This movie is a masterpiece plain and simple. It's supenseful, tragic, complex, dark, and everything else in between. The film is both a prequel and a sequel at the same time, not only developing the characters more, pushing the lore forward, and improving on the first movie, but also making the first movie even better. It is likely the greatest sequel to have ever been produced. I have literally no faults for this movie.

The editing is perfect, seamlessly weaving between two different eras, and effortlessly sucking the viewer into this complex, dark, yet beautiful world. Gordon Willis' cinematography is just as good if not even a little better than the first Godfather film, with it inventing the "flashback look".

The story is tight, yet dense with material, filled with thought provoking and profound themes, engrossing family drama, powerful and relevant social commentary, and extremely fleshed out and memorable characters.

The acting is on par with the first film as well. Al Pacino gives possibly the greatest acting performance in cinematic history. The fact that Pacino in this role can scare me more than 90% of most horror movies I've seen is just absurd to me. Pacino absolutely masters the art of acting with his eyes, and gives easily his greatest performance ever. The rest of the cast is great as well from Diane Keaton to John Cazale to Robert Deniro (who won an oscar for his sublime performance) to Robert Duvall, and others.

This music as well is brilliant. I don't even know what to say about it apart from that. The score that plays during Vito's life is amazing and memorable while the score that plays for Michael is haunting.

This movie is my favorite ever, and for good reason too.