I agree -- the Silvio character particularly made it a caricature.
What I really missed was the humor, dark though it was in the TV show. The original premise was absurd--that a mob boss would have panic attacks and go to a therapist. There were frequent surreal episodes like the talking fish on ice in a fish market mocking Tony after Pussy's murder, and then his daughter giving him a battery-powered talking fish novelty placque for Christmas. It was Fellini-esque.
This movie could have used some of that surreal "shorthand" symbolism, since it was supposedly the clairvoyant knowledge of the narrator, Christopher, who was already dead. Instead was very grim and humorless. It cried out for quick, clearly narrated explanations, like a "wham!" camera noise and a still snapshot of young Tony with his pals Artie, Pussy and Silvio as children in their confirmation class, as the voice tells you who they are—then on to the next scene. As it was, you had to try to glean who was who from which boys were using the f-bomb every other word as they walked along the street in profile.
I thought the use of Ray Liotta as a sort of morality guru was interesting. He suspected more than he was saying about Dickie's version of events that killed his father and his goomar.
Great point about the lack of humor. I didn’t laugh at anything in the movie. I get that there were multiple wink-and-nod allusions to events of the TV show that were intended to be funny and/or ironic, but I wasn’t laughing.
You’re absolutely right about the total absence of absurdist humor. I think about an episode that I recently rewatched... the one in which Adriana wants to get into the music industry. Christopher’s behavior at the studio, i.e., beating the musicians to motivate them to cut an album is darkly but absurdly funny. There’s none of that in this movie.
Ultimately, it really does come down to tone. This is the Sopranos’ universe, sure, but it’s that universe as seen in a Scorsese pastiche. It’s like, after 14 years or whatever, they forget their brand. I guess I could forgive that if it really worked... just as different iterations of the Batman franchise have wildly different tones, e.g., ranging from campy and tongue-in-cheek to darkly violent and unapologetically serious. But as a straight-ahead period mob flick à la Goodfellas, it just doesn’t succeed.