It may be hard to believe now, but nearly 30 years ago, the famous diner scene in Heat where Robert De Niro quietly faces off against Al Pacino was not received with universal rapture. Some viewers, even some professional film critics, found the low-key staging of the scene—the way that director Michael Mann uses largely over-the-shoulder shots that keep the legendary performers’ faces from appearing in the frame together; the contemplative nature of its shouting-free dialogue—disappointing in its lack of obvious fireworks. It took some years before the scene, and the epic crime film surrounding it, became a more widely acknowledged classic. There’s no chance that anyone will make the same mistake for the scene in the new gangster picture The Alto Knights where the still-legendary De Niro acts opposite himself during a one-on-one sitdown at a candy shop. For that to happen, audiences would have to remember The Alto Knights for longer than twelve hours after they’ve seen it.
A movie filled with so many protracted, lifeless passages that it’s a wonder it wasn’t made for streaming, The Alto Knights seems like it should be a quirkier, scrappier companion piece to The Irishman, Martin Scorsese’s late-career centerpiece for De Niro. Here, the reunions are less monumental, but still promising: De Niro reteams with his occasional director Barry Levinson (Wag The Dog; What Just Happened?) and his occasional screenwriter Nicholas Pileggi (Goodfellas; Casino) for an ambitious dual role. He plays real-life New York gangsters Frank Costello and Vito Genovese, who grew up together in the early 20th century before embarking upon a later-life rivalry that had Genovese ordering a hit on his former friend.
That’s not a spoiler; it happens almost immediately, before the film quickly reveals that Costello survived the attack and will serve as the story’s sometimes-narrator. Not wanting to open a whole can of worms over which one-to-two young actors could share scenes playing corresponding versions of De Niro (and probably unable to afford still-dodgy de-aging technology), the movie limits its furthest flashbacks to wordless black-and-white footage and stills, eventually understood as the equivalent of Costello cycling through old photos on a slide projector. It’s a potentially workable gimmick to get around the fact that De Niro is about a quarter-century older than either character, even with the movie taking place largely in the 1950s, and early on there are some classic old-mafia-guy beats. Levinson and cinematographer Dante Spinotti (who shot, hey, Heat, among others) use shattered glass as a medium for striking images of a wounded Costello, while De Niro gets to affect a less regretful tone when Genovese finds out Costello isn’t dead, and berates shooter Vincent Gigante (Cosmo Jarvis) at great length for his sloppy work.
De Niro’s sputtering rage over the unfinished hit is virtually secondhand, as is another, even funnier scene where Vincent infuriates him by casually dropping a bit of Mormon history that Genovese refuses to believe. But anything that comes across like a deleted scene from Scorsese, as both of these do, provides welcome jolts of laughter to the otherwise dry proceedings. Between the attempt on Costello’s life and an amusing climactic gathering of mobsters from all over the country, The Alto Knights consists largely of exposition that feels like Pileggi’s discarded notes from a more comprehensive project, fueling scenes where elderly mafioso types with little discernible personality hold meetings or attend hearings. Occasionally, someone does get shot. (With so many Old Italian Stereotypes afoot, viewers of a certain age may be surprised that no one ever says “I’m seein’ double here—four De Niros!”)
The conflict is supposed to feel intractable: Genovese is hot-headed and looks more like a Dick Tracy villain, while Costello projects a more avuncular image (his community supposedly doesn’t even know of his mafia connections) and a distaste for drug-dealing. Both men stand at the midpoint of the American Century, which sure feels like it should lead into some kind of insight. But with their childhood bond referred to far more often than it’s ever dramatized, the movie around it remains inert, no matter how much effort De Niro puts in. The movie’s central gimmick also undermines itself; the approaches and looks of Costello and Genovese are distinct enough to tell them apart quickly (it helps that Genovese always wears his old-guy shades), yet by doubling up on De Niro’s familiar gestures in a few scenes, both performances wind up diminished. After the movie’s decent opening stretch, longtime fans may enter a bargaining phase, not even bothering to long for the likes of Heat or The Irishman but merely the cheeseball entertainment of Righteous Kill, which at least supplements its De Niro-Pacino reunion with sides of Carla Gugino, John Leguizamo, and Brian Dennehy. In a sea of juiceless TV actors and Sopranos cast-offs, who is De Niro’s storied second-billed co-star here? Why, none other than Emmy-winning internet nuisance Debra Messing, playing Frank’s supposed spitfire of a wife! Congratulations are in order for her ability to grievously overact without actually raising her voice.
The Alto Knights is a bit classier than the serial-killer junk of Righteous Kill, by which I mean it is quite tedious. Supposedly it was also capable of mustering some enthusiasm from Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav in ways that, say, fellow old-fashioned throwback Juror #2 simply could not accomplish. Zaslav’s preference shouldn’t be held against The Alto Knights, but it is telling that he apparently found Levinson’s telling of this story interesting. Specifically, it tells us either that his taste in movies favors old ideas filtered through the prism of anti-dramatic board meetings where old guys fuss interchangeably, or, perhaps more likely, that he doesn’t bother actually engaging with movies beyond their squinty resemblance to other stuff. This one’s The Irishman for anyone in dire need of new glasses.
Director: Barry Levinson
Writer: Nicholas Pileggi
Starring: Robert De Niro, Debra Messing, Cosmo Jarvis, Kathrine Narducci, Michael Rispoli
Release Date: March 21, 2025