Assassins

Assassins is a top notch, big budget thriller that is often over looked when discussing Stallone's filmography. Which is a shame, cause it's one of Sly's better films and his performance as an aging burn out hit-man is quite solid.

Antonio Banderas really steals the show though as the over the top and cocky newcomer who idolizes Stallone's character. Banderas is full of energy and his performance is electric. Miguel Bain is one of Banderas' best roles. An all time great movie villain perhaps.

Many fans forget about Stallone's solid output in the 90's, Cliffhanger is always mentioned but Assassins seems to be forgotten. It's a slick and explosive action thriller from "Lethal Weapon" director Donner. Featuring some great dialog and shoot outs between Stallone and Banderas.

On the negative side, the film is too long. Running over 2 hours, "Assassins" begins to wear out it's welcome. And the love story between Moore and Stallone is too cheesy and unrealistic to be taken seriously.

Like "Daylight" and "Copland", "Assassins" is one of Stallone's most underrated films from the 90's. An over looked gem that deserves to be seen again.

This movie is very entertaining and has appropriate amount of action and suspense. The action sequences are great and the interactions between Stallone and Banderas excellent. If you're a fan of action films, this one is definitely worth a watch.

When I firast watched this film,I enjoyed it thoroughly. Ironically enough in the advent of John Woo (his american popularity and his imitators) as well as Micheal Bay, Tony Scott, and Jerry Brukhiemer, it is rephreshing to see an action movie, a shoot-out action movie, where the emphasis is on efficiency and control rather than chaos. Unlike the John Woo pilosophy of keeping the guns firing non stop even if they hit nothing, Assassins works on the exact opposite theory of every shot has a purpose and a meaning and no shot is taken wildly even to distract (add on to the fact that in most John Woo movies, and especially Michael Bay movies, the guns are super loud, whereas in Assassins, pretty much every shot thats fired is silenced). I beleive there is only one instance in the film where shots are fired wildly wnd wrecklessly, and that is during the apartment scene where Antonio Banderas' character. Micheal Bein, shoots blindly through a wall at Slyvester Stallone's character, Robert Rath. Other than that, there is not really anytype of panic fire or wild bullet spraying (in fact I dont beleive this film even features automatic rifles of any kind). Strangely enough, this allows for events that move extremly quick: example, the first scene featuring the three title characters in the hotel. We see Antonio Banderas, in the blink of an eye alomst, take out 3 guards, walkinto the room they were guarding and then take out the 4 targets in that room in the same amount of time. In a way, it is very similar to the old Samurai films since their action scenes moved in a similar manner with nothingn then all of a sudden a few quick sword strikes and the conflict is over. That being said, this movie would require a certain type of taste in action movies or is a type of movie you have to be "in the mood" to watch.

sidenote: When I first watched this film, I had no idea it featured the would be superstar Antonio Banderas, nor that it was written by the soon to be Matrix creators. In that sense it is almost a fun movie to watch because it kinda answers the question "what did they do before they were famous?" and now you know.

Sylvester Stallone and Antonio Banderas star in this great action-thriller. Sylvester Stallone plays Robert Rath, who is supposed to kill this guy at a funeral, but someone beats him to it. He tracks the man and has a nice little talk with him. The other man is another assassin, Miguel Bain (Antonio Banderas). Rath (who is the best assassin there is) gets another assignment worth two million dollars. Eliminate buyers and return girl and disk and he can retire. Bain wants to beat Rath and complete the task first. What follows is a battle between the two assassins. Sylvester Stallone looks sleepy, at one time they show a close-up of his eyes and Julianne Moore's eyes. You can see the difference so easily. Banderas is alive, which is good. The best performance is probably from Julianne Moore who is the girl they have to get the disk from. Special effects are good, as is the ending climax. Overall, it is thrilling, with a fair amount of action and violence.

Assassins is definately one of the better written action films I've seen, but then again, it was written by the Wachowski Brothers, who also wrote (and directed) the equally well done Matrix.

This film was directed By Richard Donner, who also directed Lethal Weapon 1-4 and Superman, among other films. I felt the characters were all well presented and the story was told well.

Apparently, Brian Hegleand rewrote parts of the script, but I can't imagine what, since the whole script seems so Wachowski. Huh...