Now clocking in at 9 hrs and 48 minutes, the chronological edit of Francis Ford Coppola’s classic films has finally been restored in Widescreen 16×9 DVD’s. – Scenes from THE NOVEL FOR TELEVISION are preserved here to create the most complete version of the Saga. – In Godfather Part III, a dissolve was added on the flashback to Michael watching Fredo’s death back to Michael receiving the award.
– Since the quality of the Alternate Opening for Godfather Part III is in a rough workprint quality, only the first part of the Alternate Opening shot was used, then it cuts directly to the rest of the restored scene and plays as normal. By moving the scene back to the beginning, the scenes that follow with the Archbishop giving Michael the award and the behavior at the party celebrations play very differently. The scene was moved to 30 minutes later in the film.
Coppola had intended to open the film on the business deal with Michael and the Archbishop (notice the same zoom out shot used from Part I), but later was convinced by editor Walter Murch to open the film on family instead of business. – Since this edit is intended to be a chronological edit, the Alternate Opening Sequence for Godfather Part III was used. In order to maintain the chronological edit of events, this scene has be re-placed at the end of PART I, after a short music interlude over black screen. Some Godfather fans had issues with Kay praying for Michael after the events in PART II, with the footage clearly of a younger Kay. However, instead of placing the scene after the evens of the first film (as in the novel, where the scene takes place), Coppola instead placed the scene at the end of PART II, running the end credits over the scene.
– In the TV SAGA version, Coppola incorporated deleted scenes shot for THE GODFATHER of Kay praying for Michael and lighting candles in church. – To keep from abruptly cutting from Part I to Part II to Part III, a musical interlude against a black screen was added between each film, with a Title Card presenting each new chapter.
– Since all Deleted Scenes are presented in FULL FRAME 1.33, they have been sized to match the Widescreen 1.85 aspect ratio, adding black bars to the sides of the picture.