Two film critics, three movies, thirty seconds! Fast reviews for busy people! Watch as me and myself review three movies in less time than it takes to chew a stick of Doublemint gum! Have a look as I race against the clock to tell you about twofold De Niros in “The Alto Knights,” the return of “Snow White” and the dramedy “Bob Trevino Likes It.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I join the Bell Media Radio Network national night time show “Shane Hewitt and the Night Shift” for “Booze & Reviews!” This week I review Robert De Niro’s “Klump” style performance in “The Alto Knights” and open Al Capone’s cocktail vault.
Listen to Shane and I talk about how Michael Fassbender’s 007 audition resulted in Daniel Craig getting the gig HERE!
What cocktail did Al Capone order after a day of mayhem and murder? The answer may surpriuse you. Listen to “Booze & Reviews” and find out!
SYNOPSIS: Set in the 1950s, and based on a true story, “The Alto Knights” stars Robert De Niro in the double role of gangsters Frank Costello and Vito Genovese and their battle to control the streets of New York City.
CAST: Robert De Niro, Debra Messing, Cosmo Jarvis, Kathrine Narducci, and Michael Rispoli. Directed by Barry Levinson.
REVIEW: A story of friendship and betrayal, “The Alto Knights” is the tale of gangsters Vito Genovese and Frank Costello, one a violent hothead, the other a cautious diplomat, both played by Robert De Niro.
Director Barry Levinson keeps De Niro busy, but this isn’t exactly “Nutty Professor II: The Klumps,” which saw Eddie Murphy play five of the Klump family members in the same scene. De Niro is the star X 2 of the show, the fourth wall-breaking narrator, and even appears as the de-aged Costello.
It’s a whole lotta De Niro, which his fans may enjoy, but you can’t help but think he’s breathing new life into two old characters.
His Frank Costello plays like “Casino’s” Sam “Ace” Rothstein with a few years more experience while his Vito Genovese feels like a riff on Joe Pesci “Goodfellas” role. It’s a fun gimmick, but De Niro’s double the fun approach doesn’t add much to the film overall.
De Niro differentiates the two characters with vocal inflections, and Vito usually wears a hat, but other than that and their temperaments, it’s sometimes difficult to keep track of who is who.
Written by Nicholas Pileggi, whose book “Wiseguy” was the basis for “Goodfellas,” it covers familiar ground. According to IMDB, the rivalry between Costello and Genovese, and the resulting busts at the famed The Apalachin mob boss meeting, have been part of no less than 22 other productions.
A deeper dive into their relationship as kids and ultimately, their Cain and Abel conflict—we are mostly told about the past through Costello’s expository narration—may have freshened things up, raised the stakes to and turned “The Alto Knights” into a human drama of power and betrayal rather than a retelling of a shop-worn tale.
“The Alto Knights” is a slick movie, with nice period details, but the shallow look at the relationships of the protagonists and a repetitive, drawn-out script blunts the power of the story.
We all do internet searches everyday but a new film ups the stakes. “Searching” is a high tech missing person’s story.
We first meet dad David (John Cho), mother Pam (Sara Sohn) and daughter Margot (Michelle La) through a cleverly edited montage of their on-line activity. From e-mails and YouTube videos to log-ins and Facebook pages, we learn about their lives including Pam’s cancer diagnosis. The tight family is torn apart by Pam’s illness, with 16-year-old Margot retreating pulling away from her father until one night when she disappears without a trace after a study group meeting. When she fails to answer any of David’s texts he calls the police. Working with Detective Vick (Debra Messing) he sifts through Margot’s online life in a desperate search for clues. The deeper his cyber investigation goes the more twists appear. “I didn’t know my daughter,” he says.
From Google Maps and app controlled surveillance cameras to FaceTime and Instagram, the story is told through a series of browser windows via laptops and iPhones, any device with a screen. It sounds like it will sterile, like an afternoon of web surfing with higher stakes, but director Aneesh Chaganty humanizes the story. Technology tells the tale but the beating heart of the narrative is David’s determination to find his daughter. The film’s style is very specific and very modern but the theme of connection between parents and children is universal.
“Searching” feels like high tech Hitchcock as David uncovers the details of his daughter’s life. The more browsers, the more suspense. Chaganty uses our familiarity with these sites—many of us go to them everyday—to ground the story in reality and underline the alienating quality of social media that fails to fill the hole left by loneliness and grief. Also, who would have thought a Norton antivirus reminder that Pam’s account hasn’t been scanned in 694 days could take on such poignancy?
We’ve seen these screen-shot movies before—2014’s “Unfriended” comes to mind—but none have had the emotional arc of “Searching.” It’s a little too conventional in its climax and conclusion but John Cho’s terrific performance and some genuine thrills elevate the story past its visual gimmick.
