Ever since it ended with an ambiguous blackout in 2007, fans of The Sopranos have wondered whether series creator David Chase would have more to say about the New Jersey mob family. The death of the indispensable James Gandolfini in 2013 made the idea of a sequel unthinkable, so Chase has instead opted for a prequel. A high-school-age Tony is played by Gandolfini’s son Michael in a tale explaining how he became the conflicted, troubled mob boss of the HBO hit.
The real protagonist, however, is his “uncle” Dickie Moltisanti (Alessandro Nivola), who becomes young Tony’s surrogate father since his biological one Johnny (Jon Bernthal) is often incarcerated and distant even when home and his mother Livia (Vera Farmiga) is volatile and prone to bouts of depression.
While the film offers the expected glimpses of the machinations within the mob family—including Johnny’s brother “Junior” (Corey Stoll) and Tony’s eventual lieutenants Paulie (Billy Magnussen), Silvio (John Magaro), and Big Pussy (Samson Moeakiola)—the major emphases of the film are Dickie’s relationship with his brutal father Dick (Ray Liotta), beautiful young stepmother Giuseppina (Michela De Riossi), and his alliance-turned-rivalry with Harold McBrayer (Leslie Odom, Jr.)—a high school classmate who is his chief collector in Newark’s black neighborhoods but then decides to establish his own numbers-running operation.
That inevitably leads to violence—some of it quite graphic—and the resultant war between Dickie and Harold is made even more dramatically potent by being set against the Newark race riots of 1967. Periodically the focus shifts from the Moltisantis to the young Tony’s struggle between an inclination to be good and his slide toward the dark side.
The end of the movie suggests that the choice he makes results from his devotion to Dickie, even though the older man was contending with his own demons and had decided to shut the boy out of his life. Chase intends Dickie’s struggle to mirror the older Tony’s, but it is far less compelling, not only because in two hours the writer has less time to dramatize it, but because Nivola is no Gandolfini.
And though some of the other actors—Farmiga and Stoll most notably—manage to add some nuance, most are relegated to doing what are more imitations than performances. Ultimately the movie fails to offer much new insight into what drove the Moltisanti and Soprano families or, more crucially, what made Tony Soprano tick.
Instead, it comes across as a pretty ordinary mob drama with a curiously flat protagonist. Fans of the series will be disappointed, and those unacquainted with The Sopranos will be left wondering what all the fuss was about.
Extras on the Blu-ray include two featurettes—“The Making of Newark” (13 min.) and “Sopranos Family Honor” (6 min.)—and some deleted scenes. A digital code is also included. A strong optional purchase for your library collection, although its relation to the HBO series should draw some patron interest.
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