National Geographic - The Mafia HD (2005) 4 The Godfathers

THE SOPRANOS WAS FICTION - THIS IS ALL TOO REAL. Discover 1950s home movie footage that reveals mob family life. Encounter interviews with surviving gangsters and join them in visiting locations that still bring a shudder of fear. Witness interviews with the FBI agents who risked their lives to break the mob, examine rare surveillance footage, hear taped conversations that took the Dons down, and more. This is a history of the Mafia that has remained shrouded by its code of honour until now. Features interviews with Bill Bonnano, mobster-son of Joe Bonnano, the longest-serving New York Boss of all time; Henry Hill, mobster who became the subject of the movie Goodfellas ; Joe Pistone, undercover agent best known by his undercover name, Donnie Brasco; gangsters Dominick Montigilio and Frank Culotta; former Mayor of Palermo Leoluca Orlando; Town Councillor of Corleone in Sicily Dino Paternostro. These and more reveal - from firsthand experience - the rituals and structure, the murders and corruption that make up the business end of organised crime and the secret world of THE MAFIA.

Produced & Directed by Charlie Smith ; Produced by Wall to Wall Ltd in association with Five and NDR for National Geographic Channel

Part 4 The Godfathers

Italian magistrate Giovanni Falcone became the symbol of the struggle against the mob and in the US John Gotti flaunted his mob involvement before being jailed. The glory days may have gone but the mafia is far from dead. They were two very different godfathers. John Gotti was “dapper Don”, the streetwise, publicity-loving head of the Gambino family in New York. Toto Riina was the psychopathic head of the Sicilian Mafia. As revealed in this fourth and final episode of The Mafia, between them they would bring the Mafia to crisis point. Gotti blasted his way to power, brazenly murdering his rival, Paul Castellano, during the Manhattan rush hour. He defied the law to come after him. But rising to his challenge proved tough for law enforcers as Gotti beat the rap in thee separate trials by intimidating witnesses and bribing jury members. In Sicily, Mafia don Toto Riina ('the beast') seemed equally untouchable, particularly after dispensing with his determined opponent, magistrate Giovanni Falcone. But a revolution by the people of Palermo, Sicily, tired of Mafia bloodshed, forced the Sicilian mob to change their tactics and retreat into the shadows. Gotti's eventual jailing has weakened the mob's grasp, but for how long, is the question on law enforcement minds.

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