Is Sylvester Stallone’s ‘Assassins’ Really That Bad?

Time is a film’s greatest critic, whether its praise leads to longevity or is just the flavor of the week. When you think of the greatest movies of 1980, does the Oscar Award winner for Best Picture, Robert Redford’s Ordinary People, come to mind? Or does Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining? On the other hand, some movies age like fine wine, with cult classics living on despite flopping at the box office with years of adoration from fans carrying them into infamy.

The Sylvester Stallone and Antonio Banderas-led 1995 action thriller Assassins is not quite as exemplary as the above samples, nor has it found a notable cult following to help keep it relevant for a new audience. Yet, the opinion on the feature has certainly changed with time due to several factors, with its critical panning feeling misguided when viewed in a modern context. We will examine why Assassins fell flat, its newfound appreciation 30 years later, and whether you should check it out yourself.

‘Assassins’ Pits Sylvester Stallone and Antonio Banderas Against Each Other

Robert Rath (Sylvester Stallone) is a professional hitman looking to retire. He has grown jaded by the business and realizes he is expendable. During one of his jobs, he comes across a fellow assassin, Miguel Bain (Antonio Banderas), who steals one of his contracts. Miguel admires Rath but wants to kill him to prove he is the most accomplished assassin by dethroning the best. Rath sees a big payday as a way out of the business and is contracted to kill computer hacker Electra (Julianne Moore) and steal a computer disk. Yet when Miguel goes after the same target, Rath rescues the hacker. The duo forms an unlikely alliance to try to beat Miguel and the men who hired him.

While the ’90s was a bit of a mixed bag for Sylvester Stallone, with Judge Dredd and Demolition Man coming before his appearance in Assassins, the chiseled action star was still a large name draw. Comparatively, Antonio Banderas was at the arguable high point of his career, having just come off of Desperado, which was released the same year. Julianne Moore, who rounded out the cast, co-starred in the stand-out crime thriller The Fugitive two years earlier. For the time, Assassins boasted a star-studded cast of actors who were very much on many cinemagoers’ minds.

The crew behind the scenes was equally impressive. Director Richard Donner was coming off of the well-received western Maverick (1994) starring Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster. Donner rose to fame working with Gibson, acting as the director of Lethal Weapon one to four. While new to the industry, the feature boasted writing credits from future superstars Lily and Lana Wachowski. All the cast and crew should have been a formula for success among critics and a major box office hit, but neither would be the case.

Critics Were Not Too Kind to ‘Assassins’

On Rotten Tomatoes, Assassins currently sits at 16% with 50 critic ratings. Hal Hinson, in his review in 1995 for the Washington Post, would describe the film as “(Assassins) is an example of the most expedient sort of big-budget Hollywood filmmaking—noisy, shallow and glibly violent.” and would go on to add, “As a thriller, the film is both simple and improbable.” Later on in his review, he noted that, if anything, the movie acted as a highlight for Banderas as an action star. Much of the hostile critical reception of the production shared similar sentiments, though another prevailing critique came with the pacing; many stated the film was ‘boring.’

Assassins was not a flop at the box office, but its performance was disappointing despite initially landing in the number two spot behind David Fincher’s phenomenal work on Seven. The movie would gross $83.3 million worldwide off a budget of $50 million. Considering marketing and other expenses to get movies into theaters, the production would have been lucky to break even; thankfully, it was released in the time of VHS, and rentals and purchases likely made the movie profitable with time.

Despite its critical panning and lukewarm box office run, the online opinion of Assassins has become more favorable. While on Rotten Tomatoes, the Popcornmeter is still underwhelming, sitting at 45%, the movie scores 6.3/10 on IMDB and 2.9 on Letterboxd. While neither of these scores is overly impressive, it shows the opinion of the film has changed over time to be much more favorable than critics gave to it on release.

30 Years Later ‘Assassins’ Deserves Another Shot

As the Washington Post pointed out, Assassins offers Antonio Banderas at his best. Yet, Stallone is no slouch here either, and many of his fans who have rediscovered Assassins consider it a hidden gem within his career. The initial complaints of a shaky plot are a fair assessment. Still, it was understated how well the production blends elements of psychological thriller and action with a fair amount of comedic wit. The action sequences are also well executed, and Richard Donner brings a flair to the action from his previous experience in the Lethal Weapon films and the movie offers insight into the early career of the Wachowski sisters.

Is Assassins perfect? Far from it, but it is an interesting mash-up of genres backed by strong performances that make it a movie worth checking out. The critical panning on release was grounded in some valid critiques. Still, critics underestimated the broader appeal, and time has given the movie a nostalgic edge for many ’90s action fans. You can watch it for yourself; Assassins is available to rent on Amazon Prime, Apple TV, or YouTube.