{"id":11508,"date":"2025-03-22T19:05:32","date_gmt":"2025-03-22T23:05:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=11508"},"modified":"2025-04-23T00:52:14","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T04:52:14","slug":"the-alto-knights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2025\/03\/22\/the-alto-knights\/","title":{"rendered":"The Alto Knights"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Alto Knights<\/strong> (2025)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 123 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence and pervasive language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Barry Levinson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Nicholas Pileggi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: David Fleming\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Dante Spinotti\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: March 21, 2025 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Robert De Niro, Debra Messing, Cosmo Jarvis, Kathrine Narducci, Michael Rispoli, Ed Amatrudo, James Ciccone, Wallace Langham, Matt Servitto, Louis Mustillo.<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *<\/p>\n

\u00a0I knew something was wrong when I noticed that Warner wasn\u2019t doing much to promote their gangster drama The Alto Knights<\/strong>. By all appearances, it looked like they had a winner on their hands. It\u2019s directed by Barry Levinson (Bugsy), written by Nicholas Pileggi (Goodfellas) and stars Robert De Niro (Goodfellas). Despite this strong pedigree, I saw very little in the way of marketing. The fact that the studio opted to open it in March instead of giving it a more prestigious fall release confirms it further. The Alto Knights<\/strong> is a complete misfire.<\/p>\n

\u00a0You get twice the De Niro in The Alto Knights<\/strong>. The actor does double duty playing two roles, feuding mob bosses Vito Genovese and Frank Costello. That\u2019s the film\u2019s biggest misstep. De Niro is one of the finest actors of our generation. He spreads himself too thin here taking on two distinctly different personas. He does a fine job as Costello, the more rational of the two, the one who always keeps a cool head even when the world immediately around him spins out of control. He maintains a firm grasp on a role he\u2019s played several times in his career. He\u2019s less assured as the volatile Genovese, the rogue mobster prone to acts of great violence in defiance of his bosses. This is a role more suited to Joe Pesci. He has the manic spiritedness De Niro lacks. This bit of miscasting weakens The Alto Knights <\/strong>considerably.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Costello, acting as narrator, takes us through the events that ultimately led to the infamous Apalachin Meeting of 1957 that led to the arrests and indictments of over 60 major organized crime figures. It, and the movie, starts with the attempted assassination of Costello in a hotel elevator by Vincent Gigante (Jarvis, Shogun) acting on Genovese\u2019s orders. He survives and decides it\u2019s time to retire from a business from which there is no easy exit. The threat of another attempt on his life looms over Costello like a dark storm cloud.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Most of The Alto Knights<\/strong> is told in flashbacks. It\u2019s explained to us that Costello and Genovese were boyhood friends, Italian immigrants from the same New York neighborhood. They both got into the crime business as bootleggers during Prohibition. From there, Costello became a self-described \u201cprofessional gambler\u201d and political kingmaker while Genovese engaged in activities more commonly associated with gangsters.<\/p>\n

\u00a0When Genovese flees to Italy to avoid murder charges, he leaves Costello in charge. Things are peaceful until Genovese returns to the US after the war. He wants his old job back. Bodies start dropping all over the place and lawmakers start asking questions, Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver (Langham, CSI) most notably. Mob historians will remember that Costello\u2019s face wasn\u2019t shown during his televised testimony in front of the Committee. Levinson botches the scene by repeatedly returning to Genovese watching with his cronies at the Alto Knights Social Club, yelling at him to take the Fifth like everybody else called to testify under subpoena. The Alto Knights<\/strong> borders on farce whenever Genovese is on screen. It diminishes whatever heft the film might have had if done right.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Levinson is a classic fall from grace story. The once-great filmmaker whose filmography includes first-rate titles like Diner (1982), Tin Men (1987), Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Rain Man (1988) and Bugsy (1991) never completely recovered from the flop that was Toys (1992). He\u2019s hasn\u2019t made a decent picture in 25 years, since 1999\u2019s underappreciated Liberty Heights. The Alto Knights<\/strong> does nothing to reverse his fortune. It\u2019s a confused mess that merely lists bullet points rather than explores the major events of this tumultuous time in the history of organized crime. It\u2019s more like a lecture by a disinterested speaker. It certainly doesn\u2019t help that Pileggi\u2019s script is a jumbled mess. There doesn\u2019t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I guess you could say De Niro gives half a decent performance in The Alto Knights<\/strong> and even that\u2019s only half-decent. Like I said, he\u2019s played the role of level-headed gangster more than once, mostly for Martin Scorsese. As Frank Costello, he delivers a mannered performance. He wears the part like a suit that\u2019s worn but still fits. I wouldn\u2019t go so far as to say he phones it in, but he\u2019s definitely flying on autopilot. His other performance is less than stellar. It\u2019s little more than a makeup job and a bad impression of Pesci. Quite frankly, I can\u2019t believe he went for such gimmicky casting. Maybe he saw it as challenging? I see it as a cheap gimmick that lessens the film\u2019s credibility.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Levinson doesn\u2019t do his actresses any favors with what little development he affords their thinly written characters. Messing (Will & Grace) is miscast as Costello\u2019s wife renamed \u201cBobbie\u201d for the movie. She does little more than act the part of the Jewish wife worried for her husband\u2019s safety. She has none of the spark that Lorraine Bracco brought to her mob wife character in Goodfellas. Narducci (The Irishman) is livelier as Genovese\u2019s wife Anna, a lesbian nightclub owner who tries to take him to the cleaners in divorce court. By livelier, I mean she overacts to the point of parody. She makes Sharon Stone in Casino look even better.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Alto Knights<\/strong> tries for the gravitas of The Godfather, the raw energy of Goodfellas and the melancholy of The Irishman only to fail at every one. Instead, it\u2019s slow, plodding and dull. The score by David Fleming is more distracting than anything else. It plays under scenes that don\u2019t need it. Levinson tries without success to copy Scorsese with needle drops of era-appropriate pop songs like \u201cYou Belong to Me\u201d and \u201cTutti Frutti\u201d. It does nothing to propel the action. The film remains at a standstill throughout. In the end, The Alto Knights<\/strong> does nothing but fire blanks.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Alto Knights (2025)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 123 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence and pervasive language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Barry Levinson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Nicholas Pileggi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: David Fleming\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Dante Spinotti\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: March 21, 2025 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Robert De Niro, Debra Messing, Cosmo Jarvis, Kathrine Narducci, Michael Rispoli, Ed Amatrudo, James Ciccone, Wallace Langham, Matt Servitto, Louis Mustillo. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11518,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dramas"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/The-Alto-Knights-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11508"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11508\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11519,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11508\/revisions\/11519"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}