movie review
THE ALTO KNIGHTS
Running time: 123 minutes. Rated R (violence and pervasive language). In theaters.
“From the team that brought you ‘Goodfellas’” is an enticing sell for anybody who loves mafia movies. Or, really, fantastic movies in general.
That’s the shrewd way Warner Bros is reeling in audience members to come see “The Alto Knights,” starring Robert De Niro and written by Nicholas Pileggi, who not only penned “Goodfellas” but also Martin Scorsese’s “Casino.”
But, by the end of this aimless schlep directed by Barry Levinson, those words come to have the same ring as “From the team that brought you Coke — Coke 2.”
The theoretically meaty story of New York mob bosses and friends-turned-rivals Frank Costello and Vito Genovese — both played by De Niro for God knows what reason — is turned into a dense, unfocussed and confusing history lesson that rambles on and on to middling effect.
The plot goes nowhere glacially. Underdeveloped side characters are so far to the side, they’re out of frame.
At least it starts out with a bang. Vito, the former head of the Luciano crime family, puts a hit on Frank, the current one, in 1957. Frank is shot point-blank in the head in his Central Park West building’s lobby — and survives.
I wish he hadn’t. Because then the rest of the tiresome movie is Frank insisting that he’s gonna get out of the business and retire to Italy to please his wife Bobbie (Debra Messing). Then, as our eyes glaze over, he does not get out of business or retire to Italy. He does spend an entire scene talking about his dogs, if that’s what you look for in a gangster flick.
Perhaps trying to match De Niro, Messing overacts. Her eyes are always pried open as if she’s spotted a brontosaurus in “Jurassic Park.”
Firebrand Vito, meanwhile, takes a new wife and conspires behind Frank’s back to reclaim his perch, which is less interesting than it sounds. Frank testifies in the 1950 Kefauver mafia hearings. Also laborious. Welcome to The Plod-father.
A Manhattan mafioso power struggle should drip with drama. People obsess over that lore. Tourists flock to restaurants where wiseguys were offed. But the frenemies’ animosity is poorly explained during a novel’s worth of nostalgic narrations from Frank that the viewer tunes out. It’s too much information.
And actual events — whackings, meals in back booths, parties at the Copa — don’t matter much to what happens next.
You’d think De Niro’s wacko double act would pump some gas into this empty tank. And, look, he pulls off the experiment, even if it pales next to his greatest work. He gives Vito a high-pitched voice and spiky personality, while Frank is De Niro classico.
But the twofer is a purposeless gimmick all the same. At no point do we ever forget the Oscar winner is playing both leads — an insurmountable obstacle to suspending our disbelief. This is not a serious movie.
“Alto Knights” is actually best when it’s funny, particularly in moments with Vito. The oddball is a hoot as he rails about Mormonism and tries to convince the press he’s just a regular Joe Schmo by cooking them Sunday gravy in the burbs. However, the movie’s aim is not to be the next “Analyze This.”
Or “The Irishman.” At just over two hours, it’s relatively short for the genre. Regardless, the experience is endless. A head-scratcher choice that does the pace no favors is to end scenes on slow fades to black — practically sedating the audience.
Perhaps, though, that’s a spot-on move for a film that’s one big slow fade to black.
