Al Pacino and Simonetta Stefanelli’s Sicily arc in The Godfather (1972)—Michael in exile, struck by Apollonia’s beauty in a classic “thunderbolt” moment, leading to a doomed marriage that hardens him into the family heir. Stefanelli, just 16 and scouted from Italy for her striking looks, summed up her role: “I met him, I married him, I died.” Pacino nearly got fired a week in—studio execs thought he was too short, too subdued, “not cutting it” as Michael, pushing for stars like Warren Beatty or