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AFTER THE LACKLUSTER box office performance of Judge Dredd, is Stallone losing his muscle tone? Hardly, but in his newest action flick, the 49-year-old superstar pocketed $15 million to play a hitman who's over the hill and a target of his hot young protege (Banderas), the new killer on the block. ''It doesn't take a smart person to know that Stallone and I are totally different people,'' Banderas says, ''and we're totally different people on screen, so it works well.''
While Banderas describes his character as ''cruel and amoral,'' the filmmakers took pains to make Stallone a likable killer. ''He was an assassin in the Cold War, and now all of a sudden there's no place for him,'' says Donner (Lethal Weapon, Maverick), who thinks ''it's brilliant of Sly to play the older man. Hopefully, his audience will accept him like this, and say, 'I remember Rocky, and he's a pretty good actor.'''
On the set, Stallone was happy to play benevolent elder statesman. Julianne Moore (Nine Months), who makes her first foray into action as the surveillance expert who warily teams with him, says, ''He was very helpful. The first time I hurt myself, Sly was there with ice before the medics.''
Indeed, Stallone's kinder, gentler self shows on screen: ''He only kills one person in the entire picture,'' Donner says. ''It's a psychological thriller.'' But fewer murders didn't add up to a smaller budget: In addition to Stallone's take, Donner could reportedly make more than $10 million. ''I'd like whoever said that to be my agent,'' Donner says. ''I am getting a per centage more than I got for my last film [Maverick]. Literally, that's it.'' Still, he doesn't deny that Assassins was an expensive enterprise. ''Nothing keeps the budget down,'' he says. ''We had to pay for [producer] Joel Silver's wardrobe, and that puts it over the top.'' (Oct. 6)
BUZZ: It's placed in Warner Bros.' October ''Stallone slot,'' where 1993's Demolition Man and 1994's The Specialist each made about $60 million, and this film's gotta be better than those two...right?
