I've just watched this movie and found it thoroughly absorbing. One ofGeorge's best roles. It may not appeal to those with the attention spanof a flea but for those of us who can watch a movie without someonegetting their brains blown out every 30 seconds it was very satisfying.This was a film with European sensibilities and for those of you whowatch nothing but Hollywood blockbusters I'm sure it was adisappointment.

Clooney is the only actor in the movie recognizable to Americanaudiences. The rest are Italian or Swedish but the other performancesare flawless. George is in 99% of the shots and we see everything closeup including his backside. The acting is toned down from the usualHollywood schlock and much the better for it.

At the end of the day this film, which is advertised as a thriller, isactually a love story and I'm sure that the low rating reflectsaudiences disappointment that George gets distracted by love as themovie reaches its climax.

I am not a gun buff, but I know enough off the top of my head to feelcheated by the cheesy writing in this film. You don't measure the speedof a bullet in "miles per hour," and if the main character, who issupposed to be an expert at building improvised weapons, salvages allof his parts in a mechanic's garage to build a suppressor, then atleast go to some effort to make the final product look different from astock suppressor ordered from Gunsamerica.com.

In today's age when writers have access to the Internet and can pull upChuck Hawk's Trajectory charts at the push of a button with a fewkeywords, then there is really no excuse for amateurish loose ends.

Oh, and another thing: it's a little more forgivable that the maincharacter is shooting 380 caliber bullets which make all of hisopponents drop instantly upon impact, but even that is fairly cheesy.This is a not a James Bond flick, after all. He should have at leastbeen shooting a 9mm, instead of that very stylish but veryunderwhelming Walther PPK. In real life, that pea shooter would justenrage an assassin, unless all three shots were to the head or theheart (an object roughly the size of a man's fist) and the chances ofshooting with that sort of accuracy at the range depicted in thebeginning of the film is nigh impossible. Granted, three shots from a380 will eventually kill a man, but very rarely instantly, especiallyat that range, and not when his adrenaline is pumping.

some people may find this film slow.granted,it's not action packed.butit's not intended to be.i think it's more of a character study thananything else.George Clooney plays an assassin who agrees to one lastjob,and then wants out of the business for good.the film deals with hisinternal conflict,and shows what a lonely sad existence the characterhas.it's a bleak existence,to be sure.the pacing is very deliberate,butthe film isn't what i would call boring.it is well acted and welldirected.the tone of the movie matches the existence of the maincharacter.if you don't have a lot of patience,this movie is not foryou.otherwise,id say,give it a try.for me,The American is a 6/10

This is a Slow moving film (with a capital S) so I expected goodcharacter development, good dialogue and good acting. I wasdisappointed on all counts.

This film is neither arty nor intellectual, merely an attempt at bothwhich fails.

I can understand why reviews are split on this one. The slow pace ofthe film is so different to the normal Hollywood offerings we get thatyou think (at first) that you have discovered a gem, but theneverything begins to fall apart.

There is no real definition to Clooney's character. He is brooding andisolated but we never find out about his past, so we have no real ideahow he ended up in a small Italian village on his own. He playsbrooding well, not once do you see the usual Clooney eye sparkle, buthere's the thing - it is tedious watching a character display the sameemotion for an hour and a half.

A large amount of the film centres on Clooney making a gun for anotherassassin, but it feels like this is just filling up the running time,clocking up more and more minutes. The assassin who requires the gun isinsipid. You get no feeling at all as to the type of person she is. Shehas just stumbled onto set and asked Clooney to make a gun for her.

He falls in love after sleeping with Placido a couple of times andhaving a couple of dates with her. There isn't much dialogue in thefilm but the dialogue between these 2 characters is so insignificantthat you can not believe in any way, shape or form that they have trulyfallen in love.

Then there's a priest who Clooney talks to from time to time. Aha youthink, Clooney will open up to him and we will get an idea of the depthof his character. Well no, Clooney says nothing of significance to him.

The attempt on Clooney's life halfway through the film was just odd. Itwas all over in minutes and there was no drama and even worse, no realexplanation for it, leaving the viewer with the feeling that it wasjust thrown in there.

The ending was so obvious that I am not even going to waste my timecommenting on it.

In summary - none of the characters are sufficiently developed toelicit any emotion from the viewer. You don't particularly feel anyempathy, sympathy love or hate. The plot has been poorly thought out tosay the least and you end up feeling sorely disappointed at the wholething.

Well... making bad movies. I guess Clooney staring in the distance withhis dog eyes worked for Elisabetta Canalis, but it doesn't help to savethis poor movie.

Here's the story - they must have considered the audience stupid enoughto not bother about plot holes the size of Italy and several totallyimplausible events.

First 2 hit men ("Swedes") try to kill Clooney while walking over afrozen lake. Instead of taking an easy shot on George walking over anice field, the sniper waits till Clooney's girlfriend sees the sniper'sfootprints, then misses and stands up, waiting to be shot. The otherhit-man is killed too by Clooney somehow "throwing" bullets with hispistol (Am I the only one who noticed this? I'm not sure if he doesthis to increase bullet velocity or to reduce accuracy, but it'ssomehow strange for a "professional" shooter). Clooney decidesimmediately to kill his girlfriend too, although he is convinced shehas nothing to do with it. Makes perfect sense.

Then Clooney moves to Italy and contacts his employer. This one giveshim a mobile and sends him to a remote village. George doesn't trustit, throws away the mobile and goes to another village, then contactshis employer to give away where he is. Right.

"The Swedes" arrive in Italy and find out where he is. No, really?Although they are blond, 2 meters tall and probably don't understand aword of Italian, they take their time to shadow George over severaldays so that he notices them too but it somehow doesn't seem to botherhim. When "the Swede" (I guess they're the new Mafia now) finallydecides to shoot him, he misses (they're not very good shooters either)and gets killed be being half dragged out of his car by George. Whooah!

Then George meets a colleague killer (the way he meets her and talkswith her will be a a joke for many years to come), who asks him tobuild "a gun with the accuracy of a rifle and the firing rate of amachine gun and fits in a briefcase". Instead of choosing one of 500+possible of-the-shelf guns that fit this description, handyman Georgestarts modifying a very standard M14 with a retractable stock and asuppressor built from a car exhaust pipe and puts it in a Samsonitecase that looks like it will break her back when she lifts it. I guessit makes sense if you have no clue about guns at all.

The colleague killer meets him a couple of times at some remote places,but only tries to kill him during a procession with 200+ bystanders.Unfortunately for her, George isn't as stupid as you would think after90 minutes of this movie, and had previously altered the gun so thatthe SCOPE would backfire when she pulls the trigger. Hell, yeah!

For no apparent reason, George also meets a priest and a prostitute,but their roles are totally irrelevant for the story (maybe themarketing guys rating this movie so high can help us out here, was thismeant to be symbolic?) but as far as I'm concerned, both could just aswell have been left out.

So, in the end everyone is dead except the priest and the prostituteand I'm perfectly OK with that.

Let's hope they won't make a remake from this... American's 12? TheItalian? ...

Stick to the coffee, George!