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While the storytelling intentions behind “The Many Saints of Newark” may be noble, the expectations that the project is expected to meet are a jumble that screams impossibility at every turn. Yes, this film is billed as “A ‘Sopranos’ Story,” which is correct. Set in 1967 and the early 1970s, it is a prequel to the groundbreaking television series, and its primary purpose is to establish the characters that fans of the series are familiar with and, strangely enough, love. In addition, it must be a compelling narrative about family, loyalty, and crime of the Italian-American gangster variety in order to be successful. And beyond that, this film reveals another ambition: to say something meaningful about race relations and Black crime in the context of the explosions of urban violence that shook the nation in the late 1960s, with Newark being one of the most rocked cities in the country.
What we get in the film, which is directed by Alan Taylor and based on a script by “Sopranos” capo David Chase and Lawrence Konner, is two hours of reach that exceeds grasp, a jumble of moments that frequently only alternate between the exasperating and the repellent in nature.
The film opens with an evocative crane shot of a cemetery, which later transforms into a dolly shot; the soundtrack is filled with the voices of the dead on a rainy afternoon in the city. One voice begins to dominate the scene: that of Christopher Moltisanti (whose voice is provided by Michael Imperioli, who also appears in the series), who speaks about his life and how it came to an end. “He choked me to death,” he says emphatically of one of the series’ central characters. According to some, this teases the notion that you will learn why when you get here. At the very least, if you are unfamiliar with the series. If you are familiar with the series, you will understand why. In any case, you are aware that it takes place in a world where “whys” can be provisional, fleeting, and erratic, in part because it is a world filled with psychopaths, not to put too fine a point on it.
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Is psychopathy something that can be passed down through families? It’s impossible to say for certain. Both Dickie Moltisanti, Christopher’s father, and “Hollywood” Dick Moltisanti, Christopher’s uncle, are described as “guys with one or more screws loose;” brash, violent, and impulsive individuals. Dickie’s younger brother, “Hollywood,” arrives on the island of Sicily with a trophy wife who is probably about a third his age and who catches his attention, but he doesn’t make too much of it because he can’t really. Eventually, we’ll be given a glimpse into a portion of the family’s operations, which will include a numbers-running operation aided and abetted by some African-American hustlers, the most notable of whom is Harold, played by Leslie Odom Jr. The all-caps EXPOSITIONAL dialogue was introduced in a dispiriting early example in which a character in an African-American home proclaims, “The numbers are the only way black folks are going to get out of this sinkhole city.” Thank you for the advice.
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With each new season of “The Sopranos,” the show’s expansiveness allowed for more and more authorial detachment and nuance in the performances. Even before the first season was completed, the show’s smarts and refinement had grown. The viewer was given the opportunity to take a step back and truly feel the humanity of characters who persisted despite the horrendous acts that those characters committed on a regular basis. When Tony prepares ice cream sundaes for himself and his friend A.J., it is one of my favorite “Sopranos” scenes. It occurs at the end of the seventh episode, and it is one of my favorite “Sopranos” moments. Beyond the fact that James Gandolfini turns in a masterful performance, there’s a strong sense of affinity and restfulness in this scene that helps the viewer understand that Tony has some laudable values in common with the people around him. For the time being, at least. “Many Saints” is devoid of any of that nonsense. While the film makes an attempt, albeit unsuccessfully, to establish Dickie Moltisanti as a dual character, Alessandro Nivola’s performance in the role never quite gets into the groove necessary to make such an idea meaningful.
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Dickie commits an absolutely heinous act in the first half hour of the film, but he then demonstrates genuine sincerity in his desire to do a “good deed” by bringing an ostracized family member not back into the fold (he’s in prison and not likely to be released), but by providing him with some basic creature comforts instead. This character asks Dickie to bring him a phonograph record by Miles Davis, which he dutifully does. Among the albums are a few that aren’t exactly appropriate (Al Hirt, for example—”trumpet,” as Dickie points out.) Finally, the piece concludes with a mob-movie in-joke that is so ridiculous that you can’t believe the creators thought their piece would be taken seriously after that. (“Hollywood,” as well as the imprisoned character, is played by Ray Liotta in a dual role.”)
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The flabbiness of the film, its unfocused flopping from scene to scene, and its reluctance to provide any individual scene with any dimension beyond its immediate impact, effectively vitiates the entire theme of Dickie’s ostensible mentorship of Tony Soprano, which is essentially a parody of Dickie’s own life story. Michael Gandolfini, who takes on the role of his father, has remarkably expressive eyes and the appropriate demeanor to carry himself. If he is unable to establish a coherent character, it is because he has been denied the opportunity to do so. Similarly, the other A-list actors in this film’s large ensemble cast—Corey Stoll, Vera Farmiga, and Jon Bernthal, to name a few—find themselves in a situation akin to Hobson’s Choice when it comes to their performances. Do they communicate with the actors who portray them in the series set in the future, do they imprint their own personalities on the characters, do they do both, and are they able to do both? In the end, it doesn’t really matter. It’s as though the movie has slowed to a crawl and come to an unimpressive halt after gallons of blood have been spilled (the depictions of violence are sometimes upsetting, sometimes cartoonish, but they’re always more than enough) like a car that’s run over a guard rail and crashed into some grassy knoll.
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