“Kingsman: The Secret Service” is a film I personally wasn’t really looking forward to at first.

I remember seeing a trailer for it months ago and thinking it looked too corny and derivative of James Bond and other secret agent movies.

The film surprised me because I went into moderate to low expectations and had them all blown away.

I should have expected this to happen because it’s the same thing that happened with one of the directors previous films “Kickass” but the degree to which it out did my expectations was greater in this film.

“Kingsman” as a movie does a lot of things I feel a lot of movies are too afraid to do now.

“Kingsman” as a film has a style and a personality.

It’s extremely fun and doesn’t take itself too seriously, and is just different for the sake of being different.

The film feels like it has some actual artistic reasoning behind all of its choices.

The films main characters are all likeable or at least become likeable as the film progresses.

Collin Firth is awesome as a bond like secret agent and comes off as a believable badass in fight scenes.

Taron Egerton who plays the main character, Eggsy, does a good job of encapsulating his characters story arc from starting as a troubled kid to being a believable secret agent.

The villains in the film are also really well acted.

Samuel L. Jackson plays the main villain, Valentine, and for the first time in a long time it feels like he’s playing a character and not just being himself.

His character is fun, interesting, and steals the show every moment he’s on screen.

Gazelle, Valentine’s henchmen, has prosthetic legs that have blades in them and she effortlessly kills many people throughout the film.

In fact most of the women in this film are complex and not just there to be a love interest.

The film had a surprise appearance by Mark Hamill who I assume is starting to do more live action films in preparation for the new “Star Wars” film, he used his joker voice with a British accent.

He’s not in the film very much, but it is nice to see him on the big screen.

The film constantly pays homage to other spy/secret agent films.

There are references to James Bond and gadgets that are remiscent of the old Bond films like a lighter that’s actually a grenade, a pen that hides poison, etc.

The action scenes are extremely well done and are both stylistic and easy to follow.

This film has virtually no fillers in it and it feels like every moment has a purpose.

The dialogue, action, and aftermath all fit in seamlessly.

It’s a film I would consider seeing in theaters again for the big screen experience for just how much fun it is.

The film has a couple of scenes that could be seen as controversial and at least one that has been called “reprehensible” that takes place in a Texas church.

I personally feel like these scenes were justified in the context of the film, but these scenes might be too much for some people.

The other problem with the film that takes place at the very end and involves a character of royalty pretty much giving up all characterization to be a sex object for the main character at the end of the film.

It doesn’t fit in with the rest of the film and comes out of left field because this character never acted like this until the very end and it kind of left a bad taste in my mouth at the end.

Despite the final scene I still give this film a nine out of 10 for being fun, having personality, and for overall being a great movie in the early months in the year.

I highly recommend seeing this film.

Mace Mackiewicz is a senior journalism major.
He can be reached at 581-2812 or mmmackiewicz@eiu.edu.