Really good film but bad supporting cast

Rating: 8/10 (22 September 2017)

Kingsmen is a film filled with loads of funny jokes and great characters. The best thing about this film is how clever and stupid it seems to be. That may sound like a bad thing but let me explain. The film deviates from all spy films by having great jokes like a villain who is scared of blood and hero who is a wannabe gangster which makes it refreshing and clever. The stupidity comes from the ridiculous scenes that are a parody of spy thrillers like James Bond and the Bourne series. These parody scenes work so well with all the clever scenes and the self-awareness the film has with itself.
The film follows spy movie conventions as there is a bad guy who wants to take over the world and the spy is sent to stop him from destroying earth with a virus of some kind. The bare bones are then layered with incredible characters and great, tasteful humour.
All of the characters in this film are great and while I had some problems with the supporting cast I thought all of the main actors did a great job and portrayed good strong characters that all contribute to the plot and move it forward to a satisfactory conclusion. I think some honourable mentions go to what I would call "the main guys"
Colin Firth as Harry Hart is just such a great casting choice. He emulates a level headed spy who is just great at his job and fights with the class that the kingsmen agency is all about. Firth has not got a lot of comic lines but the action scenes he has are the best I have seen in a film in a long time. The "manners maketh the man" scene is brilliant and is so well choreographed that it is hands down the best action scene in the movie with the possible exception of the church scene.
Taron Egerton who plays Eggsy is really good in this movie also. He plays a wannabe gangster really well and we see during the film how he changes into a man who understands that actions have consequences. He has a lot of joke lines in this film and they work in the film so well. Some movies, like Ghostbusters 2016 will stop the plot to tell a joke however this movie has the right flow and a good quality script so that the plot is intertwined with the jokes. Egerton does a good job of acting like a chav turned spy would act.
Samuel L Jackson as Valentine makes this movie for me. Having a villain who is grossed out by blood and violence is an inspired idea and Jackson does great work in this film and actually gave a sh^t about the character he was playing. Valentine has a legitimate reason for killing the population as he is worried about man's effect on the environment and has to save the planet by culling the population. This bit in the plot smells a little bit like Dan Brown's Inferno to be quite honest.
However you soon get over that by how goofy and charismatic Valentine is, with his lisp and his love of McDonalds coupled with a good Dom Perignon to go along with it. The jokes that he has are masterful and I love how he remarks (in the film) that this is not an ordinary spy film. Honestly I think Valentine is the best character in the film.
The supporting characters like Eggsy's mom and the drunk, abusive stepdad are the worst characters in the film. Chiefly because the actors playing them can't act and are very wooden in their performances. Even when the stepdad is being all manipulative and controlling the mom you never really believe in the performances they give and it adds such a different and violently sad tone to this movie that I actually wished they had not had so much screen time. Their parts you can just ignore anyway so it doesn't completely ruin the film but it does take you out of it due to their unrealistic and boring performances.
From a technical point of view I think the movie works well with a lot of great camera work creating some good visuals and decent CGI. There was CGI blood which is never done realistically and in this film there are BAD CG blood moments but they didn't take me out of the film a lot and did not make me enjoy the action sequences any less.
There were some bad camera panning where the camera would pan up and then to the right to show movement of characters from one place to another scene. However this was not used a lot and I can only think it was used in the train scene where Eggsy and Harry go to kingsmen headquarters.
The music in this is used very well as a way of making the audience feel and adding emotion to a scene that needs a little umph. There are some great songs used in this movie and they all make sense in the points of the plot that they are used so well done whoever was in charge of sound in this film.
All in all this film does have a few flaws and bad actors and crap CG blood use but its good points are really good. Great characters and great humour make this a film worth seeing and I advise you to go see it on DVD or download. It is worth it.