In the book, we learn that Brasi was a crazed hitman, so hellbent on loyalty that he once killed a man who worked for the Corleone family because he thought he made them look bad. He also took part in the Olive Oil Wars, where he was in the room with six other hitmen and killed all of them in various bloody ways.
Luca Brasi is Don Vito Corleone's personal enforcer, and the only man Vito himself fears. While slow-witted and brutish, Brasi is fiercely loyal and has a reputation as a savage and remorseless killer.
No one was more loyal to the Corleone Crime Family than the first capo, Clemenza. Among his most iconic scenes was when he had the traitor Paulie executed and when he trained Michael on how to whack Sollozzo and McCluskey. Clemenza was likable because he carried with him all the old school mob tropes.
Luca is a towering figure whose fearsome size and intimidating grimace strikes fear into everyone except Don Corleone. Brasi has a reputation as a brutal killer with an unlimited potential for inflicting savage violence on those who betray or cross the Corleone Family.
Because Vito had become too good at his craft; he had tamed a human lion in Luca when no one else could; and the rest of the underworld had accepted they could never turn Luca. They just never told Vito that.
In reference to Fredo Corleone being the weaker and less intelligent of his brothers, the term "Fredo" has come to refer to a weak member of a group, especially one of a number of siblings in a family, regardless of ethnicity.
Described as the child Italian parents prayed to the saints for, Fredo was the weakest and least intelligent of the Corleone brothers; his own brother, Michael, dismissed him as weak and stupid.
Michael: He Was More Ruthless
He also ordered the killing of the heads of the other five New York crime families on the same day. To top that, he killed his brother Fredo and his brother in law Carlo despite his sister begging him not to do so.
Because Vito had become too good at his craft; he had tamed a human lion in Luca when no one else could; and the rest of the underworld had accepted they could never turn Luca.
Due all the horrendous crimes he has committed, including killing his father and his own son, Luca Brasi is considered one of the most evil and dangerous antagonists of The Godfather franchise, despite his supposed loyalty to Vito Corleone.
Even people who aren't familiar with the film can recognise Marlon Brando's weary, wheezy Mafia boss, Vito Corleone, and his favourite son Michael, played by Al Pacino.
Barzini heads one of New York's Five Families, and is the second most powerful Mafia don in the country after Vito Corleone.
Ultimately, Tessio betrays Michael by helping arrange his assassination at a peace summit with Barzini and Philip Tattaglia. The summit will be held in Tessio's fiefdom in Brooklyn, where Michael will presumably be safe. In return, Tessio was to inherit the Corleone family upon Michael's death.
From the previous scene, we already know that Luca is to prepare the bait, to feign discontent with the Corleone family, and to ultimately test the waters for this newly emerging character, Sollozzo. Luca's loyalty is executed in the form of a betrayal—one that is acted, of course.
Luca Brasi : Don Corleone, I am honored and grateful that you have invited me to your home on the wedding day of your daughter. And may their first child be a masculine child.
Clemenza's strongest attribute to the Corleones was his stubborn loyalty, not his intelligence. Thus, regardless of his complaints about Michael, he would never have betrayed the Corleones. Clemenza was known as a superb judge of talent.
Lenny Montana (born Leonardo Passafaro; March 13, 1926 – May 12, 1992) was an American actor who played the role of feared hitman Luca Brasi in The Godfather.
Paulie has seemingly betrayed Vito—and thus the family—by selling him out. In The Godfather, this kind of betrayal is the worst of all sins. We see the matter discussed, in the Corleone family office, just before the viewer spends time in front of Clemenza's cozy abode.
Connie (who was unaware of her husband's role in Sonny's murder), hysterical after Carlo's death, blames Michael, denouncing him in front of his wife, Kay.
Combat. The Barzini family is the strongest family in the game, and the most difficult for Aldo to defeat.
Orson Welles - Don Vito Corleone, The Godfather (1972)
Marlon Brando was always Francis Ford Coppola's first choice for the role of Don Vito Corleone.
The Godfather's Michael Corleone is the textbook example of a psychopath.
The tragedy for Michael is that he couldn't escape the inevitable doom of succession, despite his prior knowledge. For Michael Corleone, death alone is not a punishment, it only marks the end of his tragedy - an epilogue to a saga.
Around 1925, Vito formally organized the family, with Genco as his consigliere and Peter and Sal as caporegimes. They became the most powerful crime family in New York after defeating Salvatore Maranzano, a friend and ally of the late Fanucci, during the Olive Oil War in the early 1930s.
Of course he was a sociopath. He ran a major crime family, and a well-adjusted person with no mental nor emotional issues wouldn't be able to do that.