A group of underdogs and rebels gather in an attempt to protect Dr. Sun Yat-sen, a well-known assassination target for his revolutionary ideals, who’s stopping by Hong Kong for a meeting with 13 other resistance group leaders under the pretext of visiting his mother.

Sounds like a movie for you action film junkies?

Here’s a piece of advice: don’t go into the cinema expecting Bodyguards and Assassins to be similar to the adrenaline-packed Ip Man film.

But still, there’s more than enough reason for you to part with $7.50 (Singapore dollars) for a weekday/night ticket. The movie boasts of a total of US$23 million (S$32 million) in production costs and a full scale location set (S$8.8 million) of 1905 Hong Kong (as calculated by their official website). Producer Peter Chan Ho-Sun (The Warlords) and director Teddy Chan (The Accidental Spy) even managed to assemble a 12-star lineup.

^{(All images courtesy of www.bodyguardsandassassins.com and www.sina.com)}

With so many stars in the film, an apparent danger is the lack of engagement between the audience and the characters. Bodyguards and Assassins did fairly well in this aspect of connecting the audience to most of the characters.

Donnie Yen (Yip Man) plays Shen Chongyang, a money-grubbing, good-for-nothing gambler, whose only merits are – make a guess – superior fighting skills, and a (almost-withered) conscience. With more emotional depth to explore in this character than his previous roles like Pang Yong in Painted Skin (2008), Yen unexpectedly left a deep impression. The ambivalent feelings towards his old flame were compelling, and crying scenes were surprisingly well handled.

Veteran actor Wang Xueqi (Warriors of Heaven and Earth) gave a stellar performance as Li Yutang – from the somewhat apathetic businessman, to the hesitant leader of the protection plan, to the strict father – every emotion and expression was flawlessly executed. Though the first half of the movie was virtually his solo performance, no complains here.

Tony Leung Ka-Fai (The Myth) must’ve been a rebel scholar in his past life – he brought out the skin and flesh of his role with ease. Nicholas Tse (Storm Warriors) was a convincing honest and simple rickshaw puller; his acting’s no longer over the top. Hu Jun (Mulan, Red Cliff I & II) was able to show that there was more to the antagonist than just a mindless killing machine.

Another noteworthy actor is former NBA player Mengke Bateer, who’s Mongolian. His rendition of a smelly tofu hawker is surprisingly natural, and the parody on his basketball player identity during the character’s fighting scenes provided harmless, lighthearted humour to the plot.

It didn’t bode well for the movie, though, when the audience started to chuckle at a supposedly serious character doing a supposedly serious act – which was what happened to Leon Lai’s (Seven Swords) beggar character.

The audience giggled and snickered through his time on the screen. At his ‘big moment of sacrifice’, he stands ramrod straight on the stone steps, a slight breeze hardly messing up his stiff hair, weapon in hand, with the pose of a kung-fu master ready to face death… and all we could do was laugh.

Lai’s fans can console themselves though, albeit slightly; it probably had less to do with his acting ability than his ridiculous getup and nonsensical back-story. What, pray tell, does a self-pitying, lovesick and suicidal beggar who fell in love with his father’s lover got to do with the theme of the movie?

But that’s as bad as the character backgrounders get. The innocent love between Nicholas Tse and Zhou Yun, who plays a handicapped female, was sweet, and given just enough screen time to create an emotional resonance within the audience. Father-son interaction between Wang Xueqi and Wang Bo-Chieh was wonderfully heartwarming too.

Action scenes, which were intended as the main attraction in the movie, were left wanting. The parkour sequence by Donnie Yen, and the brawl between him and professional kickboxing champion Cung Le was no doubt first-rate, but seemed a little drawn out, and some fighting scenes were dizzying with too much going on.

However, through a daring decision to cut between the intense action scenes to pay homage to those sacrificed, this brought out the ‘sacrificed anonymous’ topic of the film well without compromising its pace.

Other minor faults like characters’ makeup, such as Yen the poor gambler showing off perfectly bleached teeth, and costumes, with Eric Tsang (Infernal Affairs I, II & III) looking like he’s cosplaying Mr. Pringles the potato chip mascot, can be ignored if you’re less particular.

This is a story about the grey areas of a resistance, about the darker side of a normally perceived “good” side, about the deceit and blood that stain a shadowed fragment of revolution.

The secret of Bodyguards and Assassin’s success lies in the meticulous craft which goes into explaining each character’s motive and background and engaging the audience emotionally with not only the main characters, but also many of the supporting roles.

However, a flaw in this picture of sacrifice is the lack of a reason for sacrifice. Many characters in the film don’t even have the slightest clue who Sun Yat-sen is, as they’re set as non-educated, but they all too willingly sacrificed their lives. Too much emphasis on martyrisation led to unwarranted deaths; characters that were painstakingly developed suddenly became blind and thoughtless – cheap offerings to the cause of revolution.

Complaints and regrets aside, this is a must-watch for the amazing acting and grand action sequences (and some laughable characters).

UrbanWire rates Bodyguards and Assassins 3.5/5.

Release Details:

Opens: Dec 18
Duration: 138 min
Language: Mandarin
Rating: PG/Some Violence
Genre: Action/Drama
Director: Teddy Chen
Cast: Donnie Yen, Wang Xueqi, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Hu Jun, Nicholas Tse, Leon Lai, Eric Tsang, Fan Bingbing, Simon Yam, Wang Bo-Chieh, Li Yu Chun, and Zhou Yun.