In GF we see truly dangerous characters. First of all Vito's effect on Bonasera is Vito's effect on us: "And then they would fear you."
Solozzo radiates danger the first moment we see him. Also Luca Brasi. When he enters the Don's office, we feel the uncomfortable situation and that he could explode any moment. Also, since his return from Sicily, Michael. And to a certain degree Clemenza after he took the leak. (One could Sonny here, but I don't because he was like an open book. His danger was always immediate.)

But then during the trilogy we lose the number of dangerous people.

In GF2 we don't have a real equivalent of Sollozzo. Roth is more an equivalent of Barzini. Sollozzo is a panther. Roth is a cat.
Young Vito becomes a dangerous character, Michael develops his darkness. His body guard radiates danger, but he doesn't come close to Brasi.

GF3 lacks totally of dangerous characters. Don Lucchesi with his body guards is a laugh. Altobello doesn't have class. Mosca is like an old man, fumbling with guns. And Lupe looks like a fool. There's some potential in the twins. Zasa is ridiculous, and nobody ever cares about his "bulldog". Michael has become a nervous wreck. I would swallow a lot of inaccuracies in GF3 as I did in GF2, as long as I would care about the bad guys.

There are different levels of danger, and danger comes in more complex forms. The dangers we se in Godfather I are more "street" dangers...i.e. thugs who pose a threat to the olive oil business. In II, as Michael rises in the world the threats to him are just as dangerous...maybe more so, but they are more sophisticated. He is threatened by a U.S. Senator, who he compromises, only to be threatened by an entire Senate COmmittee, all of which is controlled by Roth's man Questadt. He is betrayed by his own brother and he is nearly killed in his bedroom. His most trusted old timer is compromised and breaks Omerta. And then there's Roth, a snake who wants him dead. These guys are all more dangerous than Solozzo, who at the end of the day was a small time drug pusher. In III, the threats are even more pronounced...international financiaers, and the Catholic Church. It doesnt get more dangerous than that.

The devolution of danger in the Trilogy reflects the devolution of the Mafia as it eschews violence in favor of the legal manipulation of people and business to achieve its nefarious ends.

(Sorry, I wasn't clear about what I meant.)

I didn't refer to factual threats. I'm not talking about the What, but about the How.
Of course, Fredo had become a threat in GF2. And the Catholic church in GF3. But in cinematographic terms they don't scare us, the audience. Yes, Sollozzo was a thug with little power. But compare the radiation of Al Lettieri in the restaurant scene with that of Peter Donat as Questadt.
What I'm talking about is how the danger is being portrayed and how it transmits to the audience. Who's ever been scared of Gilday? Who was not scared of Brasi?

Well, Puzo and FFC made a deliberate progession in II and III that was in contrast to I. You could say that II and III became the intellectual parts of the Trilogy that challenged the audience to divine relationships, motives, etc.

Based on Danito's definition, I don't think dangerous is the right word. "Fear" would be more appropriate.

Like dontomasso says, the powers in Part II and III are far more 'dangerous' than those in Part I.

But I agree, the characters in II and III don't inspire as much 'fear' as the ones in I.

True. Vito's world was relativly domestic; Michael's was global. Micahels' world was vulnerable to many more variables than Vito's world. Thus, Michael had to be more sensitive to those variables and use more of a business approach than Vito had to. So, fear of business losses would be a motive in Micahel's world.

If I understand Danito correctly: the characters in GF radiated more physical danger and fear, as individuals. The situations were more direct, more personal and in some respects, more violent. The dangers were far more subtle in II and III, but no less dangerous. The villains were even more villainous, but much less physically menacing.

Hm, the most violent scene was probably the Atlantic City massacre. FFC followed the rule, that with every sequel, the brutality has to increase. Problem: It doesn't affect me that much.
For example: The Senator Geary story is in some ways a parallel to the Woltz story, and it's handled in a similar way. Difference: Dead horse vs. dead girl. But the dead horse scene was more scary, wasn't it? Not from a rational side. But it was a completely unexpected shock. In GF2 we see Tom walking through the brothel, the prostitutes were trembling. What do we get? A naked senator.

The villains were perhaps less physically menacing, but first of all cinematographically.

In one sense some of it had to do with the acting. E.G. Virgil Solozzo looked and acted dangerous. On the other hand Eli Wallach, was horrible in his role as Altobello, and while he was just as dangerous as Sollozzo, he came off like a clown.

I actually found Eli Wallach as Don Altobello one of the better roles in Part III...

Joe Mantegna as Joey Zasa was horrible, it was him who actually was the clown.

I think the lack of "dangerous" characters is a natural progression of the Trilogy which I feel, in a general way, parallels the immigrant experience in America.

Step 1: Street-level, culturally isolated.
Step 2: Moving up in the world, attempting to overcome resistance to integrate into mainstream, "legitimate" American society
Step 3: As powerful as any "non-ethnic" American, and not held back by prejudice on a daily basis, but still struggling to move past the choices they had to make to rise past steps one and two.

It is clear and understandable why there was no one as "dangerous" as Sollozzo in the latter 2 films. But I can't say I agree that the emotional impact of the villians' actions is any less in GFII and GF III. Witness the killing of Fredo and the silent scream.

As some have alluded too, we are apt to confuse danger with the appearance of danger. Whether or not one Mafioso is more dangerous than another does not preclude the fact that they all achieve a certain minimum level of dangerousness. However, GFI was consistent with what we were exposed to in previous organized crime films in which the violence was not disguised as it was to a large extent in II and III. All of the characters in II and III met the minimum violence-capable threshhold I referred to above, but they were capable of achieving their nefarious ends through other means which the increasing sophistication of society almost required.

That just may be the understatement of the year, dt.

I think we are al in agreement that "danger" as seen in all three movies posed an existential threat. What is kind of
peculiar is that in GFI this threat is manifested by Barzini, using Sollozzo as a means to bring down the Corleone family and take over as the DOn of Dons.

By the time of II, we see what a visionary Michael was in that
he was moving past the olive oil business Barzini had so coveted and expanding the operations into Nevada and Cuba, and in the process himself posing an existential threat to the Corleone Family (Mama: You can never lose your family... Michael: "Tempi cambi (times change)." By the end of II there really was no "Corleone Family," per se, just Michael.

By the time of II it was all about Michael and the threat to his greed and ambition that posed the "danger."

So as the "face of danger" changed in all three pictures, so did the nature of the danger, and the entities to which it presented itself.

Of course, the Trilogy has always been about Michael. But DT, you point out correctly that the Corleone family in II and III was just Michael. It's true. The family that Vito built was built on personal loyalty. When Michael told Tom that our people are businessmen and their loyalty was based on that, he hit the nail on the head.

Sometimes I feel, that we don't discuss cinematographic arts here, but a true story.

You mean its NOT a true story?

We had this dialogue before.

Its dialogue redux

It's almost a miracle that I post in a Godfather thread, but this topic is very good. Haven't seen this type for a while. It starts with a good question/analysis and everybody has it's opinion.

I must say I fully agree with Turnbull. Especially on this one: The dangers were far more subtle in II and III, but no less dangerous. It's just the definition of danger you use.