by Vincent Abbatecola, Contributing Writer
From 1999 to 2007, HBO was home to the mafia drama series, The Sopranos. Over the course of six seasons, the show’s creator, David Chase, unfolded this mob epic that told the story of New Jersey crime boss, Tony Soprano (played by the late James Gandolfini), and the trials of balancing his duties to his family and his duties to his associates. What resulted from that was one of the best-acted and most well-written television shows to ever air.
Over the course of the show, there were references to a character who lived before the events of The Sopranos, and that was Dickie Moltisanti, the father of Tony’s cousin Christopher (Michael Imperioli). The way about which Dickie was spoken provided his background with an aura of gangster myth — an individual who other made guys looked up to and tried to emulate.
We’re now given a backstory to this once-unseen character with director Alan Taylor’s prequel film, The Many Saints of Newark. Despite inspired casting and the possible promise for a bigger prequel story later on, the movie doesn’t quite reach the full potential of its premise.
In 1967, Dickie Moltisanti (Alessandro Nivola) is a soldier for the DiMeo crime family, the members of which are caught in the middle of a gang war during the Newark riots. As time goes on and tensions rise, Dickie will also offer guidance to his nephew, Tony Soprano (Michael Gandolfini, son of James), as he starts to become enamored with the mafia lifestyle.
Nivola displays a formidable presence that lives up to the respect that was attached to his name in the Sopranos series. There’s a magnetism about him that draws you into his story, and Nivola makes Dickie’s character one that couldn’t fit any better into the Sopranos universe. Nivola exhibits the father-like affection that Dickie has for Tony, as well as the strong sense of duty that he has for his fellow mobsters, making you more than believe that this is the man who influenced Tony into becoming the mafia kingpin that he would become.
Gandolfini provides an emotional, breakout film performance as a young Tony. Although the teenage version of Tony doesn’t show up until almost an hour in when the movie transitions to the ‘70s, he more than makes up for the delayed appearance with a natural screen presence that would make his father proud. The poignancy of Gandolfini’s work comes from him showing Tony’s drive to find where he fits in the world and the need for his uncle’s admiration and guidance. If there’s a sequel that has a young Tony who’s closer to the center of the story, Gandolfini is more than capable of taking the lead.
As far as the other standouts go among the younger versions of these famous characters, there’s Vera Farmiga as Tony’s mother, Livia, and John Magaro as fellow DiMeo family soldier, Silvio Dante. Farmiga channels the work of Nancy Marchand, who portrayed Livia on the show, and gets many of the film’s laughs as the attention-seeking, woe-is-me Soprano matriarch. Meanwhile, Magaro is perfect in capturing the facial expressions, speech intonations, and body language that we saw in Steven Van Zandt’s portrayal in the series.
The screenplay by David Chase and Lawrence Konner tries to fit an abundance of material into nearly two hours, but it doesn’t always work. Much of the first hour goes back and forth between Dickie’s storyline and that of the racial tensions in Newark. While it’s a neat idea to give a Sopranos story some historical context, it becomes somewhat frustrating when we move away from the DiMeo crime family. Because of this, we don’t get much character development for Dickie until the second half, when the movie starts focusing more on him and his associates. Given how much this movie has to focus on, it would have worked better as a miniseries so that it could have more of the dramatic weight that can be found on the show.
Taylor, who directed nine episodes of the series, does what he can with the material, despite the underwhelming nature of it. He’s able to establish a sense of unity within his ensemble cast once again, while also using the cinematic format to add intensity to the riots and the street shootouts. In the event that there’s a second movie and Taylor comes back to direct with a stronger story, we could have something that’s on par with the top-tier installments of the series.
Although the prospect of The Many Saints of Newark bringing us back to where Tony’s story began was an enticing one, it’ll mostly just make you want to revisit the show.
Grade: B-
You can follow Vincent Abbatecola on Twitter