KINGSMAN: THE GOLDEN CIRCLE – A Review by Hollywood Hernandez
Kingsman: The Golden Circle is the second attempt to adapt the comic book to the big screen. Taron Egerton is back as Eggsy, the once upon a time street hood turned English gentleman by his mentor Harry (Colin Firth). The secret spy organization, that uses a tailor shop called Kingsman as its cover, suffers a catastrophic loss when they are hacked by a drug cartel and all of their agents are killed, except for Eggsy and Merlin (Mark Strong). The two agents search for clues to rebuild their organization when they discover they have an allied organization in the states called Statesman. The fraternal group of spies are in Kentucky and they operate as a whiskey distillery.
Channing Tatum, Jeff Bridges and Halle Berry join the movie at that point for the most entertaining scenes of the film. The Statesman team up with the Kingsman to find out who's behind the evil plot that killed all of their fellow agents in England. It leads them to a drug lord who is the head of The Golden Circle.
The Golden Circle is a drug cartel led by a cruel and evil crime boss named Poppy, played by Julianne Moore. She brands all of her agents with a circle of hot molten gold. She's forced to hide out in the jungle, but she's created her own little fantasy town that looks like a movie set from the 1950's; complete with a diner, a bowling alley and a movie house. In the funniest parts of the movie she kidnaps Elton John to perform for her on demand. Elton is hilarious as a "diva" who's held captive and forced to perform against his will.
Although her product is illegal drugs, Poppy wants to be recognized as one of the top companies in the world. So she devises a plan to taint all of her drug supply with a virus that causes severe symptoms and eventually death. She wants drugs legalized and immunity from all of her previous illegal acts in exchange for an antidote which can save everyone infected. Publicly the president of the United States agrees, but he has plans to stall the distribution of her antidote until all of the drug users die from the tainted drugs. A hardliner on drugs, he sees that as a way of winning the war on drugs and any future demand for drugs.
The problem is it's not just "junkies" who are affected by the tainted drugs. Casual drug users, like one of the president's assistants and Eggsy's girlfriend, who just happens to be a Swedish princess, are also infected. As a side note, the movie is from Fox Films which uses it's Fox News Channel to report on the crisis. Ironically, no one at The Fox News Network gets infected with the tainted drugs because, of course, none of the Fox anchors would use drugs.
The action in the movie is better than the humor, which is a one note song that replays over and over again. The "spy gadgets" are cool and there is also some key product placement of a few items that will be available for purchase online.
The movie is rated "R" for violence and some harsh language and it runs 2 hours and 21 minutes long. On my "Hollywood Popcorn Scale" Kingsman: The Golden Circle rates a LARGE.
Directed by: Matthew Vaughn
Cast: Taron Egerton, Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Channing Tatum, Jeff Bridges, Halle Berry, Julianne Moore
MPAA Rating: R
Runtime: 141 Min.
