Kingsman: The Secret Service

After a month of pretty poor cinema offerings, along comes the first genuinely entertaining film of 2015, Kingsman: The Secret Service. A sleek, stylish, hyperactive, violent and frequently very funny throwback to the heyday of the James Bond films when they didn't take themselves quite so seriously. 

The film stars Colin Firth as Harry Hart, a senior agent with a secret agency called the Kingsman. As the film begins, his life is saved by another agent, who dies in the process. He calls on the fallen agent's wife and young son, promising a favor to them if it is ever needed in reward for the agent's valor and service. Seventeen years later, Eggsy (played by Taron Egerton), the young son all grown up calls in that favor when he gets arrested for car theft. To his surprise, it works when he is let go and meets Harry. 

Harry sees a lot of potential in the kid, despite his rough past that includes car theft, drugs and assorted other criminal elements. He offers the boy the chance to become a candidate to join the Kingsman agency. Eggsy enthusiastically accepts but finds many there consider him unlikely to succeed, with many of the other candidates looking down on him for his lower class background. Much to their surprise though, Eggsy perseveres and  surpasses the others, surviving far longer than any anticipated, except perhaps Harry.

Meanwhile, billionaire Valentine (played by Samuel L. Jackson) is cooking up a scheme to throw the world in to chaos in an effort to cull the human population down in size significantly, convinced that the human population is killing the planet. At his side is Gazelle (played by Sofia Boutella), a double amputee with prosthetic legs with long, sharp blades that come out when she kicks. 

As training comes to end, Valentine's threat becomes more and more real as Valentine has gotten all the world leaders as well as many other government agencies and influential people on board to his scheme. Not knowing who they can trust, it falls to Harry, Eggsy, another recruit Roxy (played by Sophie Cookson), and the Kingsman equivalent of Q codenamed Merlin (played by Mark Strong) to defeat Valentine and save the world. 

Kingsman: The Secret Service is a fantastic piece of action entertainment with it's tongue firmly planted in it's cheek. It is a hyperviolent throwback to the classic Bond movies. It has Colin Firth playing against type as the suave secret agent. It's such a surprise to see Firth, who made a career playing romantic lead roles, breakout into a huge fight, taking on several people at once. It's a revelation and could refresh his career much like Taken did for Liam Neeson. Samuel L Jackson clearly having a ball as the Bond villain type, speaking with a lisp, who can't stand the sight of blood. Gazelle is a badass woman in the vein of classic Bond henchmen such as Oddjob or Jaws.  Mark Strong is great a Merlin and it's nice to see him playing someone other than the villain for a change. 

I have now seen this film twice in two weeks and both times I had an absolute ball. The film is a fantastic throwback to the old spy movies, when they didn't take themselves quite so seriously. It's a wild ride with plenty of humor (even though some of it may be a bit risque to some) and thrills makes it a whole lot of outrageous fun.