put on trial. The Corleones pretty much represented LCN in Tahoe. If a company doesn't have a past history of OC, then what would make them think that the company was mobbed up?

He wrote it to make money.

~Liz

Thank you everyone, for your responses. It's given some insight on how i should orgaize my essay lol. Thanks

Chris