Kingsman: Première mission

I was very impressed with Matthew Vaughn's directing and writing in the first two films, of whom Jane Goldman also shared the writing credits, but in this one she was absent, and wow what a difference it made. In the ridiculously unnecessarily long 131 min runtime, only 10 mins total had anything to do with the Kingsmen. The rest was a convoluted scattershot of unnecessary plots that seemed to be a bunch of short films thrown in a blender to come up with this nonsense. There were too many plot and technical issues, and scenes that will make you shake your head in disbelief of what you're seeing, and why. Even the entire villain portion was too short, lame, and lazily written and executed. There were so many long dragged out and unnecessary scenes, you can literally fast-forward to the end of the scene and miss nothing of relevance. Basically 90% of this film was all filler with very little substance - and that's as a stand-alone film; as a prequel, it's all filler with maybe 2-3 minutes of any "Kingsmen" relevance. It's really too bad, because the rest of the film - cinematography, choreography, performances etc were all very good. I gave the first two films 9's, and I'm struggling to even give my very generous 6/10 for this one. Please include Goldman in any future Kingsmen films; at least her vision was coherent, cohesive, and exciting.

All the Kingsman movies have had very impressive action sequences and this one didn't disappoint. The way they film the choreography seems as thought out as the choreography itself. This one was certainly more serious than the previous films of the franchise, which I actually liked, but it still had lots of over the top scenarios and funny moments, true to form. I also appreciate how they don't always pull the punches for their characters, things go wrong, plans fall apart, and the characters have to adapt. It's much more engaging that way!

A decent prequel that had a few great action scenes and dramatic moments; but that overall didn't have the charm of its predecessors. The CGI looked too computer generated and the storyline too heavy. With so much story to cover the scene jumps happened to often and disrupted the flow. Acting was good and characters were well cast,

The movie is not perfect but entertaining and also a little underrated. After all the bad reviews I was prepared for anything and yet I was surprised and well entertained. Some scenes are a bit over the top weird and somehow don't fit into the overall picture, but on the whole I found the movie really entertaining. Some historical interpretations were hard on the border of insipidity but as an adult you should be able to classify it somehow and you should not take the movie too seriously.

I enjoyed this prequel far more than the Kingsman sequel - which wasn't bad, it just wasn't particularly good either.

Ralph Fiennes is, as ever, just brilliant while Rhys Ifans steals the show as Rasputin. Some brilliant action scenes in it and a sprinkle of comedy. Perfect for a night in where you can switch your brain off and just enjoy the show.