The same year, Stefanelli landed her breakout role as the innocent Apollonia Vitelli-Corleone, the beautiful but doomed first wife of Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) in the American crime film The Godfather, directed by Francis Ford Coppola.
After Michael is notified of Sonny's murder, he and Apollonia prepare to move to Siracusa, but she is killed by a car bomb meant for Michael, proving the other Mafia families know where he is hiding. Michael returns to the United States in 1950 and assumes Sonny's role as Vito's heir apparent.
's The Godfather starring Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall and more film veterans. Fans of the crime drama are still particularly curious about what happened to Simonetta Stefanelli, the actress who played Michael Corleone's first wife, Apollonia Vitelli, in the film.
Michael has become a true Corleone (embracing both Italian culture and mob affiliation), and his marriage to Apollonia signifies Michael's official acceptance of this change and what it means for his future. When Michael marries Apollonia, he is wedding himself not just to her, but to Sicily and his father's values.
His wife, Apollonia, disappeared from the Corleone family because Fabrizio, Michael's bodyguard, being hired by Barzini, put a car bomb in the vehicle Michael was going to use to move to a different part of Sicily, but his young, new wife decided to drive the bomb-laden car to the door to pick Michael up and was blown ...
The Godfather (5/9) Movie CLIP - Michael Loses Apollonia (1972) HD
Did Michael actually love Apollonia?
The Godfather's Michael Corleone may have loved many things, but his first wife Apollonia wasn't one of them. The pair were wed in Sicily in the mid-stages of the groundbreaking 1972 Francis Ford Coppola film, not long after Michael took refuge there after murdering police captain McCluskey and Virgil Sollozzo.
Did Michael Corleone ever tell Kay about Apollonia?
Despite initially maintaining a loving marriage with Kay, he never informs her, feeling regretful and guilty over his past marriage. In the books, Apollonia is never thought about after her death by Michael, only in the movie "The Godfather iii", does Michael have a flashback about her.
They would have been married for almost a year. She would have been pregnant with his child and would have learned how to drive. Sadly once she was killed, Michael was never the same after that.
In Mark Winegardner's Puzo-estate authorized novels The Godfather Returns and The Godfather's Revenge, Kay's abortion is a miscarriage. She lied and told Michael that it was an abortion, knowing that he would never forgive her for it and would allow her to get a divorce.
An interesting side note is that there is no indication in the novel or the first and second movies that Michael or anyone ever tells Kay that Michael had been married in Sicily let alone how his first wife died.
In the novel, Tessio helps broker the summit shortly after Vito's death. In the film, Tessio approaches Michael at Vito's funeral about setting up the peace summit, Michael already anticipated the plot via his father's warning: whoever approached Michael about the peace summit would be the family traitor.
After her brother's debut concert, the assassin Mosca tries to kill Michael. One bullet grazes Michael's shoulder, but the other accidentally hits Mary in the chest, fatally wounding her. Michael is devastated by Mary's death, and screams in torment while cradling her dead body.
Despite this, the two of them maintained a loving relationship in 40 years of marriage, and Vito never sought a mistress or ever found the need to strike his wife. Carmela diligently managed the household in times of both peace and trouble, knowing the schemes of her sons and the nature of husband's associates.
During his stay in Sicily, Michael married a local girl named Apollonia Vitelli (Simonetta Stefanelli) and, after her death, he returned to America where he married Kay Adams (Diane Keaton). He and Kay went on to have two children, Anthony (Anthony Gounaris, James Gounaris, and Franc D'Ambrosio) and Mary.
His place of birth is listed as Hell's Kitchen, New York. And even though his death comes in the third installment (which was released in 1990), the closing events take place in 1997. This means Michael is 77 years old at the time of his death.
By The Godfather Part II, Kay has decided that Michael is a cold, distant, inattentive husband and father, but only after an attempt is made on his life in the family home does she resolve to rebel against him. At first, Kay's rebellion is silent and private: she aborts the child she is carrying.
lisbethblom said: Al Pacino in 1990: “Michael loved Kay when he met her and he loved her throughout his life and he loves her to this day. He not only loves her but he also admires her.”
Of course Michael had good reasons to lie. The biggest was to protect Kay. What Kay did not know could not hurt her. Because Michael left her out of the Family business, nobody had reason to kidnap her or toture her to extract information.
Kay was more than just business. She was his connection to home, his humanity and his dreams. He had to be a better man with her...and Michael wanted to believe he was a better man.
Enraged, Sonny speeds towards Connie's apartment in Hell's Kitchen ahead of his bodyguards. At the Long Beach Causeway toll plaza, Barzini's men trap Sonny and shoot him to death. During a meeting with the other crime family dons to establish peace, Vito realizes that Barzini masterminded Sonny's murder.
Al Pacino was 31 when he played Michael Corleone in The Godfather, but the character was only 25. In The Godfather Part III, Pacino was 49 while the character, Michael Corleone, was 59 years old.
Immensely talented and powerful, he is undone by tragic flaws: his insatiable desire for vengeance, which creates a web of violence and recrimination that he cannot escape; his illusions of omnipotence, which blind him to the fact that achieving legitimacy is impossible; and his sense of being perpetually at war, which ...
Michael's biggest mistake (IMO) was from the word “GO”: having to avenge the attempt on his father and killing Sollozzo and McCluskey, and consequently take on the family business. That pulled him deeper into the dark side. However this emanated out of love and loyalty to his family.
