Kingsman: The Secret Service

Kingsman is a comical action film, with secret agents, high-tech weaponry, and international espionage, as well as intermittent jolts of crazed satire and broad spoofs of several sorts. It’s a mostly entertaining stew of movie ingredients, but erratic in ways that dilute and dull down the whole enterprise. While the spoofing of James Bond films is mostly affectionate and inconsequential, the parts of the story involving spy agencies, Internet moguls, global conspiracies, and semi-futuristic technology are a rather unstable mix of sci-fi extravagance, furious satire and fanboy jokiness. Colin Firth, who plays a foppish variation on the Bond-type super spy, acquits himself nicely in the dialog scenes but is pretty clearly out of his element in the movie’s blindingly souped-up fight scenes. Samuel L. Jackson is sharp and stingingly funny as the wide-eyed, lisping Internet mogul with sinister plans. Taron Egerton is mostly likable as Gary “Eggsy” Unwin, the fledgling secret agent whom the veteran Harry Hart (Firth) hopes to bring to the special “Kingsman” branch of the British secret services. Cinemark 14, Feather River Cinemas and Paradise Cinema 7. Rated R