38. Kingsman: The Golden Circle

Firstly, again this is incredibly late. I have two films to
catch up on, this, and IT. I don’t feel so guilty about not catching up on
either. Kingsman is simply not great, and I feel everyone has seen IT. My
excuse for my lateness, is that I have started my Masters at uni, and been
juggling various types of work, uni timetabling, weekend activities. It turns
out that if you do a Masters, you have to do work outside of uni. Who knew! So
here we are. As you probably already know, my new years resolution was to write
my blog for every 2017 film I see, hence the catch up.

You might have seen me reference the original Kingsman film
in a previous review. I watched the first film for the first time a month or so
ago, in preparation for the sequel. I really enjoyed it. I found it a good
balance of comedy and action, and found the plot interesting. Predictable in
parts, but an easy watch. I found parts of the comedy sexist and dated, but I
attributed this to it being a slightly older film, and perhaps whenever it was
released, there wasn’t enough publicity around what is acceptable and what is
not. Not that that excuses it.

So coming into the sequel, I was actually really excited. I
was ready for an easy funny film that would keep my attention. What actually
happened, was that I was watching a really bizarre, silly and offensive film. I
feel the plot line was just quite silly, but not in a clever or surreal way.
The main idea is that Poppy (Julianne Moore) is trying to control population by killing off
anyone who takes drugs. A chemical is produced that when reacting with someone
who has taken drugs, they start a process in their body, starting with a purple
rash, moving to ‘mania’ and then freezing, and finally death. Here Eggsy (Taron Egerton) must save the day, and stop the chemical from being released throughout the
world. Obviously the film takes the stance that people who take drugs clearly
shouldn’t die (which probably still isn't the view of some people) but I felt the
film could have explored social issues and reasons why people may take drugs
more.

I also have problems with the way mental health was
perceived in the film. At one point I remember the main nemesis being described
as ‘having mental health issues as a child’. If that isn’t stigma, then I don’t
know what is. Also the so called ‘mania’ portrayed in the film is nothing like
mania, a medical term for a type of mental illness, or a symptom. Again, not
helping the stigma. My working background is in mental health, and I don’t
think some people who are hospitalised due to manic symptoms would be best
pleased to see their condition stereotyped as dancing around and listening to
loud music in a blockbuster film. It’s not particularly helping to educate the
audience, but more contributing to the stigma created by society.

Another strange thing about the film is the presence of
Elton John. He’s in the film loads and swears occasionally and is generally
made a spectacle out of. Why did he agree to being part of this??? It’s not
like he needs the money. I found it so strange, and it didn’t contribute to the
plot at all, except that robot dogs wouldn’t kill him as he was Elton John.
Very strange experience, I felt like I was on drugs myself just watching it.

I can understand why some people would enjoy the film, in a
similar way to how people would enjoy Zoolander 2. Actually I’m not that sure
why you would enjoy this film, but George and Bailey did. Maybe this is your
thing. It definitely did not live up to the original film, so I can only give
it a 5/10. I give it a 5/10 as Zoolander 2 got a 4 and it was marginally better
than that, and clearly, looking at the box office figures, this must be the
type of thing some people enjoy.