Kingsman: The Secret Service

A spy organization recruits an unrefined, but promising street kid into the agency’s ultra-competitive training program, just as a global threat emerges from a twisted tech genius. IMDB

Weirdly, I’m still not quite sure what I think about this Bond movie pastiche.  I’m conflicted.  The best way I can think to do this is to nick take inspiration from Cara and the format she uses over at Silver Screen Serenade… here goes…

I’ll always love Mr Darcy

The good:

• Colin Firth.  Just generally, Colin Firth.  He’ll always be Mr Darcy and for that I’ll always love him a little bit.
• The styling.  Kingsman looks good, from the suits to the gadgets to the special effects.  It has a decent budget and it shows.
• Micheal Caine.  Again, just generally.  He’s a national treasure.
• Well choreographed action and fight scenes.
• Good strong female character at the Kingsman boot camp, although I can’t recall her name.
• Eggsy, the ‘promising street kid’ who I thought was supposed to be a teenager but it says on IMDB that he’s 26 (does that mean I’m old?  Like how they say you know you’re old when you think policemen look young?).
• The star-studded supporting cast which had me saying things like “oh, that’s her of that programme” and “wasn’t he in Titanic?” and “oh, I love that guy”.

The bad:

• Poor Samuel L Jackson playing a charicature baddie (although to be fair most of these characters are charicatures to some extent).  He did his best, but something about this character just didn’t sit well with me.
• The domestic violence sub-plot featuring Eggsy’s mum and her thuggish gang-leader boyfriend.  Nasty and unnecessary, serving no real purpose or benefit to the film or its plot.
• SPOILER ALERT: the Swedish princess, having been imprisoned by the baddie, offers to have anal sex with our hero if he succeeds in saving the world.  I have so many issues with this, I’m not even sure I know where to start.
• 1. She’s a woman.  I don’t know anyone who would offer up casual bum-sex with a stranger, whether he saved the world or not.  I certainly don’t think a princess would be so free with her affections.  I mean, why would that even cross her mind?  Surely, she’d be more likely to offer him some kind of medal or financial reward or something?  And why specifically up the bum?
• 2. Furthermore, besides the obvious, why would Eggsy be so keen to take up the offer?  A few minutes earlier he was trying to ensure the safety of his mother and baby sister, but once a bit of up-the-bum action is on offer, he forgets all about them.
• 3. Up until this point I’d quite enjoyed Kingsman, but the final shot of the princess’s bare arse waggling in the air made me feel like this film wasn’t meant for me.  It kind of felt like a massive ‘up yours’.  You know what, Kingsman?  Up yours!  SPOILER ENDS  I know this is fiction, I know it’s not meant to be taken seriously, but I don’t think it’s good enough.  OK, you could argue that I’ve taken this too seriously, but it really left a bad taste in my mouth.
  
• Way too long, at 129 minutes.
• Not as clever as it thinks it is.

Poor Sam does his best with the material

Overall, I think this is a pretty decent film but the domestic violence and the Swedish princess business really brought it down and left me feeling icky.

Score: 6/10