Kingsman: A New School Twist on Espionage

    Two years ago, my perception of the spy genre changed completely solely based off of one film in particular. This film that really caught my attention is Kingsman: The Secret Service, and it was written as well as directed by Matthew Vaughn, who is known for his work on Snatch, Kick-Ass, and X-Men: First Class. The film's star-studded cast consists of Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Samuel L. Jackson, and newcomer Taron Egerton. This film's witty humour and spin on the spy genre makes for an extremely refreshing and surprisingly hilarious crude James Bond movie.

    As the film begins, we are introduced to a modern world where a secret organization called the Kingsmen exist. This group of extremely skilled and highly trained spies carries out missions unregulated by any form of government and is a completely top secret society. When one of our spies is killed off in the very beginning of the film, we are then transported to his home where his wife and young son live. Just after he passes, one of the leaders of the group stops by to visit the wife and child of his colleague to let them know of the unfortunate news, and while doing so gives the young boy a token that he says he may use once to get him out of anything that he needs. Flash forward fifteen years and that little boy is now a twenty-something hailing from a poor neighborhood and it seems as though life won't stop beating down on him. That is until he gets caught back up with the Kingsmen when we uses his token to get out of jail. 

    The story then takes on the new life of training and becoming a Kingsman in the tryouts with several other people. After he officially becomes a Kingsman he is taken on missions with the other spies as they try to stop the villain from taking over the world with his mind-controlling phone and internet services. This film does justice to not only the action and comedy genres, but has many great callbacks and references to older James Bond and other spy movies. Kingsmen completely changed my outlook on the espionage genre as a whole and allowed me to appreciate them much more!

Insidious

    Six years ago I sat down in a movie theater and watched the scariest movie I had ever seen in my life at the time. Insidious is a paranormal horror film directed by popular director James Wan, who has directed countless big budget modern horror movies and has reshaped the genre as a whole in modern times. Insidious stars Rose Byrne, Patrick Wilson, Ty Simpkins and Andrew Astor as the Lambert family, a seemingly normal American family until one of their sons starts displaying odd behavior and shows signs of a possession. When their son becomes increasingly sick both physically and mentally, weirder things start to happen more and more and the doctor they have working with him doesn't seem to be working, so they call in a professional medium, Lin Shaye. The plot from here then goes into full catastrophic mode as the house begins to literally fill with bad spirits and ghosts who have "insidious" agendas, according to one of the character's in the film.
    What Insidious did to the horror genre as a whole is completely revolutionize it. Before this film, for many a years the world had not seen a horror movie up to this quality and general level of horror contained in the film. As seen now, this was not simply some big-budget horror movie with a horrendous script, but actually a diamond in the rough. This film set the precedent for the modern horror genre and created a revival for the genre and the film series that would go on to make millions off of the sequels.
     The director of this film, James Wan, has been a well known director for many years now with his first big hit Saw from 2004. Now James has not only solidified himself as one of the most genius horror directors of the 21st century, but has begun to explore new genres and isn't only sticking to horror. Insidious really captured my interest and love for the horror genre and has changed the opinion on how good these movies actually are in the eyes of the public. Until this day Insidious is the scariest movie I have ever seen and until we get something that shocks me more, I believe that this will go down as one of the best horror movies ever.