Rodrigo Amaro Produced by Francis Ford Coppola and starring Michael Madsen, Chris Penn, Jeremy Davies, Virginia Madsen, Tom Sizemore, Mary Stuart Masterson, Hal Holbrook, Luke Perry, James Belushi, Burt Young, without a strong name writing or directing it, "The Florentine" was one of those good reunions of great people from Hollywood that resulted in one of the saddest films ever made, and sad in a bad way. Here's a film that wasted a little the potential of talented actors that didn't get a clue of what they were doing when they entered into this small work.With not much of a purpose on sight, "The Florentine", of the title is a bar owned by Michael Madsen's character, a place where most of the characters will spend some good time in between their personal dramas before the great event in town, the wedding of Madsen's sister. Other event on course is the return of her first love, who abandoned her on the wedding day. Until we get to the party, there's the characters dilemmas about love, money, deceits, respect, meaning of life and etc, slow speeches that don't evolve to anything interesting and worth seeing. There's good moments like the ones involving Jeremy Davies trying to impress a beautiful waitress that doesn't want anything with him or Sizemore dealing with two crooks that robbed the naive Perry, who joined on a business enterprise that was a complete scam. The dialogs are uninteresting, most of the characters are real losers that don't have a thing to say except arguing about not having any money, but in the end everybody gets happy because they have the opportunity of being known as the common people, and common people all get together at The Florentine. No wonder why a project with such a good cast is so below the radar and is very likely that Mr. Coppola didn't get his invested money back with this thing, and to think that he directed 11 films (between 1983 and 1997) just to pay the high costs of "One From the Heart", a box-office failure but an excellent picture better than "The Florentine". I wonder how many he had to produce just to pay for this one. 5/10

dlafarm This movie seemed quite realistic - the actors do a superb job of creating their characters and that's what moves the movie! The scenes seem authentic to me, even though it is outside my own realm of experience. I just happened to notice the title and am glad I stopped to watch. I felt empathy with the bride and wanted a "happy ending" for her. There are some very well known actors there (including two from Saving Private Ryan), and I don't know why this movie isn't being shown on the other movie channels. It would give more people the chance to watch it. Well worth the time. Perhaps a different title would have induced more to view it.

perp This film is a sensitive depiction of the excitment and drama in the every day lives of people who are familiar to us all. Caught in a place where just scratching out an existance takes all the energy of a group of people who life has forced to use any means available to just get by. The siuations, characters, their relationships and dialogue bring us into a close understanding of life lived with little more than the basics. If you want to see a picture, (more a snapshot), about basic truths that we all share, this is it.

MJive I was very anxious to see this movie since it was filmed where I live, in the Lehigh Valley. It took a long time since it was filmed--about two years ago--to be released. And I must say I'm very happy with it. Great cast and it was a pretty involving story. The Florentine is mostly composed of short scenes between different pairs of actors, and it moves along at a pretty even pace, though it is perhaps a bit slow at times. Overall, I'd rate it a 7 out of 10.