Director Matthew Vaughn may not be the auteur that James Cameron or Christopher Nolan are, but when it comes to pure fun, his movies (X-Men: First Class, Kick-Ass, Kingsman: The Secret Service) continuously prove to be as exciting as anything out of mainstream Hollywood. Kingsman: The Golden Circle picks up where the 2014 original left off, with protagonist agent "Eggsy" Galahad (Taron Egerton) battling super villains all the world over in high-speed cars, atop of snow covered European mountains, and even in the jungles of Cambodia. The baddie this time around is Poppy Adams (a more charming than usual Julianne Moore), a drug cartel mastermind so twisted, she runs employees who've disappointed her through a mincing grinder, and does it without ever taking that sunny, happy-go-lucky smile off her face (she also keeps Elton John as her personal prisoner/entertainer, and the legendary musician's scenes are quite funny).
This sequel also introduces a few agents from the American secret service (Channing Tatum, Halle Berry and Jeff Bridges), appropriately called Statesman, whose cover is the manufacture of high-quality whisky in rural Kentucky. The movie is perhaps about fifteen or twenty too minutes too long, but at least it's action-packed and humorous in just the right doses (an old retiree in the Alps who comes very close to dying says, "That's the best shit I've taken in 3 weeks"; if that doesn't make you laugh, perhaps you have no sense of humor whatsoever), and moves at a kinetic pace despite its length. Kingsman: The Golden Circle is proof that Vaughn can turn typical action material (that most Hollywood directors would likely botch) into something unexpectedly amusing and appealing, and that is a true testament to his directing talents.
B
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