The Alto Knights
The Alto Knights
Two of New York City's most notorious organized crime bosses vie for control of the city's streets. Once best friends, petty jealousies and a series of betrayals set them on a deadly collision course.
Alex | Pop Culture Brain reviewedMarch 17, 2025
Are two Robert de Niros better than one?
I saw The Alto Knights
So here's the good and the bad without spoilers
Call your dad, because his new favorite movie is about to drop
The Alto Knights hits theaters Friday
Directed by Barry Levinson - who has made a lot of good movies
And Starring Katherine Narducci, Debra Messing, and De Niro in 2 roles
It tells the true story of how the nationwide crime syndicate known as The Mafia fell in the 1950s
After its two aging dons went head to head
De Niro plays both of those parts and he's pretty good in both roles
one of which is an impressive chameleon act thanks to the makeup and the higher voice he puts on
It's kind of a cool flex for him to take this on at this point in his career
And I'll shout out the congressional hearing scene in the middle of the movie
Which has a lot of compelling dramatic tension and old school scenery chewing
Messing is also a standout, selling a lot of the movie’s comedy with her attitude
Speaking of which, this film was relatively funny in parts. I laughed a couple timesa at the Wise Guy antics
And It seems like Levinson was open to some riffing and unscripted surprises
Which was necessary… because otherwise this movie lacked energy for me
Like these aging dons reflecting back on their careers
Alto Knights felt like an echo of an echo of an echo of the better movies we've seen from these guys in this genre
The script was overly complicated and convoluted
It feigned towards themes of aging, old grudges, and violence versus nonviolence
But because the plot took precedence, the movie ended up thematically hollow
And then Levinson made some kinda baffling editing decisions
He borrowed techniques from documentary filmmaking - for realism’s sake
But instead those choices just created multiple layers of artifice
Basically, there was a lot of wasted potential here
and it's a bummer to see something
That you know could have been great under different circumstances
but then again, De Niro doing two roles isn't something you see every day