It's hard to see when watching GFI because time speeds by so quickly, but Connie and Carlo were married for ten years! A good movie like this, from the wedding sequence in the beginning to Carlo's demise at the end, its easy to think that everything took place in a couple of years (and this only because of Michael's plight to Italy), so this realization leads me to wonder -

1) did Carlo's abuse to Connie cease after the death of Santino?

2) how many children did they have together?

3) after ten years of marriage, maybe Connie and Carlo matured as a couple (you can notice that Carlo is a bit nicer to her at the baptism. Instead of telling her to shut up, he says, "Connie, please." when Michael says he can't go to Vegas) and maybe Connie's grief at the end of the movie was sincere as opposed to outright shock.

Carlo's mistreatment of Connie was payback for his lack of stature in the Family. Once he sold out Sonny he sealed his fate. Mike pulled in into the mall to make him as ease, but also to keep an eye on him. He was dead anyway no matter what, but would behave himself right under Mikes nose. I am of the opinion that Carlos relationship w/ Connie depended on his status with the Family. Mike knew that and that's why keep was pulled in, to keep him happy and out of trouble until they made their move.
Alot of this is explained better in the book.

They had two children. Victor (1948?) and Michael Francis (1954?)

1. Probably yes. Even Carlo had enough brains to figure out that continuing to openly, physically abuse Connie would lead to disaster for him.
2. Two (Michael Francis Rizzi was born in '55).
3. Outwardly yes. Joe Cago gave an excellent rationale, which is supported in the novel, which paints a picture of Carlo idolizing Michael. But the novel also says that Carlo was still philandering. He was calling his mistress at the very moment that Michaelcame in to give him the bad news.

Carlo was nice to Connie because they were at a church in public. He couldn't go beating her there at the baptism of their son.

Their relationship is described more at length in the book. Carlo was a creep who married Connie to get in with the Family. He abused Connie, at first out of rage because they kept him in an unimportant position. He later used that as a way to lure Sonny to his death. He was brought into the mall so that he could be watched (keep your friends close, but your enemies closer). While he may have cleaned up his act, his treachery was one that couldn't be overlooked, especially since everyone assumed he had gotten away with it.

By the way, Connie has a much happier life in the book. She forgives her brother, tells Kay that she didn't mean what she said, and marries a fine, young man not even a year after Carlo's death. I prefer to think of her that way rather than that hard, bitter woman in GF2.

Spouse abusers, particularly violent ones, usually don't just decide to "stop it."

Of course Carlo couldn't chew Connie out at the baptism in front of Michael and the rest of the family. Carlo knows, or should know, that Michael got the lowdown on what happened while he was in Sicily (i.e. the events leading to Sonny's murder) from either Tom Hagen or Vito, or even for that matter from Mama, so Michael knows all about Carlo brutally beating Connie.

Her reaction at the end is a combination of shock, anger at being abandoned in short order by the three "big daddy" figures in her life - Sonny, Vito, then Carlo, and blaming Michael for it all.

But by the time of GF II, she's over that - she's whoring around with boy-toys and dweebs like Merle, and at that point her resentment toward Michael is based on the fact that he is acting like a stern daddy (not letting her just do whatever she wants) more than anything else.

But she understands that Carlo taking the Dirt-Nap was the best thing that could have happened for her.

She always saw herself more as a Corleone; that is her true self-identity. After a couple of years she would realize how Carlo had betrayed and endangered the lives of Sonny and Vito, and I think she would want nothing more to do with the name "Rizzi" or the memory of Carlo.

I think this can be seen in the line by Michael in GF II about how she's ignoring her children - I intrepret this as a result of the fact that they remind her of Carlo.

So my speculation is that Connie would have wanted to minimize any reference to "Rizzi" with the boys, and changed their name to Corleone, to honor the family she really felt she was a part of.

So my feeling is that while they were still fairly young, Connie would have changed the boys' names to Victor Rizzi Corleone and Michael Francis Rizzi Corleone, to make them 'true Corleones' by name.

Connie knows that their family is involved with illegal buisness. She knew that Michael wanted Carlo to stay behind in the mall for a few days before joining her and the kids in Vegas. Connie is one smart cookie. It took her a few years to realize that she didn't need Carlo ( I mean come one, the guy beat the shit out of her and committed infidelity) after all, but I think she acted u'pazzu at Michael because of widow hysteria.

Santino and Michael wanted Carlo to be paid back for the beating of their sister. But Michael kept his temper in check and he waited ten years unlike Sonny who went after him right after he found out.

In the book, Carlo's only real reason for beating Connie is because he felt a sense of power knowing that he could actually slap around a Corleone. That he actually, or at least he felt he actually owned the daughter of the most powerful crime boss in the Cosa Nostra. And hell, there's even a scene in the book (which is eluded to in a deleted scene), that shows Carlo bossing around Connie in Vito's very own house, and she comes running downstairs to tell him, and Vito refuses to interfere. Connie even asked him if he'd ever hit Mama, and he simply said "My wife never gave me a reason to hit her." What are you waiting for, just read the book, it's very much worth the $8.

Yes, the book fills in some gaps and is a great read, but it's not infallible - it seemed to me that this whole idea, that Vito would be OK with Carlo slapping Connie around, because he was the husband and she was the wife, seemed a little out of character.

While Vito certainly had a lot of "old world" principles, most fathers - specifically most Italian fathers - are very very protective of their daughters, especially the youngest daughter. And Vito is certainly no stranger to using, shall we say, rather "extreme" methods to get what he wants.

My opinion is that Vito and Carmella would have been OK with Carlo asserting authority and telling Connie what to do, but if either one of them found out that Carlo was beating the living beejeesus out of her, turning her face into a punching bag and whipping the crap out of her with a belt (while 7-8 months pregnant!! ), what Sonny wanted to do would have looked like Miss Manners compared to what Vito would have done.

He'd have had Luca Brasi go turn Carlo into dog meat - verrry slowwwly - and probably helped out with the job personally for the sheer satisfaction of it. He'd have given Carlo the Fanucci treatment.

And Vito certainly would have been mindful of Carlo's ego-tripping and delusions of grandeur that he was some big powerful dude because he slapped around a Corleone, and taken pains to crush out those delusions in a big hurry.

Carlo is a cockroach, a third-rate flunky. Vito doesn't have any 'plans' for him. He'll be kept busy running some penny-ante sports book. Vito's attitude toward Carlo (besides his instinctive reaction to want to ice him) would be the same as when Michael finds out Moe Greene is "straightening out" Fredo:

"You slapped around my daughter?!?"

Vito was no idiot, and I'm sure he had as much knowledge about the going's-on between his daughter and his son-in-law as Michael and Santino. But consider this: Michael was away in Sicily during their first few years of marriage, and personally never saw the faded bruises on his sister. Any information he gathered was second hand upon his return to America - and not from Sonny, either. So, with that said, EnzoBaker mentions the scene where Carlo and Connie are fighting in Vito's own home and Vito does not interfere. Plus, after Santino's death and Michael is speaking to the Capos, Tom, and Carlo about the move to Vegas in Vito's office, Vito pinches Carlo's cheeks and says, "I'm happy for you, Carlo," and Carlo says, "Thank you, Poppa." If Vito was Michael's advisor, and if both men were equally smart, how come Vito didn't suspect Carlo's role in the death of Santino?

I've read the book, many times, and it is implied that Connie, being very young, was a bit immature as a new wife. Vito seemed under the impression that Carlo's responsibility was to man-handle her, to put her in line. Connie (or Kay, for that matter) were Americanized, unlike Carmella who was from the same world and attitude as Vito, and that was why Vito said in the book, "my wife gave me no reason to beat her."

I think that it seems a little out of character for Vito not to do anything if he knows that Carlo slapped around his daughter, but I also agree that he probably turned a blind eye to it hoping that it would "straighten" Connie out. When she complained to him I always figured it was about Carlo slapping her or something, not an actual beating like he does later on.

I think, though, that if Vito knew Carlo was beating Connie up while she was pregnant he would have stepped in. I seem to recall something hinting that he was never really told Carlo was physically abusing Connie (the occasional slap not counting) since they didn't live in the compound. And remember, he only let Carlo come and live in the family compound because as he puts it in the novel "I'm short on sons."

I don't think there's any instance where Carlo lays a hand on Connie within view of Vito. Yeah, he bosses her around and stuff, but he doesn't hit her.

And the scene where Vito says "I'm happy for you," I always took to mean that Vito already knew that the plan was to ice Carlo. The whole trip-to-Vegas deal was a ruse to lull Carlo into complacency.

Certainly Tom Hagen would have told both Vito and Michael all the details leading up to Sonny's killing, since if Carlo was already a traitor, they knew they had to keep an eye on him - they were only keeping him in the family in order to keep control over him.

And it always seemed to me that Vito (Brando) delivered that line a little too fawningly - that he was faking it. (Very reminiscent of the lines he delivered in "The Freshman," when he was parodying his Vito role.)

One thing I failed to mention, is that although Vito really didn't do much at face value, he created a kind of buffer system to keep an eye on Carlo for him. Also, eventhough he gave Carlo a bookmaking job, he took control of it from Carlo because he was running it into the ground. Carlo still thought he was in charge, but he wasn't. Everything that happened during the day at the bookmaking job, a Corleone soldier working there would call a higher up guy, that guy would call either Sal or Pete, Sal or Pete would call Tom, and Tom would deliver the news to Vito. So eventhough Vito did nothing immediately, he was well aware that his son-in-law was a piece of sh*t, and took measures to deal with him.