Vito Corleone

Vito Corleone is a character in Mario Puzo's novel The Godfather, and in the trilogy of films of Francis Ford Coppola. He is portrayed by Marlon Brando in the first part and by Robert De Niro in the part II.

Vito was born in the small town of Corleone. His father, Antonio Andolini, was murdered by a boss of Sicilian Mafia (Don Ciccio) because he refused to pay tribute to him; Vito was only ten years old. Then, Ciccio's men came to the Andolini's house to take Vito away and to kill him. So Vito's mother took him to see Don Ciccio and begged for forgiveness, but Ciccio refused and his mother sacrificed herself to save his son, who escaped succesful. Vito was also an orphan and he left Sicily to take refuge in America. Unable to speak english ; he was renamed as « Vito Corleone » when he arrived in America because he had a tag on his clothes that mentioned « Vito Andolini from Corleone ».Vito was later adopted by the Abbandando family in New York where he met his best friend: Genco Abbando. Corleone began working at Abbandando's store, but he quickly lost the job because of Don Fanucci, the local mob boss.

Vito started thus to commit petty crime to survive and he commited a murderer: he killed Don Fanucci and took his place in the New York's Mafia. Then he started an olive oil business with his friend Genco Abbandando and he used this firm as a cover for his organized crime sydicate, which amassed a lot of money by illegal operations.At the same time, Vito married and started a family: he had three sons and one daughter.

Even if his business was founded on gambling and murder, Vito Corleone was known as a generous man who respected a strict moral code of loyalty to his friends and, above all, to his family.He tried to spread these values through the New York crime world: he always wanted to avoid murders and wars between rival gangs and he also disapproved of the traffic of hard drugs. At the end of his life, he succeed to make all his businesses legal, and it was a great victory to him.

Don Vito Corleone died of a heart attack when he was playing with his grandson in his garden ; his last words were « Life is so beautiful ».His son Michael, a veteran who has been decorated during World War II succeeded him at the lead of the family, as Vito wished.