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Date: 2/1/2022
In theaters: “The King’s Man”
A prequel to the successful “King’s Men” franchise, I had high hopes for this film that looked, at least by its trailer, to be a fun period adventures film. Trailers, of course, can lie.
Instead, I treated myself to two-plus hours I will never get back to a remarkably terrible motion picture written and directed by Matthew Vaughn, a filmmaker whose previous work illustrates he knows how to make a good movie. He directed “Layer Cake,” a superior gangster/crime film; the Neil Gaimen fantasy film “Stardust;” the superhero film “Kick Ass”; and the first two “Kingsmen” movies. He is certainly capable of doing a good movie but for whatever reason, he missed the mark with the film.
Essentially an origin story, we are introduced to the Duke of Oxford (played by Ralph Fiennes), who has excelled in war as a soldier but is now a dedicated pacifist. When his wife dies, he vows to protect their son no matter what.
Fast forward a dozen years and the world is about to be embroiled in the first World War, a conflict he forbids his son from joining.
It turns out the global conflict is being stoked by a villain known as The Shepherd. He has assembled agents to destabilize Europe so he can destroy Great Britain. The Duke, becoming more and more aware of what is going on, starts an espionage operation with the operatives being British domestic servants working around Europe and the United States.The Duke’s closest aides are Djimon Hounsou as Shola and Gemma Arterton as Pollyanna.
Just like Tonto and Kato are the brains in “The Lone Ranger” and “The Green Hornet,” respectively, these characters are the ones who have organized much of the intelligence operation.
Okay, That’s all fine. The film starts to fall apart when the story focuses on The Shepherd. Through the film he is seen only in the shadows fueling the notion he is actually another character in the story. He is.
He lives on the top of a small mesa in central Europe in a barn with goats. There is a tiny elevator, but we are to assume he has access to both water and electricity, although there is no logic in that.
The logic falters in other parts of the film, such as having Rasputin – yes, he is one of The Shepherd’s agents – do an entire fight scene as if he was dancing. That became old and stupid quite quickly.
Then there is the storyline that America won’t enter WWI and save Europe because The Shepherd has sent a female agent to the White House so she can seduce the president. She gives him a lap dance in the Oval Office, which is filmed, creating considerable leverage.
This is 1917, not 2017.
The climax of the film is set up when the Duke stops another female agent, strangling her with her own scarf. That scarf is made – wait for it – of cashmere from goats who live at only one place in the world, The Shepherd’s mesa!
At this point I wanted to do some strangling myself of the director who also wrote the script.
By the way, there is a scene in the credits that is predictably stupid.
The film is a beautifully produced period piece with some very competent performers. The problem is it is written on a grade C comic book level. It’s sad there was clearly a lot of money spent on the film and yet the director chose some moronic story-telling choices.
This is a terribly disappointing film to say the least.