Synopsis & Review

In early 20th century Hong Kong, where many Chinese have fled in order to escape the oppressive Qing government, a rebellion against the ruling Qing Dynasty is brewing. Sun Yat-Sen (also known as Sun Wen), a political leader and revolutionary, is coming into Hong Kong from Japan where he will help to formulate the plan to overthrow the Qing Dynasty in mainland China. The Qing, upon hearing of his arrival in Hong Kong, send several assassins to the city in order to kill Sun.

A group of Chinese in Hong Kong, led by Li Yutang, a businessman, form a group of bodyguards for the arrival of Sun Wen. Among these body guards include Chen Shaobai (Tony Leung-Ka Fai), Liu Yubai (Leon Lai), Deng Sidi (Nicholas Tse), Shen Chongyang (Donnie Yen), and Wang Fu-Ming (Mengke Bateer).

Despite the film has been marketed as a Donnie Yen movie, Bodyguards and Assassins features a pretty awesome ensemble cast of popular movie stars (and basketball player Mengke Bateer) including Nicholas Tse, Leon Lai, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Fan Bingbing, etc, etc. In fact, Donnie's role in this movie is actually quite limited compared to his other movies. He is only one of the men equipped with the task of ensuring Sun Yat-Sen is able to meet with leaders in Hong Kong to discuss the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty.

But even without Donnie Yen kicking butt every two seconds, Bodyguards and Assassins is still is one of the better martial arts movies I've seen. Interestingly, the director chose to create a large build-up in the beginning, where it is mostly storyline and not much action. All the events, however, escalate to an epic hour long fight sequence (there are maybe one or two small fights in the beginning, most of them involving Donnie Yen). It's an interesting take by the director, who doesn't resort to meaningless fighting scenes every five minutes or so like the typical martial arts movie. If you're looking for pure fighting action, then this movie probably isn't for you. Watch it for the storyline instead.

Bodyguards and Assassins is one of the more plot-based movies I've seen in this genre. There are a TON of characters in this movie, and each of them gets a small sub-plot. Whether this works is up to debate, but I enjoyed it. One could probably argue that there were too many characters in the movie, but I felt it added a lot to this film by emphasizing the group over one individual. I do admit I was confused at the beginning by certain plot elements (like who's on the good side, who's on the bad side), but once the movie started going, I picked up on what everything was about pretty easily. Plus, you've got all these great actors in this film. Nicholas Tse, who is usually a leading man, takes the unsightly role of a poor rickshaw driver in a dramatic and heart-warming role. Leon Lai, the Cantopop singer, plays a poor beggar with a broken heart.

But let's get to the epic one-hour long battle sequence. This happens pretty much when they are transporting the rickshaws through the city. There are several nice fights in here, especially one with Donnie Yen's character and MMA fighter Cung Le. So although Donnie isn't a major character in the film, his fight is without a doubt the best one. There's a couple other good ones, including one between the beggar Liu Yubai (Leon Lai) and a throng of soldiers.

What I really liked, though, about the end battle sequence was the realistic effects. Blood looked real. Weapons looked sharp. Hits looked hard. Everything just seemed to have been done very masterfully. A lot of props to the special effects people and action choreographers.

Furthermore, this movie looked amazing. Sets, costumes, cinematography, is all top-notch. I felt that the great editing and camera-work also definitely contributed to this movie's epicness. The movie, shot on a 23 million dollar budget, looks to have used every single dollar of that budget and probably another 40 million on top of that. It really looks just as good as any Hollywood movie.

Overall, it was a terrific film, and furthermore, the film is true to real-life events (Sun Yat-Sen is the first president of the Republic of China). If I could change anything, I would add a few more fights for Donnie and make him one of the more central characters. Pick this one up on DVD!

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