I am not entirely sure why I held off going to see the
Kingsman for so long. It had got good reviews, was meant to be in the
same vein as Kick A$$ (and not at all like Kick A$$ 2) and the mock James
Bond-like premise appealed. But still I stayed away for a while until
finally getting off my own a$$ to go and see it.
And I was not disappointed. The Gentlemen killers
(and the odd woman too) are up against the baddest of bad guys, one with
charisma and conviction and the ability to convince many other people that his
megalomaniacal plan is the right thing to do.
The main villain of the piece is played with lisping
gusto by Samuel L Jackson, not a strutting tough guy wielding a pistol of
destiny but rather a tech millionaire with a vision and a bevy of loyal
henchpeople to help him reach his goal.
Standing against him is Colin Firth as Harry Hart, all manners
and reserve yet a lethal killer ready to stand up for what is right. And
he has a protégé, Gary "Eggsy" Unwin (Taron Egerton), a young man with potential (a military background, an
incredible gymnast, high IQ scores… the usual secret agent recruitment tropes)
but who comes with personal private demons, mainly in the form of his traumatic
family history and so comes pre-loaded with a chip on his shoulder and
Something To Prove.
The story itself unfolds pretty much as every other tale
of this ilk has since the beginning of film, but the level of violence and the
strength of its language set it apart and make it intentionally hilarious at
times. There are amazing gadgets and secret hideaways and international
travel and amazing feats of danger and tests of courage… and a couple of
privileged pr!cks who want to stand in our hero’s way.
Without going al the way through the plot, lets just say
that the performances are all as excellent as they are cliché (Mark Armstrong
and Michael Caine are in there too as the technological genius and patriarch,
and they fill those roles really well) and the villains are suitably dastardly,
even if the lead villainess seems to be a rather unexciting knock off of the
super excellent Hammer Girl from The Raid 2.
The secondary characters are not really given anything to
do: Eggsy’s friends possibly died somewhere (no idea what happened to them after
initially providing a sounding board for our hero) and the female characters
are wildly uneven, Eggsy’s fellow trainees being shown as competent but left
almost literally wandering around in the snow as the majority of the action
happens.
And the Norwegian Princess… well I had heard that a joke at the end of the film almost ruined the experience for a lot of moviegoers with its misjudgement, and while the audience all laughed nervously in my screening, the scene in question did seem very not in keeping with the overall tone of the film. Perhaps it was meant to push buttons and envelopes rather than match the rest of the movie.
At any rate, the film overall was a lot of fun.
Action, adventure… not really any romance, but some Maccas in there at an
appropriate time.
Verdict: The Kingsman is a great deal of fun, even if the
fun and the action are further into R territory than a lot of other films in
this genre. A couple of off jokes (and one BIG one) stop this from being
a great film, but still, worth a look. 8 suits out of 10.
