The words ‘pleasantly surprised’ always came to mind when I watched ‘Kingsman: The Secret Service.’ I was always more taken with the slightly cheeky Roger Moore era of the Bond franchise, before it all turned uber-serious courtesy of Daniel Craig. Therefore, I was delighted to see great stunts, ridiculous gardens and over-the-top villains hiding in hollowed-out volcanos (or the like). Now, I’m even more delighted to say that the sequel is actually pretty good, too. Yes, you can always argue that the sequel will never topple the original (Empire Strikes Back, Godfather II, Aliens and T2 excluded), but, as far as sequels go, this one stays pretty much true to the spirit of the first and is definitely worth a watch if you like spy movies in general, or – like me – are stuck in the past in the Connery/Moore Bond era.
In case you’re not up on the first movie, you don’t really have to be as this one stands alone quite nicely as well. It’s about a super secret English spy agency that masquerades as a tailor’s in the middle of London. However, one sunny day someone goes and drops bombs on all but one of the Kingsmen agents, leaving the last man standing to flee across the pond and join his counterparts in America, aka The Statesmen (and find out who was behind it all, obviously). It’s good to see all of the cast have returned for this one (even ones you may not think should be in there, but that goes into ‘spoiler’ territory) which is always nice to see. And it’s equally nice to see that the film isn’t afraid to kill off characters who you may not expect to see go out in the way that they do. Not only do the Kingsmen and Statesmen have to find out who blitzed the London agents, but also stop Julianne Moore from distributing drugs that will poison the world while they’re at it. Now, despite my overall praise and enjoyment of the film, I felt that Julianne Moore was possibly the weakest element. Not because she was an especially bad villain – she’s a great actress and did everything she could to appear as menacing to the world’s population as possible, but she had one hell of a tough act to follow – Mr Samuel L Jackson. He was so crazy (and brilliant!) in the original that anyone was going to struggle when following in his footsteps.However, that’s just a minor gripe. You could say that if you’ve seen one spy movie then you’ve seen them all – i.e. a super villain wants to do X and the hero must stop him, then insert a few high-octane car chases and fist fights along the way. Well, ‘Kingsman: The Golden Circle’ doesn’t offer anything particularly new by going against that formula. It’s simply the way it’s done that sets it apart from the rest. It’s silly, light-hearted fun, but at the same time is able to dip effortlessly into the action genre and also provide some genuine heart-felt moments. I hope we definitely at least get a trilogy out of this franchise. Dark, gritty Bond is okay if you’re in the mood to be mega serious, but for those of us who still like our spy thrillers a little more light-hearted, then Kingsman is definitely the way forward.
About the only major thing that jarred with me was some really noticeable CGI backdrops, but the action scenes were so well-shot that these more than made up for the Glastonbury festival that was blatantly created on a PC.
9/10 almost as perfect as The Godfather
No comments:
Post a Comment