Frank Costello (Robert De Niro) survives a hit, and while in recovery, decides to step away as the head of the Luciano family and cede control to Albert Anastasia (Michael Rispoli).  Vito Genovese (also Robert De Niro), a longtime friend of Frank’s who had to flee to Italy to wait out charges, does not believe Frank’s intentions to go clean.  His own lofty ambitions mix with his paranoia, igniting a violent gang war that erupts out of New York City and threatens to take down the entire mafia enterprise. 

Barry Levinson directs The Alto Knights for Warner Brothers from a script written by Nicholas Pileggi.  The 123-minute crime drama owes a major debt of style to most immediately Martin Scorsese given De Niro’s involvement with this project and The Irishman (2019) among other Scorsese pictures, but by extension Francis Ford Coppola who helped to write the modern mafia drama style guide and, lest we forget, also cast De Niro as Vito Corleone in The Godfather Part II (1974).  It is a competent piece of imitation, but what sets Levinson’s work apart from any of the dime-a-dozen acolytes who attempted similar feats is that the story which he and Pileggi chose to tell is a thrilling tale of betrayal and faltering loyalties between two friends who have taken off on separate directions and find themselves ideologically opposed.  They actually chose an interesting story and were committed to bringing it to the screen with all the back-room elegance that makes these mafia stories so alluring.

The film hinges on a bit of a gimmick with De Niro’s double casting, a tactic that allows the actor to stretch a bit into, to be reductive, Joe Pesci territory as Vito, while also presenting a rather typical, more level headed mobster role of which he has peppered his expansive resume with.  What is surprising about this, though, is how often Levinson and cinematographer Dante Spinotti capture the two in the same frame.  Sure, these scenes tend to be rather stationary conversations across a table, but it is nice to see a film set and commit to a bit, even if it does serve better as a marketing ploy than a viable filmmaking tactic, especially once one considers De Niro’s age.  Giving him a screen partner may have allowed for some more dynamic action across the runtime, and allowing him to play agianst type as Vito exclusively would still bring the excitement of seeing him color a little outside of the lines. 

Beyond De Niro’s performance, the film shines under Neil Spisak’s production design, who curates that specific brand of ill-gotten, excessive wealth, chronicling the changing tastes across the decades that this story spans.  Bobbie (Debra Messing) and Anna (Kathrine Narducci), Frank and Vito’s respective wives, get the flashier costumes pulled by Jeffrey Kurland, but even the men in their suits each have a style about them, which helps add the necessary visual texture to make these films really work.  Where Knights begins to break the mold from even Scorcese’s own pictures, is in how it delves into the parallel feud between Bobbie and Anna as the rift between Frank and Vito grows wider, and while they do not have much to do over the course of the film to really say they have much narrative agency, it is nice to see that they are fleshed out a bit more than is typical in this genre and they are not just set dressing. 

While we are enraptured by the swirling cigar smoke, clicking whiskey glasses, and starchy white shirts, we stay engaged with the film as The Alto Knights is telling a very compelling story, albeit one that takes a little time before the pieces truly come together.  Pileggi keeps us at arm’s length for much of the first half, but as the pieces begin to fall into place, it becomes clear that Vito will not let Frank step away peacefully. Frank, then, to prove his intent, petitions Joe Barbara (John Dinello) to hold a nationwide gathering of all prominent members of the crime families throughout the country, where he will step down as leader of the Luciano family and turn power over to Vito.  This fateful soirée, better known as the Apalachin meeting, results in over 20 arrests of prominent family leaders and pulls back the curtain on the mob, showing the American people just how vast the criminal network was.  Frank Costello was not at that meeting.  It takes a while before things get moving, but a little over the halfway mark, when Albert confronts the leaders about Vito and his attempted hit on Frank, which opened the film, the dominoes finally begin to fall, and Levinson finds his stride delivering a thrilling conclusion to his film. Rispoli’s scene with the family leaders is a high water mark, not only for the film, but for the narrative as well as it begins to really draw the line in the sand between the various ideals held by these men in a world that is rapidly changing and modernizing away from the old ways and tradition.

The problem with the film is that, especially for the first half, Pileggi’s script is setting an elaborate stage and it is almost all delivered through voiceover from De Niro’s Frank in a strangely yellow lit, often returned to set up of the aging mobster sitting on a park bench as the camera pans from left to right at a slightly raised angle.  It almost seems like Frank is telling his story from heaven with the way that, we can only assume, is supposed to be sunlight, washes out the entire frame; though the camera placement forces the actor to look up towards the lens.  Thankfully, we do not spend too much time here, but there are long sequences of time-setting as black and white photos fade and twirl in and out of frame while lively swing and jazz pumps through the speakers, giving these scenes just enough electricity to keep us involved.  It feels almost documentary-like in how it is presented, and while it is well put together and never not engaging, Pileggi’s script and Levinson’s direction are all too happy to tell instead of show.  Either a reworking of the way the narrative is presented – beyond more traditional casting, either framing it through the lens of the wives or of Albert – or a full and total commitment to putting out a 150-minute or more film would have really benefited this story of true American crime.  

The Alto Knights feels like one of those films that “they just don’t make ‘em like this anymore,” and in part that is true, as the story has been in development hell for close to 50 years before finally receiving its green light.  On one hand, that space was helpful as it was not in such direct marketplace competition with Goodfellas (1990) or Casino (1995), two films which Pileggi penned, but on the other hand, those works have become such modern classics that this entry into the canon never expands beyond feeling like a pale comparison even though they are stemming from the same font.  De Niro has flashes of excitement in his performance, and it is never without something to look at; those heavenly glow scenes excluded, of course. A good mafia story often traces the same arc as a Greek tragedy, and The Alto Knights is no different as it tells its story packed with lots of intrigue and paranoia that clouds these characters’ vision.  It is not as violent as those mob movies from years past, nor is it as sleek and sexy as the crime movies of the present, but Levinson delivers a solid effort and has a commitment to a tangible style that, despite the dual role trickery, pays off tenfold especially considering the dire visual state that so many current releases suffer.  It may not be a masterpiece, but it provides that same comfort of catching up with a solid programmer in the way it gets its hooks in audiences for those two hours and throws a couple of delightful surprises their way.