Random Movie Review - Kingsman: The Secret Service

Better late than never I guess. So after watching the 2 Kick-Ass films and X-Men: First Class, I was curious to see where director Matthew Vaughn would go next and I can definitely say that he can make great films based on graphic novels and comic book series which kick ass and are fun to watch. They may not be BAFTA worthy, but they are enough to keep us pumped and interested and with Kingsman, its pretty much the same thing. Given that it is being given to us in a world where James Bond and Jason Bourne are the kings of espionage, there is a heck of a lot that it needs to do if it is ever supposed to be in league with those films and I don't think it is, but it is still a lot fun for what it is. So let's take a peak:

So Kingsman is this secret service that works in a similar fashion to MI5 in the sense that its all about protecting our world from potential terrorist like threats, though for Kingsman, its all about doing all that with style and class. During one mission, a Kingsman agent called Harry Hart (played by romcom regular Colin Firth), fails to prevent the death of one agent who turns out to be the father of one Gary "Eggsy" Unwin (played by up and coming actor Taron Egerton). Harry decides to give the message about his death personally to Eggsy and his mum Michelle (played by EastEnder Samantha Womack) and gives Eggsy something that has a number should he ever need help, but has to say a certain code. 17 years later, another agent called Lancelot (played by the admiral guy in POTC, Jack Davenport) is killed by one Gazelle (played by Sofia Boutella), an prosthetic legged assassin who works for Internet billionaire and the film's main but really positive antagonist (I know there is another word for it, but its completely gone out of my head) Richmond Valentine (played by Samuel L. Jackson who of all the roles he has done, this is by far his most oddest and weirdest of roles) who retrieves one Professor Arnold (played by Luke Skywalker and the voice of the Joker, Mark Hamill) to have him join his cause to create a new world by inflicting violence onto people who buy his SIM cards. Eggsy, now older, continues to live with his mother and abusive step father, before Harry finds him and after some persuasion, has him train for Kingsman to be Lancelot's replacement and from then on out, his life changes, but its only a matter of time before Valentine catches on and must be stopped.

So I think its great that Colin Firth is branching out into other genres besides romcoms, having done a great job of the king in The King's Speech and its also great to see Samuel L. Jackson in a role that many of us wouldn't normally see him in. And Its also good to have Mark Strong as a good guy rather than a bad guy. The film uses these actors and manages to give them roles that they wouldn't normally do and its very clear that they are having fun with these roles which is always nice to see. I like this film a lot. There's plenty of action packed moments, there are parts that make it funny and what's more is that we finally get to see some actors in roles that are very different to the roles that we would normally see them in which makes the film worth seeing. It also surprises me that 20th Century Fox are distributing this film as they are not generally known to distribute many films with British actors and a British setting in it. That's normally what companies like Universal or Studio Canal are generally known for doing. But anyway, I enjoyed this film a lot, even though there are points that make the fighting look more CGI than real which I don't know if that was how it was filmed, but hey what do I know. So yeah, great film and definitely worth the watch if you love films based on graphic novels with film makers that do these sorts of films right. 9/10