In 1995, Michael Man's "heat" Traffic in Cinefiles for centuries: Legendary actors Robert de Niro and Al Pacino will share the screen in an epic crime thriller. Now, in 2025, we have a new crime thriller that Robert de Niro has to come face to face with ... Robert de Niro. This is not such a bad idea: Despite a series of suspicious roles in the last half of his long, valued career, De Niro remains one of our best actors, and he has turned into some recent shows - specifically his work in two Martin Scorsese films, "The Irishman" And "Killers of the Flower Moon" - It proves that he still got it.

With Barry Levinson's "Alto Knights", De Niro drags double duty, playing two gangsters in real life, who grew up as friends before becoming bitter enemies. There is plenty of room for potential fun for mobile phones, and yet Levinson's film is so lifeless that it cannot climb to this occasion. De Niro, who is buried in an unconvincing makeup that makes it look like a Guav villain from Warren Bitty's "SEC Tracy", He is trying to try to do something of his double roles, but the approach to make two different characters playing is never over what is more than a trick. What could have been an interesting experiment ends to feel like distracting.

Mafia and gangsters have been with us since the dawn of the film, and a common criticism against these pieces of pop -is that they celebrate the criminal lifestyle (this is a common indictment in a few of Scorsese's films, which also take place). So I will say one thing about "Alto Knight": Here's a movie about mobile phones that makes Mob Life look absolutely Bored. There is no glory here - there is a Numerous Scenes where one of De Niro's characters is just hanging out in his living room watching TV instead of collecting a gun. According to Alto Knights, being in the Mafia is just as exciting as the lazy week afternoon.

As "Alto Knights" begins, it is 1957, and Frank Costello (De Niro) was shot dead by an armed lobby of his residential building. Frank survives only minor injuries, and he immediately knows who ordered the hit attempt: his old friend Vito Genovese (also De Niro). Through retrospectives, accompanied by Frank's storytelling, we learn that Frank and Vito went out into the crowd together. Vito eventually rose to the ranks to become the boss, but eventually had to escape to Italy to win a murder sheath. Before leaving Vito, he left Frank in charge.

A few years after living in exile, Vito returns and wants his empire to return. Frank encourages caution and patience, and thereby begins to form a dispute between these two former friends. Men are complete opposites: Frank is a quiet, boring kind of boy who anonymously goes for his criminal activities - as anyone who knows his history of the crowd, FBI director Edgar Hoover, has spent years in claiming that the Mafia did not even exist. In the outside world, Frank is a simple businessman and a "professional gambler".

Vito, in sharp contrast, is a bulb. He is glittered and violent, prone to knit people to death without hesitation. Vito himself even recognizes the differences between the two: he says Frank is a "reasonable" one of the couple. Ostromas differences between the two characters give De Niro a lot to work with: he plays Frank as a quiet, almost asleep and portrays him as a vulgar and bad pace (he also raises the pitch of his voice when he plays to differentiate the two).

As a longtime fan of De NiroI will admit that I was hoping for some kind of magic here. As I said above, I think De Niro still has the goods - when it works with the right material. Unfortunately, "Alto Knights" is not the right material, although there are some talented people working in front of the camera. In addition to De Niro, a piece of "Sopranos" casts appear, while the film's script is greeted by Nicholas Choggi, the crime writer who wrote the book that inspired Goodfellas.

Maybe the weak point is Levinson. The film director had previously joined the genre of the movie "MOB" - he used the unforgettable "Bugsi" - but Levinson is too reserved, too muted for this kind of things. It may be too obvious, but you can't think that if Scorsese is united with chickens and De Niro for this film, it may have been something special.

And while De Niro is trying to get the best, trick double casting is constantly distracting. Despite their differences in personality, there is never a moment when we buy that these are two different guys. The make -up of the face and voice are changing aside, it is always obvious that we see De Niro sitting in a stand in a restaurant with De Niro.

Occasionally there are views of something more interestingly scattered through the Alto Knights. At one point, Vito begins with the romanting of Anna (Catherine Narducci), a woman working with a lesbian nightclub. The two are getting married, and Vito soon starts stealing money from the Anna club, and she takes it to court - pouring a wealth of mafia information in the process. In the truth, I would rather watch a whole movie about that: Owner of a lesbian nightclub that surpassed the mafia in the divorce court. It sounds like an interesting story that has not been told on the screen before. And yet, "Alto Knights" conveys this as a fast, fun anecdote that is almost immediately forgotten to return to bad blood between Frank and Vito.

There is also a thrown line where Vito implies that he and Frank began to grow after Frank married his wife Bobby (Debra Messing). Indeed, the film makes an unusual point to show us that Frank would rather hang out in his living room watching TV with his wife and both dogs instead of spending time in the club with the boys. Romance that comes between the browns of both mafia Also It sounds like a neat movie idea, but again, "Alto Knights" treats this information as short, ordinary fodder and then goes on.

I suppose there is something comfortable and cozy about "Alto Knights"-that's the type of sleeping father of a father who can easily be seen from the worn-out armchair through semi-closed eyelids in the afternoon. The type of film that your father attracts and then says "Good" after asking how it was. In other words, there is nothing offensive badly about "Alto Knights" ... but you want to have, because at least it may have done the movie more interesting.

/Movie rating: 5 out of 10

"Alto Knights" opens in theaters on March 21, 2025.