Exciting action film.

Richard Donner delivers the goods as usual with Assassins; an entertaining, well-crafted action thriller that cannot be missed by fans of the genre. Naturally Sylvester Stallone is pretty close to his tough guy action hero. He can use a gun stylishly and he can kill in cold blood; however the body count is surprisingly low considering Sly's modest reputation for over-the-top action movies.

Stallone plays professional hitman Robert Rath who is considered the best at his profession. Over many years he has made a big name for himself for his stylish ways of fulfilling contracts assigned to him via electronic communication. Robert is now old and visibly past his prime; he wants out of the business no questions asked. After accepting a final job from his long-time employer, what follows is a manhunt as young hitman Miguel Bain (Banderas) starts hunting Robert with the intent of becoming the number 1 hitman in the world.

I won't spoil anymore for you, because then it just wouldn't be as fun with all the interesting (and surprisingly unpredictable) plot twists that lead to a very intense climax.

Stallone is at his usual standard here; sometimes the subtitles function looks very attractive during some of his dialogue scenes, and sometimes you just can't keep your eyes off the screen while he's carrying a firearm. Truth be told his dialogue isn't as unbearable as it usually is. Contrary to popular belief he puts determination and commitment into one of his roles. He may be type-cast as a typical single-note action hero and it's understandable. Stallone is quite underrated and has produced a bunch of action films that are decent slices of entertainment. One would never expect someone like Antonio Banderas to show up in a film like this. He plays his psychotic hitman role extremely well. Banderas is certainly much better than one would have initially expected. He's very dark, cool and well conceived. Julianne Moore is another surprising addition to the cast. Starring as a hacker, a very game Moore does what she can with a fairly mediocre screenplay.

The directing by Richard Donner is first-rate and high class: especially during the action scenes. This stellar directing is to be expected when one examines other films on Richard Donner's résumé. The man who gave the world the Lethal Weapon series uses his traditional Hollywood style: lots of blood, lots of action, lots of things blowing up.

The film was written in the days preceding The Matrix and hence The Wachowski Brothers hadn't yet made a name for themselves. The two brothers can write a good screenplay. It's filled with intriguing plot twists and exciting concepts for different action scenes. Of course these creative action scenes are given the visual royal treatment.

Overall, I found Assassins to be highly enjoyable and underrated. The film suffered lots of criticism and it still does. I, however, thought that it was a good mix of action and thrills. Granted this action film is long and tedious with a running time of over 2 hours, but the intense climax is worth every minute of the build up. Certainly worth seeing.