Your thoughts?

Wow TB, quite a question.

Of course, answering that requires that one answer the age old question first: what is love? My wife and I are approaching 48 years together. There are times when I still get giddy being with her; other times, no. But there is never a time that she's not in my thought big time. Is that love? I can't think of my life without her and I have no interest in any other woman. Is that love?

Michael went through his own self-imposed trauma that took him from what was probably a marriage of convenience to realizing what was important in life. Kay was part of that epiphany. Love? Not really, not romantic love. Love as a friend, as someone to turn to, yes.

When Michael first began seeing Kay, I really believe that his intentions were to stay out of the Family business,(except for using the connections to get a good job) ,and live a quiet, comfortable life with her. Once he decided to go down the path he did, despite his love for her,he relegated her to the status of "Mafia Wife". At Connie's wedding,while still a "civilian"he seems to enjoy telling Kay the Luca story in great detail. Contrast that with the classic "Don't ask me about my business,Kay". To sum it up,I think that Mike did love Kay,but the difference is that it was mutual and unconditional at first,but then after Mike became a "cheap Mafia hood", Kay was expected to be quiet,have babies,cook,and keep her mouth shut.

I love you with all-a my heart! If I don't see you again soon, I'm a-gonna die!

LOL Good one, olivant !

I think Michael really did love Kay for herself before he got involved in the family business. We see this in a deleted scene before Vito was shot, when he and Kay are cavorting in a NYC hotel bedroom, and he asks her to impersonate a telephone operator so he can tell Tom he's still in New Hampshire. The next time he sees Kay, they're having dinner in that hotel room before he goes to the hospital--no more cavorting. But, after he shoots Sol and Mac, no more Kay--no hint he's even thinking of her in Sicily--and it's all Appolonia.

He waits a year after returning to the US before "wooing" Kay in New Hampshire. That scene looks more like a corporate merger or acquisition negotiation than a marriage proposal. He tells Kay he loves her with all the passion of a lawyer scrutinizing a contract. Kay even says, "I don't know what you want from me, Micahel." I think he simply wanted to use her--to bear his children, to help give him a "respectable" front, and to validate his fantasy of being "legitimate." The novel even says that Michael was disappointed when Kay took instruction in the Catholic Church--he wanted his family to be "more American."

At his party in III, Michael shouts at her that "I spent my life protecting my family from the horrors of this world." "But you became my horror," Kay replies. She says she "dreads" him. That says it all. But, near the end, he's still using her--he asks her to "forgive" him after giving her a long rationale about his father, the family, etc. "You mean, forgive you, like God?" she replies. Then, improbably, she says, "I still love you, Michael, I always will." It's one of the weakest moments in the movie.

No doubt Mike treated Kay deplorably in most of their relationship. There is, however one scene that almost makes me feel sorry for him,and that is when he tells Kay " I'll change. I learned that I have the strength to change". To me it is obvious that he is grasping at straws,and I don't think even he believed it. A desperate attempt to change the inevitable.

He loved her, but not like his first love.. I believe he could never love where he would get hurt like that again..

Did Michael really love Kay? following on similar [old] thread

I believe Michael loved Kay but his love was 'packaged' different due to the dramatic changes in Michael's life-style from “That's my family Kay It's not me” to It is me

There were some tender, loving moments – among others

• Michael promised “We'll go to the city we'll see a show and we'll have dinner” when Kay was griping that Michael "had to see his father and his people" on his return from Moe Greene meeting
• Michael reaches for and held Kay's hand at Anthony's party
• Michael and Kay, when they were dancing, seemed quite loving
• Michael and Kay spoke lovingly about the baby feeling like a boy
• Michael sees the drawing Anthony left for him on his pillow, reaches over and strokes Kay's cheek
• The way Michael protected Kay during the bedroom shooting was indeed incredible!
• Michael's first question to Tom at the Desert Inn was “Kay know I am back?”

It was over between them at that point. When Michael returned to his Tahoe home after the Desert Inn scene, Kay didn't even look up from her sewing. That's why, right after that scene, Michael asked Mama if it was possible to lose one's family.

IMO, it was all over right after the Tahoe shooting. That look Kay gives him while clutching Anthony says it all.

I agree TB.

Of course, when they were dancing and Michael told her "I'm trying" she must have felt so discouraged and forlorn. Perhaps even resigned. But when she came under attack (and her children also), it all changed.

No doubt It's one of the many weakest moments in the movie.
Kay dreaded him but she says, "I still love you, Michael, I always will." her horror

Michael spent a lot of time thinking of Kay even as he got married in Sicily Still loved her, his horror

She was deplorable too Abortion scene She didn't ask him to "forgive" her

She never understood nor supportive that he was a top Mafia boss, trying to become a "legitimate" businessman

1. She knew about the band leader's brains or his signature
2. She knew he was Mafia when she married him
3. Connie told her how many men were murdered along with Carlo
4. Happily enjoyed the unholy and evil spoils
5. Legitimacy was blood money laundering
6. When her bedroom was shot up suddenly dawned on her this Sicilian thing must all end

Hypocrite! If there was no shooting she would have continued enjoying the rich and powerful life

We had quite a few discussions years ago about Kay going along with Michael for all those years, knowing all the things you cited. Many posters believed that Kay thought she could "change" Michael, although there's no evidence of her trying to do that in the movies (Michael says in the Washington hotel scene that he "knows he can change").

Kay's "horror" began at the very end of GF, when Kay sees Clem kiss Michael's hand and says, formally, "Don Corleone"--see that horrified look on her face when she recognizes that whatever rationalizations she may have made about Michael's mysterious business gave way to the realization that he was, indeed, a Mafia Don. People can deceive themselves into believing what they want to believe--but not forever. My guess is that Kay thereafter behaved like a typical well-bred wife of the era: "love" gradually giving way to
"duty" toward the wifely responsibilities to preserve the marriage and keep a two-parent upbringing for her kids. Wives of that era were conditioned to believe that those burdens fell mostly on her, not on him; and that divorce represented a failure of hers, not his. I grew up in that era, and I can tell you that divorced women (but not men) were shunned, as if they had the proverbial Scarlet Letter on their foreheads. But the Tahoe shooting--the direct threat to her, her children and her home--pushed her over the edge.

Sure thing Evita and Turnbull Tahoe shooting - it was over for Kay [Abortion - it was over for Michael]

Both Michael and Kay were delusional about “legitimacy” but Michael was at least trying
If organized crime could wash their blood money clean, become “legitimate” let alone in five years RICO would probably be out of business!

Kay was blind and part of the same hypocrisy
Kay knew what Michael's business was, knew her rich, privileged life was funded by tainted money, from other criminal [and perhaps innocent] people's murder, misery and blood

Whilst “the Tahoe shooting--the direct threat to her, her children and her home--pushed her over the edge” Kay used the abortion for her escape leaving their young children in the unholy and evil Sicilian thing, with the father who is blind to everything other than business

I believe as a mother Kay should have at least tried, taken up the second chance Michael offered and tried to salvage the situation for the sake of their children

"Kay didn't even look up from her sewing" - was Kay aware Michael was actually home? Kay may not have heard Michael over the whirring of the sewing machine

What I found disturbing was Michael not reaching out to comfort his wife who'd just had a 'miscarriage' and the trauma of their bedroom machine gun sprayed

She just abandoned her children She knew impossibility he would let her go impossibility he would let her take the children from him so used the abortion for her escape abandoning the children

It seems a bit harsh to say she abandoned the children.

She continues to have visitation with them and, as Michael acknowledges at the beginning of GFIII, eventually does take primary custody of them, in practice if not legally.

He had already told her, very clearly, he won't let her take the children from him that it is an impossibility Even after that she tells him about the abortion as if that would swing it her way

I reckon she was totally irresponsible abandoning the children in the unholy and evil environment, she was escaping from, with the father she herself said is blind to everything other than business and Anthony's friends were his buttonmen

How long were they with Michael? When did Kay get them?
Dartmouth alumnus Michael with all his power, money and resources couldn't be entrusted with their education!

I posted in another thread that Kay must have gotten the children pretty soon because Michael, in his letter at the very beginning of III, said, "I entrusted your education to your mother..." Both kids seemed to be of school age by the end of III.

Michael never finished college.

I reckon they were older Wasn't Anthony at law school?
Anyhow, irrespective when the children were left they were very young and no doubt needed their mother in their tender age especially in the unholy and evil environment, she was escaping from not knowing how long before she sees them again Ever

Michael's letter at the beginning of III was to both of his children and I inferred that he turned over responsibility for their education to their mother well before Anthony went to law school.



"Ever"?? The last we saw of Kay in II, she was ending a visitation with the children, who appeared to be about the same age as when we saw them at the Hotel Washington, when Michael bellowed, "You won't take my children from me!" Visitation rights are part of any separation or divorce proceeding, which I'm sure Kay--or Michael--initiated soon after that scene.

I will have to watch it again but my inference is different!

At that time of the abortion scene, there was no knowing what was in store
The only reason Kay was not sleeping with the fishes because she was the mother of Michael's children

Mothers getting the children are part of any separation or divorce proceeding unless they were deemed unfit but here they were with the father

Thank you for referring to my earlier thread:

http://www.gangsterbb.net/threads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=36402&Searchpage=1&Main=2074&Words=%2BHow+%2Bdid+%2BKay+%2Bget+%2Bthe+%2Bkids&Search=true#Post36402

Of course Michael loved Kay. In fact, in court papers was the following:

There are many many crazy things
That will keep me loving you
And with your permission
May I list a few
The way you wear your hat
The way you sip your tea
The memory of all that
No, no they can't take that away from me
The way your smile just beams
The way you sing off key
The way you haunt my dreams
No, no they can't take that away from me
We may never never meet again, on that bumpy road to love
Still I'll always, always keep the memory of
The way you hold your knife
The way we danced until three
The way you changed my life
No, no they can't take that away from me
No, they can't take that away from me

I believe as a mother Kay should have at least tried, taken up the second chance Michael offered, tried to salvage the situation for the sake of their young, impressionable and vulnerable children, to nurture and protect them from the 'unholy and evil' as Kay claimed

As regards Kay's “visitation” it seemed to me Kay was visiting the children behind Michael's back arranged by Connie ie: Kay did not seem to have visitation rights as such
Connie was desperately hurrying Kay to leave because Michael was coming - perhaps Kay's allocated time with the children was up?

How did Kay get the kids?
Whilst the children “did end up with Kay eventually” as we found out in Godfather 3 we are none the wiser when Kay got the children

I'm not arguing that Kay was Mother of the Year.

But to claim that she "abandoned" the children is just wrong. That, by definition, would mean that she cut off contact with the children, which is clearly not the case.

In fact, she must have had pretty open lines of contact to both the children and Michael if she was able to persuade Michael - not exactly a guy to let bygones be bygones - to allow her to take over the children's education.

I don't think that Michael didn't know Kay was visiting the children. I think that Michael would have done more than close a door in Kay's face if he and Connie were conspiring against his wishes.

I also think it's highly unlikely that there was an actual divorce or any kind of formal visitation agreement. Michael would never have allowed his personal affairs to be aired in court.

I definitely agree Woltz. Also, I had never thought of your opine that Michael would never have allowed his personal affairs to be aired in court. That's a very good point.

At the beginning of III, Kay shows up at Michael's Church ceremony with her husband, Douglas. I doubt she was a bigamist.

Now, this is a quandary.

I agree with Woltz that Michael would not want the exposure of his underbelly that would be the product of a divorce. On the other hand, as TB states, Kay was not a bigamist. So, what transpired?

Well, maybe Michael made a deal with Kay about a quiet divorce that would not expose his underbelly and her abortion: You give me the kids and I won't ruin your life. On the other hand, Michael's underbelly was already exposed by the Senate hearings. However, Michael would have been cautioned by legal counsel that once ya'll are divorced, your marital privilege (regarding testimony) disappears. Maybe he followed that advice until he made the decision to entrust the kids education to Kay. Of course, we don't know when that would have taken place: grade -school, high-school, college?

There are so many mitigating factors to consider here.

Kay did bring Michael's [two] children into this world!

Sure thing Woltz “Michael would never have allowed his personal affairs to be aired in court” as Michael would “use all his power to keep something like that from happening”

How did Kay get the kids?

If Michael knew Kay was visiting the children, why was Connie desperately hurrying Kay to leave because Michael was coming?

What more could Michael have done in front of the children and Connie “than close a door in Kay's face”?

I believe whatever arrangements made, would have all been on Michael's terms until Michael entrusted! the children's education to Kay

We are none the wiser when Kay got the children nor when Michael and Kay divorced All we know is -

How did Kay get the kids?