ASSASSINS (1995)
A Film Review Copyright Dragan Antulov 2002
Nobody is perfect and anyone, even the most talented among individuals, can have a bad day. In the history of cinema there are many examples of truly gifted people who produced films way below the expectations. But ASSASSINS, 1995 thriller directed by Richard Donner, is one of those rare cases that defy explanation. It gathered not one but many extraordinary talents - legendary action film producer Joel Silver, screenwriting team of Wachovski brothers and, finally, action genre specialist Richard Donner as director. It is easy to imagine some of them, or even all of them, missing their mark and producing a disappointing title in their filmographies. But ASSASSINS is something special - a film with quality lower even than otherwise pathetic standards of 1990s Hollywood commercial cinema.
Protagonist of this film is Robert Rath (played by Sylvester Stallone), hit man who is at the top of his profession and whose rich and powerful clientele includes even US government. Lately, he became tired and disillusioned with his bloody career and wants to retire. Before this happens, he must take few more assignments and this is time when he is forced to confront bizarre but deadly threat in the form of Miguel Bain (played by Antonio Banderas), young psychopathic Spaniard who wants to kill Rath and thus get his reputation of world's top assassin. Deadly rivalry between two killers is complicated with the appearance of Electra (played by Julianne Moore), computer expert who was supposed to be Rath's last target and who stole a computer disk with priceless data.
Simply counting things that went wrong with ASSASSINS would require a lot of time. Some things are more obvious than other, though. The plot about two competing hit men seems suitable for Tarantinoesque black comedy, yet Wachowski brothers wrote this film as straightforward thriller that was supposed to take its characters and situations quite seriously. Unfortunately, the screenplay takes too many poetic licenses and often insults viewers' intelligence with this preposterous concept. For example, common sense tells us that the best professional killers in the world are those who work in the shadows and are never heard of. Yet Wachowsky brothers describe character of Rath as some kind of international celebrity who has to deal with deranged fans. Then, plot dealing with professional assassins could have dealt with some ethical and psychological issues of this profession. Yet, the characterisation is black-and-white - on one side we have "good" killer who is calm, professional and still has some scruples, while on the other side we have "bad" killer who is his professional and ethical opposite. Script of ASSASSINS also unsuccessfully tries to have some authenticity by using post-Cold War motives, and the use computer technology is even more pathetic.
Another big flaw of ASSASSINS is terrible miscasting, quite worthy of characterisation. Interestingly enough, Stallone, despite his tendency towards wooden performance and despite being totally unconvincing as the hit man with the heart, isn't the worst actor in this film. That title should go to Antonio Banderas, who was probably hired for the role of assassin more because of his "hot" post-DESPERADO status in Hollywood than because of his acting talent. Banderas can indeed play interesting and bizarre characters, but this didn't happen in the case of Miguel Bain. His performance of murderous loon too often sinks to the levels of horrible over-acting, making that character more irritating than fearsome. Finally, there is Julianne Moore who equally unsuccessfully tries to justify completely unnecessary presence of female character. Except, perhaps, by trying to show film authors as environment-friendly by allowing Moore's character to spray fur coats in a scene that seems more suitable for some other film.
Even the action - the reason why most of the viewers could have forgiven flaws in the plot and characterisation - is less than satisfactory. Richard Donner indeed has talent for this sort of films, but its nowhere to be seen in ASSASSINS. Scenes of chases, fights, shootouts are impressive only because of relatively large bodycount, but are in the same time totally implausible, predictable and boring. The final showdown is even worse - in an attempt to find some originality, Donner makes this scene the longest in the film. Yet, this showdown is the least attractive and totally unattractive. But the worst thing about it that, for the most part, it consists of two men waiting for something to happen. This Godot-like situation is edited in such way that it seems as unpleasant and boring for the audience as for the characters. And this experience is such that many viewers could do without. Same as without ASSASSINS in its entirety.
RATING: 1/10 (--)
Review written on August 21st 2002
Dragan Antulov a.k.a. Drax http://film.purger.com - Filmske recenzije na hrvatskom/Movie Reviews in Croatian
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