Newly Re-Edited, “The Godfather: Part III” Is the Masterpiece It Already Was
By Richard Brody December 8, 2020
In the new version, the story is identical; so, for that matter, are its emphases.
The main changes to the film are seen at the beginning, where Coppola has eliminated the sumptuous papal knighting of Michael andreplaced itwith an in-chambers discussion between Michael and Archbishop Gilday (Donal Donnelly), which sets the quid pro quo of his “contribution.”
The difference between “Part III” and the first two films isn’t in style; it’s that, with the third film, Coppola was passionately interested in his subject.
The first two “Godfathers,” made during the age of the Vietnam War and Watergate, reflect a generalized recognition that American self-congratulatory mythology was a hollow veneer; they tore away the veil of civic virtue to show that gangsters are us, that corporate power and Mafia power were indissociable.
In “Part III,” Coppola did with and to the Catholic Church what he’d previously done with and to American mythology.
Where “Part I” and “Part II” tapped into a general Zeitgeist of disillusionment (which accounts significantly for its success), “Part III,” though a box-office success, is a much more personal film, with a political and emotional engine that is Coppola’s alone.
In “Part III,” Coppola challenges the religion in which he was raised; he confronts the rituals of the Church, the hierarchy on which it depends, the virtual cult of personality—running in a chain from the parish priest to the archbishop to the Pope—on which it is based, and even the Church’s very notion of a mediated relationship to God. (It’s no coincidence that the movie’s voice of conscience is Michael’s ex-wife, Kay, the daughter of a Baptist minister; she’s played by Diane Keaton.)
The movie is an audacious, self-scourging drama of a crisis offaith.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/newly-re-edited-the-godfather-part-iii-is-the-masterpiece-it-already-was
It seems like someone was not happy with the "papal knighting of Michael" "Y" head scene and wanted it removed yet the fact remains that this film was indeed aimed at the Vatican and Rome which is why Q chose Godfather III as a Map Legend, Key or "Signature".