Kingsman : The Secret Service [2015]

Language - English
Director - Matthew Vaughn
Run Time - 2 hours, 9 minutes
Genre - Action/Comedy
Starring - Taron Egerton, Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Samuel L Jackson and Michael Caine.

Kinsgman : The Secret Service remains a tale of two halves. While the first half of the movie was exciting and intriguing, the climax leaves you to wonder IS THIS FOR REAL? This could have been one of the best movies of the year, had the finale been executed in a better fashion. To put it in another way, the movie gears you up for 'Avengers' and delivers to you 'Daredevil'. The audience was lost when the plot stopped making sense. To be honest, I expected much more from the director of X-Men First Class and Kick Ass.

Hollywood bigwigs - Colin Firth, Michael Caine, Sameul L Jackson and Mark Strong give fantastic performances, as is expected from them. But what ticked me off was that Michael Caine was given such a small role considering his enormous acting talent. Taron Eagerton as 'Eggsy' and Sophie Cookson as 'Roxy' delivered some good performances. Be sure to have an eye out for them in the future.

The movie starts off with a secret agent being KIA, and his family being given a medal with a number at the back to call in time of dire need. The son would grow on to be our protagonist, Eggsy. Egssy has no goals and aims in life and always gets in to trouble. One such time landed him into jail. He calls the number and gets freed by the secret service. He is subsequently recruited into being a Kinsgman and ultimately saving the world from the Internet Billionaire Valentine [Jackson] who is hell bent on killing the 'extra' people on the planet to save it.

And BOOM, this is where reality disappears and  we get embroiled into a world of fantasy. Eggsy is able to battle countless of soldiers without getting a scratch and bombs turn into something in the image of fireworks.

I admit, there's a sense of suave and class around the film. The action seems to be well crafted and the movie has been shot excellently, but for me a film must cater to logic which it fails to, and thus disappoints.

It could be a one time watch.

My Rating - 7.1/10 

The Imitation Game [2014]

Language - English
Director - Morten Tyldum
Run Time - 1 hour, 54 minutes
Genre - Drama/Thriller
Starring - Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley and Mark Strong

One would say that they have watched one too many movies based on the second World War, but none as intriguing and as brilliantly made as The Imitation Game. The Imitation Game is as good as a historical movie could get. Its constant shift between the three time periods makes it even more interesting.

Benedict Cumberbatch stars as Alan Turing, a young, yet cocky genius who is called on to help crack Enigma, which is the Nazis' encryption machine. Turing can be called narcissistic, rude and impossible to work with. Until he meets Joan Clarke [Kiera Knightley] who makes him understand the need to work with others. From thereon, all of them work on to crack the encryption code and help Britain win the war.

Someone who did not know about this extraordinary man - Alan Turing gets a solid introduction to this complex individual and his extraordinary work which led to the first model of the modern computer. The fact that Alan Turing's cracking of Enigma was kept a secret for 50 years is also astonishing.

Hugh Alexander is an interesting character played by Matthew Goode, who was earlier against Turing, but finally got around to crack the 'Enigma' together. Goode shows promise and is capable of having lead roles in the future. Adding to that, even Mark Strong played a small, yet fine role as Major General Stewart Menzies

Cumberbatch has now proven himself to be among the Grade-A actors in Hollywood with a plethora of brilliant performances to his name now, be it in film, television or the theater.

Well made movie, with some brilliant acting and good background score, The Imitation Game is a must watch.

My Rating - 8.9/10