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melis-writes · 3 months ago

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Kay was whiney, demanding and domineering. Apo was the submissive, soft, feminine, and agreeable girl that would've suited the entire mafia lifestyle as a wife 50x better than Kay. Yes, him and kay had more concrete and geniune enduring history and love but objectively kay was not the right fit for michaels direction once he stepped up and got into the family business especially after the don got shot. Kay could've accepted reality and the facts that the man she loved changed and she could've left, breaking up with Michael without any dramatics and moved on (like she eventually did after 2nd movie).

I could careless about both of them. Apo and Kay but Apo would've just blended in so well and adjusted to the life perfectly. She was made for it and men like Michael in that world needed Apos, at least on the rise and transition into power. Apo would've never disrespected him and aborted a human life like that especially without telling Michael. I can't see it for her at all. She would mostly get tired of his shit if she got fed up and would've left with the baby (even if he objected). She wouldnt have aborted as some self righteous pompous protest to his evil and madness. Like girl just say you didn't want another baby period and you hated him so thus you never wanted Michael's baby period.

A life is a life period, even if its not born yet and she knew michael was looking forward to having a boy. Its white entitlement and privilege she has that you guys dont seem to understand. She could've turned the baby over to Michael and been done with it. I think she deserved the slap he gave her and Its factual he loved Apo and both of his loves for apo and kay shouldn't be discredited.

This film was made back during a time where love could be conceptualized without needing a bunch of literal experiences together and a laundry list of memories.

Michael liked kay and "loved" her cause she was the best, nearest and only option out there. Men will have a general love for who they're with but there will always be a woman out there past present or future that will be his IT girl, his true type and who he would be with if he someone granted him the chance to have any type of woman he wanted and not just the woman he naturally met.

Apo isnt better than kay and kay isnt better than apo but everyone needs to accept that Apo was better suited for the lifestyle and organized crime. She just was. Last thing Michael needed was some blonde wife at home groaning and being dramatic about all of this like she never had a clue and couldn't leave. She was wealthier and better off than 80% of the country and most people with Michael and abusive relationships like Michael sister and her man existed. Michael stepped out on her when he was under the assumption he would start a new life in italy. Other than that? He always stayed with kay and anyone else would've did worse. Every other mob film the men cheat and dont care.

Apo didnt get a chance and didnt stand a chance but had she lived? Even if she were to have left michael eventually, she's still the better choice not cause of her being above or better but because he needed a more subdued, softer, easier to mold very TRADITIONAL old world kinda girl there.

All I ever saw with kay and michael aside from good times was butting heads, competition and kay determine to make him submit instead of just leaving peacefully and bowing out.

Kay was strong, stood up for herself and her children and was smart. Apollonia was a child, puppeted by her parents and sold off to the highest bidder and couldn't think or act by herself. Apollonia was the perfect young, naive and helpless girl that a corrupt, older mafioso would want on his arm for 3 reasons:

Control: The husband to dominate his wife and control her, having her agree to his every whim and demands.

Power: A mafioso who was also a family man was looked upon as having more structure and being respectable.

Children: To legitimize his family further and have sons to succeed the mafioso in the family business.

Michael's type was always Kay and women like Kay. If Kay wasn't the "right fit" for THE Michael Corleone, why the hell would a man as powerful, influential, well known and wealthy as him bother to keep her around? Michael could have had anyone he wanted. He could have had a woman like Apollonia brought to him out of Sicily faster than tracking Kay down to talk to her and get her back on his side. He chose not to, that was Michael's decision because he wanted to be with Kay. Nobody made Michael do anything he didn't want. Only Michael knew what was right for him and he acted on that.

You're right, Kay could have accepted the reality and the facts of what she had gotten herself into, but what is this so called "reality" and "facts"? She was lied to for over a decade, gaslit and deceived. She didn't know the "reality" and "facts". She knew whatever lies and secrecy Michael fed her to keep her quiet, confused and in line like he would have done with any woman in his life at that point. Kay could've left? She did. Once she realized her husband was becoming a sociopath, endangered her and her children's life (while she was pregnant, mind you) and all his lies came spilling through with his corrupt lifestyle he gaslit Kay into believing he was out of, she left. She did just that.

What dramatics? It was Michael who was dramatic. Michael got up yelling and acting abusive. Michael struck his wife. Was that necessary? Could he not have controlled himself? Let's not make excuses for his fury. What's ignored here is that Kay knew the only way to have Michael let her go, divorce her and make sure they never see each other again was to abort his child and bring it up to his face by insulting the family business (calling it "this Sicilian thing"). She understood it just as well as Michael did, so it was no "Sicilian thing", but she did what she had to do to make that man hate her so Kay could truly be free of him. Michael should have moved on. Why is half the plot of The Godfather Part III Michael chasing Kay around, telling her he loved her and wanted her back? Why was he lamenting like a loser? Why did he pretend to be her taxi driver? Why did he want all that closure? Talk about dramatic.

Apollonia would have been easier to abuse, control and manipulate. Those are the ONLY reasons why she would have adjusted "perfectly". Apollonia would never have left Michael even if he beat her day and night, and that's depressing and horrid to think of as a concept. She wouldn't have up and left, where would she go? She'd have broken English, no money, no education, no credentials to her name other than being a child-birthing machine and no job. She'd be stuck being Michael's bangmaid for the rest of her life. She'd know nothing but a lifetime of his cruelty and distance no matter how many children she popped out. That would be Michael's only use for her, just like how back in Sicily Michael's only use for her was for sex. It literally states in the book Michael married her because he was horny and knew people in Sicily were too "prude" and pre-marital sex was frowned upon. Also, he was bored, there for months without an end date and kept Apollonia as a "sex slave" (stated in the book verbatim) in the house without letting her see anyone for weeks.

Kay did want Michael's baby, which is clearly why she got pregnant with it and carried it for 3 months, until she almost got assassinated with Michael and her unborn child and discovered all of his lies. Why should she go and be a single mother of 3 children, one of which is a newborn baby without a father figure or the funds to support it? Why would she give birth to Michael's expectation; a boy more intelligent and cruder than Anthony to succeed Michael? Who the hell would wanna carry that nightmarish reminder in their body for 6 more months after divorcing the guy?

"A life is a life" I'm gonna have to stop you right there, anon. I'm more than happy to debate The Godfather on all levels, but not the topic of abortion. The fetus was in Kay's body, it's Kay's choice. She was in no way, shape or form entitled to carry a child for 9 months that she didn't want just to "hand it over" to Michael like it's some sweater she knit over a period of almost a year. Also, it's alarming you think Kay deserved to be hit because she had an abortion. You think domestic violence is justifiable in certain cases to you? Unless Kay gave birth to that baby and tore it apart alive in front of Michael's face, nothing warrants abuse, period. Full stop. Women don't deserve to be abused by their husbands.

Mario Puzo, the literal creator of The Godfather, Francis Ford Coppola and Al Pacino himself said Kay was the love of Michael's life many times over. Apollonia was never mentioned. In the book, it clearly states Michael only loved his father and Kay. It's not "factual" he loved Apollonia, that is strictly your opinion. It's actually incorrect, considering the given statements from Puzo and the novel.

"This film was made back during a time where love could be conceptualized" Incorrect. People had no issue falling in love and creating loving memories and bonds with each other in the 1940s-1960s. I think this is a form of Apollonia cope, because Michael had no bonding with Apollonia other than giving her presents to appease her parents through his wealth so he could literally do 1 thing with her) have sex. He had plenty of bonding with Kay though, and this seems to bother Apollonia stans. You can't discredit this just because it doesn't suit your narrative.

Kay was Michael's "it" girl whether you like it or not. Like I stated above, Michael could have had anyone he wanted if he truly didn't love or need Kay. Just as easily as he married Apollonia, he could have had any other pretty Sicilian girl or whatever to suit his corrupt lifestyle. Again, as Mario Puzo himself, along with Al Pacino and Francis Ford Coppola clamed, Kay Adams was the love of Michael Corleone's life. They're literally telling you right there that Kay IS the "IT" girl of Michael's life.

There's too much talk of what Michael "needed" to succeed in his lifestyle and not enough talk about his corruption, his evil personality, and the pain he caused others. Why are we trying to find women to be trapped alongside with him? Why are we picking which women best suit to go through those evils with him? We should be talking about how Michael deserved nothing good in his life because he fucked it all up for power. He could never be half the man his father was, and the irony of it is that he had it all from birth and he still chose to sabotage it.

That's all I'll say on that.

#al pacino #michael corleone #the godfather #apollonia vitelli #kay adams

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msfbgraves · 1 year ago

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So, I love to watch videos of people reacting for the first time to movies. Almost every time I’ve watched people reacting to The Godfather movies, I’ve noticed that a large chunk of people (especially men, true, but surprisingly a LOT of women) all hate or strongly dislike Kay. Even growing up, both my parents disliked Kay lol, I remember.

It’s surprising to me, as I like all the women in the trilogy (yes, even Mary! Her character is sweet and affectionate, and I love how close she is with her dad!), and I always did like Kay…though I admit, I simply don’t like her with Michael after he decides to join the family business. Apollonia would have been the best fit. Besides, in Part 3, Michael sobs when Anthony sings the love song and thinks of Apollonia and their wedding even years later. And he chooses to return to Sicily to sit and brood/die in the place where they spent time together. That says it all, for me.

I can't say I've spent a lot of time on whether or not I liked Kay or Apollonia or both or neither in relation to these films. I remember watching the second film with my mother, and when the dancing scene between Michael and Kay came up, she said: "Hm. She's frightened."

I do find it surprising how many people make it about liking or not liking either or both of Michael's wives, when discussing the films as a whole. Kay doesn't fit into the mob world, that's the whole point of her, that's why Michael chose her initially, and that's why the audience may not like her - she sticks out like a sore thumb. She shouldn't be there. She agrees! That has nothing to do with how good she would have been for Michael. I do like Kay, the girl has guts. And I think that Apollonia and Michael would have made a fantastic mob marriage.

Michael ghosted Kay, and that is a shit way to break up whatever the circumstances, and by rights, they should have stayed broken up. Michael would have been nothing but a cad boyfriend who turned into a criminal, so people would have said she dodged a bullet.

Ah, but it isn't that simple, is it. If you share your time and love with someone, there will always be some form of bond. Whether or not you act on it is a completely different matter, and I feel Michael should have started fresh, and left Kay the hell alone. He could have written to break up, thank her and tell her to build a life without her. Or simply let her be one of those sacrifices you make, the same he later asks of Vincent. This life isn't good for Kay.

Would it have been good for Apollonia? I think she might have been more familiar with the codes of mob life, I think both Vito and Carmella would have adored her, I think it could have worked out beautifully. She probably wouldn't have felt the need to escape, or that the American life was better than what she left, she wouldn't feel so torn because she knew her roots. Maybe her children may have felt less at ease, but their father would have grown up completely American and helped them.

But it was not to be. Michael already gave up Kay for the life, and I believe him when he says he thought of her. And I believe in love at first sight with Apollonia, and he lost her, and I feel that if Apollonia is gone completely, maybe he can rekindle the love bond with Kay? And he does, under force, and they spend more time as husband and wife, and of course this strengthens that bond as well. But Kay is unhappy, so she breaks it off this time, and yet Michael refuses to let go of that bond (who do you think Mary gets it from)?

Apollonia and Michael is more romantic, less stressful - the fairytale his mob life cannot be. Kay is more realistic. They share a strong young love, and later, at Michael's absolute insistence, a very painful marriage, and Michael loves her and he loves Apollonia because I think that this is something that can happen. You can love two different people, if you want -widowed people do love again, and that doesn't negate the love they lost. Now of course, there may be sexism going on. A woman should simply be pretty and quiet, huh? Do we know a single of Apollonia's opinions other than her wanting to drive and not wanting to bother with English? Whereas Kay actually challenges Michael the way a wife has a right to challenge her spouse! And some people don't want to challenge their spouse and that is fine too! The point is that a marriage should work between two people and Michael's and Kay's didn't and Kay was the one calling that long before Michael, if she does love him. And Michael does not want to give it up. It's tragic, but it isn't Kay's sole fault. Again, she did move on. She rejeced his proposal, or tried to, he didn't want to hear no, she left him, he won't let her be, because he can't let go of emotional bonds apparently.

And who is to say who Apollonia might have become? These films are so very rarely interested in the world of these women, only looking at them in how they affect the men. And that's fine, the films are about Michael. But it's unfair to reduce all the other characters as people to how they relate to Michael. I promise you, if anyone ever made a biopic of my father, you wouldn't get to know everything there is to know about me simply by watching how I relate to him, or vice versa. People are allowed to exist however good they are, or not, for other people.

#kay adams #apollonia vitelli #michael corleone

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