Episode 48: The Godfather (1972) (Guest: Steve Koh)

Episode 48: The Godfather (1972) (Guest: Steve Koh)

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Description

Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather (1972) is widely regarded as one of the greatest films of all time. Based on Mario Puzo’s best-selling 1969 novel, The Godfather depicts the rise and legacy of the Corleone family, a fictional Italian-American organized crime family led by Vito Corleone and the transformation of his son Michael from a reluctant outsider to a ruthless mafia boss. The film, which features an ensemble cast of American film icons, including Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duval, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, and John Cazale, explores themes of family, power, and the American Dream. It also provides a window into the relationship between law and culture while offering complex perspectives on the meaning of justice.

Guest: Steve Koh

Steven Koh is Associate Professor of Law and the R. Gordon Butler Scholar in International Law at Boston University School of Law. Steve teaches and writes in the areas of criminal law, constitutional law, and international law. His research has appeared or is forthcoming in leading journals, including New York University Law Review, Duke Law Journal Online, Cornell Law Review, Washington University Law Review, and Boston University Law Review. He is a contributor to Just Security and Lawfare law blogs and is a fellow at the Center for Cultural Sociology at Yale University. Steve also has significant litigation experience both in the United States and internationally, having worked as a Trial Attorney in the Criminal Division of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) in Washington, DC,  Counsel to the Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Counselor for International Affairs (the top international law adviser to former Attorney General Loretta Lynch), and in The Hague, as a Visiting Professional at the International Criminal Court (ICC) and before that as an Associate Legal Officer at the U.N. International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Steve’s current research focuses on the field of cultural sociology, where he brings an interdisciplinary lens to law and culture, including the relationship between formal corrupt legal mechanisms and notions of justice—themes at heart of The Godfather.

Timestamps:

0:00     Introduction

3:08     “I believe in America”

12:27    Business and the personal

14:07    Competing views of law and justice in America

16:57    The legitimate and illegitimate, the sacred and the profane

20:52   Narratives about the mafia

26:59   The consigliere

33:59   Tensions between tradition and modernity

39:37    Ritual

44:41    Performance and power

49:11     Retribution

55:18     The mafia and The Godfather

56:48    Codes of loyalty

102:39   The immigrant experience

Further Reading:

Barber, Nicholas, “The Godfather: Have we misunderstood America's greatest film?”, BBC (Mar. 13, 2022)

Coppola, Francis Ford, The Godfather Notebook (2016)

Denvir, John, “The Slotting Function: How Movies Influence Political Decision,” 28 Vermont L. Rev. 799 (2003-04)

Gambrell, Brian C., “Leave the Representation, Take the Cannoli: The Crime Fraud Exception to the Attorney-Client Privilege and ‘The Godfather,’” 23 South Carolina Lawyer (2011-12)

Papke, David, “Myth and Meaning: Francis Ford Coppola and Popular Response to The Godfather Trilogy,” in Legal Reelism: Movies as Legal Text (John Denvir ed., 1996)

Puzo, Mario, The Godfather (1969)

Seal, Mark, Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli: The Epic Story of the Making of The Godfather (2021)

Publication Date

9-16-2025

Disciplines

Law

Episode 48: The Godfather (1972) (Guest: Steve Koh)

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