Who doesn’t like a good spy film?
If you raised your hand (either figuratively
or literally,) after reading that last sentence, then Kingsman: The Secret
Service is definitely not for you. For the rest of us, Kingsman is both a highly
charged and self-aware compliment to the spy films of past and present (not
unlike the way Scream was a knowing compliment to all of the horror films it
referenced,) while attempting to carve out its own small niche in the spy genre
itself.
In this humble reviewer’s opinion, the film achieves the former, but never
achieves the latter.
Kingsman is a loose adaptation
of a Mark Millar (Kick Ass) and Dave Gibbons (Watchman) comic book titled, The
Secret Service that was first published in 2012. In this filmed version, Colin
Firth plays Harry Hart, a covert operative whose protégé is killed in the line
of duty. Harry later hands a medal of bravery to the son of his protégé along
with a phone number and coded phrase if he or his mother ever needed
assistance.
Seventeen years later, the boy, Garry
“Eggsy” Unwin (played by relative newcomer, Taron Egerton) is a young man without direction
and living with his mother and her abusive boyfriend. Eggsy is arrested for stealing
a car, and he uses his one phone call to dial the number on the back of the medal.
After saying the code-phrase, Eggsy is immediately released from jail without explanation.
Outside the police station, Eggsy meets Harry, the man who gave him the medal
so long ago, and Eggsy soon discovers that his father was a part of a secret
organization of spies called “Kingsmen,” and is offered an opportunity to become
his new protégé.
What follows is a classic comic
book origin story as we follow Eggsy’s training into the world of spies. While
this happens, the Kingsmen are busy investigating a man named Valentine, played
by the always amazing, Samuel L. Jackson, who might be responsible for a series
of high-profile people suddenly disappearing around the globe. Soon, Harry Hart,
Eggsy, and the Kingsmen must deal with a plot of worldwide significance that
deals with the manipulation of technology for a nefarious end.
Kingsman: The Secret Service is
a movie that is aware of the spy films that preceded it. It’s so reverential
to these films that, in one scene, a character even names some of the most
famous spies in popular culture as a none-too-subtle tip of the hat to the genre.
This reverence for the genre is never far from our sight, as the winking and
nodding almost becomes the point of the plot.
This is the film’s biggest
flaw. Any movie that is constantly winking at us and saying “Did you catch
that reference?” can get tiresome after a while and make us wonder when the
film’s own unique voice will begin.
Sadly, it never does. There is a point
where the winking and the nudging goes on for a bit too long, and this reviewer
wished it could have been toned down to allow for its own voice to shine
through. It is one thing to be reverential of the spy genre, but entirely another
to make that reverence a constant part of the story. It’s like the film
constantly taps you on the shoulder to remind you of the genre it’s sending up,
and that became a tedious and annoying reminder.
Since the nods to the spy
genre never end, the film never really transcends the genre that it clearly loves, and thus, never succeeds in forging its own identity.
One cannot watch this film
without drawing comparisons to Mark Millar’s previous comic book adaptation to
film, Wanted, starring James McAvoy, Angelina Jolie, and Morgan Freeman. Wanted has the exact “normal-guy-joins-secret-society” plot as Kingsman, but with
slight variations, and there is a sense that this has all been seen before many times.
Despite being the “wink-wink-nudge-nudge”
fest that it is, Kingsman does deliver some really cool moments, including some awesome action
sequences with Colin Firth. He dispatches foes with the style and ease of a man
calmly pouring a cup of tea between trigger-pulls and knife-stabbings, making sure never to muss up
his perfectly tailored, Savile Row suit in the process. The violence is fast
and frequent, providing an appropriate amount of menace to the story. Yet, there
are a few intentionally muted scenes that tone the violence down using a bit of surrealism, but make no mistake; it’s still an “R” rated film.
If you liked Wanted, you’ll
probably find Kingsman to be a better film, but you will see the similarities
immediately. If you love the spy genre, and you just want to sink back into that
world as seen by some “super-fan” filmmakers, then Kingsman will entertain you, and it's definitely worth your time. However, if you want
something that is wholly original, taking the spy genre into new levels
of excitement and creativity, Kingsman will probably be a disappointment to you.
