I didn't think of becoming popular: Francis Ford Coppola

Francis Ford Coppola, director of highly acclaimed "The Godfather" triology, says he never intended to be a popular Hollywood director.

"I wanted to make small and personal cinema. I never intended to be some important Hollywood director. The success of 'Godfather' put me in a different position " said Coppola while speaking at the HT Leadership Summit at the Taj Palace here Friday.

The trilogy made Coppola popular, but he said he didn't want to make "Godfather 2" and "Godfather 3".

"I never thought that there should be more than one 'Godfather'. I thought I did everything in the first movie. But Paramount (the film's distributor), said 'You have the formula of Coca-Cola and don't want to make Coco-Cola'? I wanted to call the third movie 'The death of Michael Corleon'," he recalled.

In a conversation with Riz Khan, he talked about his path breaking films and creative journey and also saluted Indian filmaker Satyajit Ray, Bollywood and Sanskrit epics as well.

"I love Bollywood films because I come from a family involved in musicals." he said, citing late Bengali cinematic great as an influence.

Coppola, who brought in a wave of new cinema with films like "The Conversation" and "Apocalypse Now", said one should not give up after failures.

"I believe that you achieve reward for something for which you were once fired for. Hence we should explore. Many people liked the opening of 'Patton' (1970) but that got me fired, " he said.

The director and producer has now ventured into the wine and hotel business.

"All the business I have gone into involves story telling. Wine is like music: the more you know about it the more you enjoy," said Coppola.

The acclaimed director emphasised on the value of changing techniques and what could be the future of cinema.

"Cinema is a marriage of writing and acting. Ultimately it is in the choice of the story and how that reaches people. Cinema is about to change dramatically. The audience will be the master of the situation and there won't be Paramount, MGM any more. It will be Netflix and Facebook in the future," he said.