Half Good, Half Bad

Rating: 3/10 (12 August 2015)

I'm not for or against this film. I don't get my knickers in a twist over a bit of GCI blood, violence, profanity or the endless clichés. I AM however against the injudicious amount of CGI used in every other shot, & the fact that this film falls apart about half way through. Seriously, you have a bit of realism at the start & it's fairly grounded. But as it goes on it becomes more & more Disney. Until about half way through, right about when a certain character meets his demise, & it just gets reduced to the Hollywood way - Everyone suddenly knows martial art, acrobatics, gymnastics; Slo-Mo to compensate for how slow western audiences are, TERRIBLE lighting, CGI backgrounds, intrusive generic epic music, & the all time high "Girl power doing round house kicks" cliché.
Colin Firth has such inimitable demeanour that he is the only one that sells the story. But the kid that takes over? My God he was a chore to watch.
They also try to level the playing field where sex is concerned by having male & female protagonists en-roll for The Secret Service. Another dumb idea seeing that in reality not 1 single woman has worked as a secret agent. This is no doubt taken as discrimination by those as stupid as post feminists, when in reality it is a simple fact that men are more physically dexterous. They soon push her to one side anyway & have the boy get all the screen time.
Samuel Jackson has his moments & is fun to watch but he is non-threatening & you feel sorry for the likable character he builds up. His henchman once again has to be a fit young slender brunette who dodges bullets, never gets scared, shows no emotion, jumps around like a flea on a griddle blah blah blah the usual male-written girl-power tripe.
The "controversial" church scene is the best in the movie which is probably why it sticks out. It's brutal, impressively shot, bloody & shows conviction. Which is FAR more than I can say for the rest of the film which goes soft & shows a blatant hesitation of following through. All of a sudden blood is swapped for cheap puffs of coloured smoke copied & pasted in perfect synchronisation in all harmless humour so as to not offend the next lot of screen test reprobates. What a joke. What a mess this film is.
Avoid or watch drunk with the Mrs.