The winner of eight 2010 Hong Kong Film Awards, including best picture, Bodyguards and Assassins is a very loose re-telling of some of the events that led up to the revolution that eventually overthrew the Qing dynasty in 1911. Sporting a huge budget and a cast chock-full of stars, the movie has all of the makings of a historical epic, and in most ways, it does succeed in that regard. But somehow, perhaps because it's being watched by a Western reviewer, the end results come up feeling a bit hollow.

With a running time of about 165 minutes and a story that has around twelve "main" characters, it's a little hard to quickly distill a plot synopsis here. Basically, the movie takes place in 1906 Hong Kong, where a visit by Sun Yat-Sen (the leader of the revolution, who would later become known as "The Father of the Nation") is seen as the Qing leaders as an opportunity to quell the uprising. A rag-tag band of fighters comes together to form a plan to protect Sun long enough during his stay in Hong Kong so that he can give out the plan for the revolution to all of the local leaders.

Despite Donnie Yen's top billing and prominence on the promotional materials, he is not the star, and Bodyguards and Assassins cannot really be considered an action movie. The movie's first half is very much a drama, with only a small fight scene thrown in, which serves as the impetus for some of the characters who have been sitting on the fence to choose up sides in the revolution.

Director Teddy Chen handles this section of the film well enough, and the almost universally solid performances help things along. Though it is a bit strange that Nicholas Tse was the lone actor who garnered a HKFA. He doesn't do a bad job, but really, the only notable thing about his performance was that the film-makers tried to ugly him up by putting a couple of scars on his face. There are several other actors, most notably Tony Leung Ka-Fai, who probably deserved the recognition more.

At any rate, the last hour or so is where Bodyguards and Assassins switches into high gear, with a nearly real-time exposition of Sun's trip through Hong Kong that is punctuated by plenty of high-powered set pieces. Helmed primarily by noted action director Stephen Tung, the phrenetic proceedings during this segment of the movie are finely made and offer up some good thrills -- though the use of elements like CGI bloodspurts and obvious wirework will be disappointing to those viewers wanting a more realistic and hard-hitting style.

When boiled down to its' core, Bodyguards and Assassins is a movie that possibly didn't merit all of those Hong Kong Film Awards, since it comes off as somewhat unfocused. There are a few too many characters thrown into the mix, and we really end up learning nothing about the real events and people of the time. Also, the somewhat over-the-top action sequences don't really quite mesh with the more serious dramatic elements.

But in the end, Bodyguards and Assassins becomes a movie that is more than the sum of its' parts. Unlike some other recent big-budget Hong Kong releases like Kungfu Cyborg, this is actually a good film that won't leave you feeling disappointed or outright outraged.

RATING: 7