An Italian-American family gathers together during one very hot day in Astoria, Queens.

A successful writer living in Los Angeles, Dito (Robert Downey Jr.) is summoned home to Astoria after a 15-year absence by his mother (Dianne Wiest) when his father (Chazz Palminteri) becomes seriously ill.

His father never forgave Dito for leaving home and thus the two have a very strained relationship. Memories of his youth come flooding back as Dito (played as a teenager by Shia LaBeouf) revisits the old neighborhood, encountering the few childhood friends (the "saints" of the film and memoir's title) who aren't in prison or dead.