Jay Killion had been the presidential bodyguard, but for the inauguration of the recently elected president, he is assigned to the first lady, Lara Royce. Lara, an arrogant feminist, initially hates the methodical and by the book Killion, and so she does all she can to avoid him and disregard his safety procedures. The situation becomes complicated when repeated attempts are made on Lara's life. Eventually Lara decides to trust Killion's instincts and precautionary methods, and the pair embark on a difficult and often perilous cross-country journey, with the assassins close on their heels.......Ah The Cannon group, the epitome of eighties production companies. Their movie are like cheese on toast, really good throwaway comfort, but too much can be very bad for you, so one every now and again is a must, especially when there go to guy Bronson is involved.This is one of his more poorer efforts though, not quite reaching Messenger Of Death risibility, but nowhere near as over the top as Kinjite, or Murphys Law, this film would have definitely benefited from being R-rated, and a little more action packed.So the film consists mostly of Jill Ireland making Bronsons life a misery (life imitating art?), by calling him names, running away from him every chance she has, and ignoring the fact that almost everybody who isn't wearing a suit wants to kill her.And then there's the rest of the film, the Cannon goodness, featuring Bronson on a machine gun wielding Bike,mourning into Danny Trejo when he jumps of and firing a rocket launcher.............a rocket launcher, into a barn.The guy here is 60+, and he's still running around like someone half his age. The set pieces are splendidly over the top, and you know you are watching terrific trash, when you see Bronson throw an empty machine in an hilarious way at a man in a wet suit.He two leads aside, the acting is woeful, the White House exterior looks like a chain restaurant, and it all ends with a man falling out of a window.Absolute rubbish, but by George, it's fun while it lasts.

First off, I'm a huge Bronson fan, have been since the late '70s. I watched every film he made on the big screen since "Love and Bullets", which ironically was the beginning of his end as a big name, Hollywood-blockbuster star.I kept hoping that things would turn around for him, that he would make a really good film in the '80s, but that never happened. And I don't know what he was thinking when he signed with cheapjack studio Cannon and hack director J. Lee Thompson for most of his latter films."Assasination" gave me some hopes when I saw that Peter Hunt was directing instead of Thompson but those hopes were quickly dashed. First off, the film looks incredibly cheap, like it was made for about 3 mil, minus Bronson's inflated salary (I heard he insisted on 5 mil per picture which is probably more than the rest of the budget for all his Cannon films). The White House scenes were filmed on the VA grounds in West LA - I was taking the bus when they were shooting. Nice job on recreating the white house but did no one think about getting the Palm trees out of the shots? Guess not.Secondly, the supporting cast is really bad. Ireland was dying of cancer and despite this she's not bad but the horrible Asian woman playing Bronson's sidekick was typical of Cannon's talent at the time --non-existent. I would be real curious to learn how she got this role. I can't imagine a worse actress for the part, plus she's a good 40 years younger than Bronson! The story is not that bad and it's something that bigger and better-budgeted studios did later (Eastwood's "In the Line of Fire" and Costner's "Bodyguard" film) but the way it's staged here is really sad. I'm wondering if they could not afford to do more than one or two takes per shot. None of it is believable in the slightest. If Secret Service men really behaved like the keystone cops in this movie we'd have presidents rotating out of office (and out of life) every few months...

Bronson plays Jay Killian, a secret service agent who has been transferred from guarding the newly elected President of the U.S. to now guarding the new first lady. Eventually, Bronson learns that the first lady is being targeted for assassination (hence the title), the film for the most part deals with Bronson keeping the first lady out of harms way. Not really an excessive actioner for Bronson considering previous efforts from his career, meaning that it's a little light on the violence factor. Jill Ireland plays the first lady, who has quite a mean streak to her in the film, her snobby attitude makes quite a pairing for her and Bronson's character. There are some comical moments here and there throughout the film, Bronson has more dialogue than usual which is nice, he adds a little rare touch of comic relief althroughout the film. I would recommend this movie to any Bronson fan, it's not Paul Kersey, but Jay Killian isn't too bad either.

I can't believe I sat through this garbage. Palm trees in D.C. (already mentioned), a dummy-as-dead-body bit so obviously artificial that I thought it was SUPPOSED to be a dummy ... until it left a bloodstain ... stilted dialogue, ridiculous plot. I think it's a shame that Jill Ireland's final film before her death was this stinker. Don't waste your time - I wish I hadn't. The only saving grace is that it was on cable, so I didn't waste my money on top of everything.