‘The Alto Knights’ offers a flashy De Niro performance but misses the mark on the powerful storytelling of iconic mob films.
By James Verniere/Boston Movie News
Two De Niros for the price of one, what could go wrong? With a screenplay by New York City mob historian Nicholas Pileggi (“Goodfellas,” “Casino,” “The Irishman”), the incomparable Robert De Niro in a dual role as 1950s gangsters Frank Costello and Vito Genovese, and Barry Levinson (“Bugsy”) as your director, “The Alto Knights” could not go wrong, right? Well, it does, starting with that title. The film is an almost Shakespearean story of fraternal best friends who turn into bitter and even deadly mob rivals and how the organized crime established and run by Italian-American immigrants grew in the 20th century into a coast-to-coast phenomenon and even a global enterprise.
The film chronicles the lives of Costello, aka Francesco Castiglia, and Genovese, both born in Italy and emigrated to the United States in their youth. They and their organization flourish during Prohibition when the government made smuggling booze and running speakeasies a big business. In the aftermath of World War II, Costello wanted to become more legitimate, while Genovese dreamed of using the drug trade to finance even greater fortune and power. Costello’s closest confidante is his longtime, beloved wife, Bobbie (Debra Messing, very good), who is Jewish. Together, they live in a posh Central Park West penthouse apartment. Genovese lives in Manhattan’s Little Italy and is married to the mercurial neighborhood nightclub owner Anna (Kathrine Narducci, “The Irishman”), with whom he has a tempestuous relationship. Genovese’s right-hand man is the shambling, somewhat clownish Vincent Gigante (Milo Jarvis, “Shogun”). Also in the film’s very strong supporting cast are Wallace Langham as Senator Estes Kefauver, Louis Mustillo as Joe Bonanno, and Michael Rispoli as Albert Anastasia, who is cut down in the barbershop at the Park Sheraton Hotel across from Carnegie Hall.
The action begins with a failed 1957 assassination attempt on Costello by Gigante, whose small-caliber round fails to penetrate Costello’s skull, leaving him wounded and bloodied, but alive. The subsequent action, narrated by an elderly Costello, includes the Kefauver Hearings, Genovese’s return to Italy from 1937 to the 1940s, and Costello’s rise, becoming the New York mafia’s “boss of bosses.”
Like Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” (2019), “The Alto Knights” (the title is the name of the social club in Little Italy, where Costello and Genovese were regulars) mixes mob history and American and world politics. The film often relies on flashbacks but lacks clarity and fails to be truly gripping. Most of the younger characters, and their actors, feel overshadowed by the legacy of the “Godfather” films and “Goodfellas.” While Luke Stanton Eddy and Antonio Cipriano play the younger versions of Costello and Genovese, respectively, they don’t have much opportunity to truly develop their characters.
The emphasis is on De Niro as the older Costello and Genovese, and instead of getting two De Niro’s for the price of one. We get a single De Niro, 81, in different make-up and wigs, recycling gestures, voices, mannerisms, and tics that have been better utilized before. Yes, that is a cross-dressing singer-dancer on the small stage in Anna’s club. Why does it take them so long to flee the scene after the bartender is blown apart by gunmen? Much of the action and the dialogue is repetitive.
Director Levinson, also known for “Diner,” (1982) and “Rain Man” (1988), has done good work more recently in “You Don’t Know Jack” (2010), “The Wizard of Lies” (2017) with De Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer and the TV series “Dopesick” (2021). But he falters here. “The Alto Knights” fails to demonstrate the empire-building that led to the creation of organized crime in the United States. The screenplay makes an effort. But I don’t think Levinson’s heart was in it. On several occasions, Costello and Genovese meet, giving De Niro a chance to act opposite himself, a potentially fascinating prospect that also falls flat. Lensing by Dante Spinotti (“The Last of the Mohicans,” “Heat”) emphasizes the silky chiaroscuro of nighttime Manhattan. Scenes of mobsters in suits semi-comically fleeing a few State Troopers on the New York State/Canadian border are another misfire. Uffa!
‘The Alto Knights’
Rating: R for violence and pervasive profanity
Cast: Robert De Niro, Debra Messing, Milo Jarvis
Director: Barry Levinson
Writer: Nicholas Pileggi
Running time: 2 hours
Where to Watch: AMC Boston Common, AMC Causeway, AMC Assembly Row, and other suburban theaters.
Grade: B-
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