Fun with Spies

Rating: 7/10 (16 February 2015)

Greetings again from the darkness. In 2010, writer/director Matthew Vaughn turned the superhero genre on its ear with the hit Kick-Ass. With this most recent film, he has done the same thing to spy-thrillers. We get the well-tailored look made famous by Roger Moore's James Bond, the fanciful and lethal gadgets from early Bond films, the ever-present umbrella (put to new uses here) of The Avenger's John Steed, and the ultra-suave and debonair manners of Napoleon Solo from The Man from U.N.C.L.E. We get all of that in a surprisingly effective and fun action performance from Colin Firth.
Fun is the operative word here. It's clear all parties involved are having a great time, especially Mr Firth going drastically against type. There are two action-packed and pretty humorous (in a demented way) fight scenes. One is early on inside a London pub, and has Firth flashing his particular set of skills against a group of thugs. The other (and even more raucous) fight occurs inside a church and is set to Lynryd Skynyrd's "Free Bird". The body count piled up as fast as the guitar licks.
As spectacular as the fight scenes are, the real fun here is in the characters. The old guard of the Kingsmen includes Firth as Galahad, Mark Strong as Merlin, Jack Davenport as Lancelot, and Michael Caine as Arthur. This long-standing group is one part international spy, one part Knights of the Round Table  and these gentlemen are extremely well trained and impeccably well dressed. When one of their agents dies on the job, the recruitment boot camp kicks into gear. Made up of a group of relative newcomers to the movie world, the two most interesting are Roxy (Sophie Cookson) and Eggsy (Taron Egerton). Adding to the intrigue, Eggsy is the son of a former Kingsmen, and has some skills that aren't initially apparent.
Of course, what would a spy-tribute movie be without a colorful villain? Samuel L Jackson plays lispy megalomaniac Valentine, who has a quick gag reflex when it comes to violence. Fortunately his henchman Gazelle (Sofia Boutella) is equipped with razor sharp leg prosthetics and some ultra-crazy fighting skills. We even see Mark Hamill as Professor Arnold  fans of the Mark Miller/Dave Gibbons graphic novel will appreciate the irony.
Firth and Egerton play off each other quite well in the mentor-pupil relationship, and Egerton is clearly set up for the franchise sequels  as is his friend and fellow Kingsman, Ms. Cookson. For those who think the Daniel Craig Bond films are too dark and serious, this provides a flashback to lighter Bond fare (minus the misogyny). Many hot topics are touched on: class warfare, domestic abuse, racism, etc, but mostly this can be taken as a rollicking good time because "it's not that kind of movie". It does, however, remind us that "manners make the man".