"The Children of Huang Shi" is a remarkable story ... told in routine fashion. Watching it is like wandering through a museum but never feeling compelled to linger before a painting or to imagine yourself transported into the image.

Based on real events and set in 1930s China, it explores how an English journalist named George Hogg (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) disguises himself as a Red Cross worker to gain access to Nanjing, where the Japanese are committing acts of atrocity. After secretly photographing the massacre of civilians, he is about to be executed when he is saved by Chinese guerrillas led by "Jack" Chen (Chow Yun Fat).

Hogg survives another near-death experience, only to end up at an abandoned schoolhouse turned orphanage populated by 60 Chinese boys. He tells a nurse (Radha Mitchell) who arrives with supplies, "I didn't come halfway 'round the world to play nanny to some savages."

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'The Children of Huang Shi'

2 1/2 stars = Average
Ratings explained

• Starring: Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Radha Mitchell, Chow Yun Fat.
• Rating: R for some disturbing and violent content.
• Web site: www.sonyclassics.com

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It turns out he did come halfway 'round the world to play father figure and savior in this movie directed by Roger Spottiswoode ("Shake Hands With the Devil," "The 6th Day," "Tomorrow Never Dies"). Hogg hatches a plan to keep the boys safe from both the advancing Japanese and the Chinese, who will conscript them.

With a script by James MacManus and Jane Hawksley, the movie tells what happened in oddly flat fashion, and fails to develop the few orphans who emerge as supporting players. Filmed largely in China, it looks authentic but lacks the power and emotion you would expect in the story of one man's compassion and courage in the face of such overwhelming odds.

Opens today at the Manor.