THE KING’S MAN [2021 / 2022] [Blu-ray] [UK Release]
Discover the Origins of the very First Independent British Intelligence Agency!
Set during World War One, ‘THE KING’S MAN’ tells the exhilarating origin story of Kingsman, the world’s very first independent intelligence agency. As a collection of history’s worst tyrants and criminal masterminds gathers to plot a war to wipe out millions across the globe, one man must race against time to stop them.
The third instalment in the British Kingsman film series, which is based on the comic book “The Secret Service” (later retitled to “Kingsman”) by Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons, it is a prequel to ‘Kingsman: The Secret Service’ [2014] and ‘Kingsman: The Golden Circle’ [2017].
FILM FACT No.1: Awards and Nominations: 2022 International Film Music Critics Award: Nominated: Best Original Score for an Action/Adventure/Thriller Film for Dominic Lewis and Matthew Margeson. 2022 Set Decorators Society of America: Nominated: Best Achievement in Decor/Design of a Fantasy or Science Fiction Feature Film for Darren Gilford and Dominic Capon.
FILM FACT No.2: In June 2018, Matthew Vaughn announced that a prequel film titled ‘Kingsman: The Great Game’ was in active development, stating that the plot would take place during the early 1900’s and would depict the formation of the spy agency and that the project would film back-to-back with “the third regular Kingsman film” which was scheduled to be released in 2021. In September 2018, it was announced that Ralph Fiennes and Harris Dickinson would star in the prequel with the former also serving as one of the executive producers of the film.
Cast: Djimon Hounsou, Ralph Fiennes, Shaun McKee, Peter York, Matthew Goode, Charles Dance, Alexandra Maria Lara, Alexander Shaw, Bevan Viljoen, Harris Dickinson, Gemma Arterton, Shaun Scott, Andrew Bridgmont, Rhys Ifans, Valerie Pachner, Daniel Brühl, Joel Basman, Todd Boyce, Richard Stephenson Winter, Takako Akashi, Thorston Manderlay, Terence Anderson, Andy Cheung, Ron Cook, Barbara Drennan, Maja Simonsen, Benedick Blythe, Max Count, Emil Oksanen, George Gooderham, Alexa Povah, Tom Hollander, Branka Katic, Alexander Shefler, Rosie Goddard, Dora Davis, Lucia Jade Barker, Molly McGeachin, Angus Castle-Doughty, Jed O'Hagan, Thomas Mahy, Connor Calland, James Musgrave, Martin Razpopov, Aaron Vodovoz, Gabriela Calun, Gabriel Constantin, Vår Haugholt, Ronja Haugholt, Alyona Kazarova, Fiz Marcus, Nina Novich, Andrey Andreev, August Diehl, Nigel Lister, Daniel Vernan, Nigel Pilkington, Ed Cooper-Clarke, Stevee Davies, Alison Steadman, Russell Balogh, Kristian Wanzi Nekrasov, Stefan Schiffer, Tim Bruce, Hal Hillman, Ian Kelly, David Calvitto, Ian Porter, Simon Connolly, Alexander Cobb, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Emun Elliott, James Backway, Cassidy Little, Neil Jackson, Ben Ayers, Gwithian Evans, Cory Stuckey, Timon Staehler, Timothy Blore, Ross Anderson, Robert Aramayo, Remus Brooks, Felix Mosse, Will Pattle, Amy Leeson, Dolores Carbonari, Stanley Tucci, Pippa Winslow, David Kross, Olivier Richters, Eliah Arnstjerna (uncredited), Claire Ashton (uncredited), Lasco Atkins (uncredited), Jeremy Azis (uncredited), Ross Bailey (uncredited), Mateusz Balcerek (uncredited), Anna Ballantine (uncredited), Jon Bentley (uncredited), Pierre Bergman (uncredited), Chloé Booyens (uncredited), David Byrne (uncredited), Christine Callaghan (uncredited), Callum Chiplin (uncredited), Paul Philip Clark (uncredited), Zachary Coleman (uncredited), Stuart Cumming (uncredited), Jack Cunningham-Nuttall (uncredited), Mark Anthony Dawson (uncredited), Herbert Forthuber (uncredited), Hal Fowler (uncredited), Kya Garwood (uncredited), Albert Giannitelli (uncredited), Constantine Gregory (uncredited), Peter Hardy (uncredited), Zak Holland (uncredited), Tobias James-Samuels (uncredited), Charli Janeway (uncredited), Rasneet Kaur (uncredited), Chris Kaye (uncredited), Jake Kemp (uncredited), Denis Khoroshko (uncredited), Renars Latkovskis (uncredited), Jhon Lumsden (uncredited), Louis Mackenzie (uncredited), Katarina Martin (uncredited), Tiago Martins (uncredited), Tomás Paredes (uncredited), Phil Reeve (uncredited), Sam Rintoul (uncredited), Ben Matthew Saunders (uncredited), Jake Siame (uncredited), Jessie Vinning (uncredited) and Will Willett (uncredited)
Director: Matthew Vaughan, p.g.a.
Producers: Adam Bohling p.g.a., Angus More Gordon, Carlos Peres, Claudia Schiffer, Cliff Lanning, Dave Gibbons, David Reid p.g.a., Mark Millar, Matthew Vaughn p.g.a., Ralph Fiennes, Stephen Marks
Screenplay: Karl Gajdusek (screenplay), Matthew Vaughan, p.g.a. (screenplay/story), Dave Gibbons (based on the comic book “The Secret Service”) and Mark Millar (based on the comic book “The Secret Service”)
Composers: Dominic Lewis and Matthew Margeson
Costume Designer: Michele Clapton
Cinematography: Ben Davis, B.S.C. (Director of Photography)
Image Resolution: 1080p
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1
Audio: English: 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio
English: 2.0 Descriptive Audio
French: 7.1 Dolby Digital Plus Audio
English: 2.0 Dolby Digital Stereo Audio
Subtitles: English SDH, French and Netherlands
Running Time: 130 minutes
Region: All Regions
Number of discs: 1
Studio: 20th Century Studios / MARV
Andrew’s Blu-ray Review: ‘THE KING’S MAN’ [2021] is set in the early years of the 20th century, and the Kingsman agency is formed to stand against a cabal plotting a war to wipe out millions. Here we go back in time to World War I, and returning director Matthew Vaughn where he decided to adapt the comic books from Mark Miller and Dave Gibbons, but this time with Karl Gajdusek handling script duties and is certainly taking the Kingsman franchise series in a different direction.
Over two years on from its initial release date, a prequel to the very successful Kingsman franchise and grossing over $800million to date, has finally overcome its seemingly interminable number of delays. ‘THE KING’S MAN’ is a delightfully simple play on words, takes us back over 100 years to witness the birth of the most covert of covert operations. This latest offering serves as a rewarding shift change for the series following the mixed critical reception of its previous instalment, ‘Kingsman: The Golden Circle.’
The story centres on war veteran turned Red Cross supporter Orlando Oxford aka Duke of Oxford [Ralph Fiennes], effectively performing a role similar to that of Colin Firth who performed twice in the present-day timeline Kingsman films. Orlando Oxford is resistant to letting his son Conrad Oxford [Harris Dickinson], honourably join the war. Not only does the Orlando Oxford have a first-hand experience of those horrors, but he and a much younger Conrad Oxford were each traumatized by witnessing matriarch Emily Oxford [Alexandra Maria Lara] gunned down. As a result, Orlando Oxford is deeply terrified of possibly losing his son to senseless violence, sheltering the 18-year-old on the verge of 19-year-old as much as possible.
In addition, being set around the early part of the 20th century, means the inclusion of several almost cliché elements of a period British piece such as the war, controversial historical figures, and the tense relations between England and Scotland.
While ‘THE KING’S MAN’ also involves creating the spy organization full of gentlemen and including a cameo appearance of the tailor shop itself, it’s more concerned with telling a rather bland tale about war and nobility, or rather, reputation and character. Orlando Oxford still operates from the shadows unbeknownst to Conrad Oxford, who is mocked and labelled a coward for not enlisting. Conrad Oxford desperately wants to serve and earn medals like his father, whereas Orlando Oxford believes there is a silent way to improve the world, hence the conversation regarding perception and actions.
Orlando Oxford has also established an underground network, which is just a hidden basement attached to a secret door in his office, where various estate personnel such as nanny Polly Watkins aka Galahad [Gemma Arterton] and Shola aka Merlin [Djimon Hounsou] and others capable of obtaining information or planting characters in locations with ease whenever it benefits the plot. A network of these academic intellectuals searching for and exchanging secrets could make for its own exciting slice of action espionage, but here it’s reduced to just another plot element worth mentioning.
The same goes for the villainous band of misfits operating out of Scottish mountains, each meant to have a distinct character but mostly just come across forgettable and barely thought out, like everyone else here. On the villainous side, seemingly supernatural Russian monk Grigori Rasputin [Rhys Ifans] an eccentric wizard-bearded nutter, is the exception, with one of ‘THE KING’S MAN’ more entertaining stretches following an attempt at seduction through sweets and something else that won’t be revealed here. It can be said that it leads to thrilling one-on-one combat involving dancelike fight choreography, bringing to mind some of the crazier combat stances in the first film.
Rasputin in real life was very crazy despot as portrayed in the film, even crazier actually in real life. The scenes with the son almost dying and Rasputin controlling the Tsar and his wife by seeming to heal him was also spot on. Again, check out photos of the real Rasputin. The film really nailed it!
One thing that really annoyed me about the film is having Tom Hollander play King George, Kaiser Wilhelm and Tsar Nicholas, which to me did not work and was so pathetic and insulting acting and instead they should have had three different actors playing those real people. But one saving grace was the brilliant actress Gemma Arterton playing Polly Watkins aka Galahad: A maid and member of Orlando's spy network, who was totally brilliant as always in whatever film she appears in.
By the way, you need to know your history about World War One to appreciate this film. This film was an excellent retelling of the history of World War One. Second, the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand really happened almost exactly as portrayed with the bomb being thrown at his carriage, but misses but blows up the car behind, the Archduke Ferdinand escapes and goes to the Town Hall to give them a speech and a piece of his mind on the attempt, then his car makes a wrong turn and stalls right in front of the Bosnian Serb student Gavrilo Princip [Joel Basman] who promptly shoots the Archduke Ferdinand and his wife.
The film is fast paced in places; however, the story does get a little lost along the way. Anyway, ‘THE KING’S MAN’ feels like a successful effort to right any wrongs the previous film ‘Kingsman: The Golden Circle’ might of made. It’s terrifically entertaining, capitalises on the star power of its leading actors and its key supporting cast who all give great performances apart from Tom Hollander, tells a genuinely interesting story behind the scenes of the First World War, and delivers some mightily satisfying action sequences along the way. Forgiving a few storytelling missteps, ‘THE KING’S MAN’ is really a journey of discovery. Please Note: Watch the end credits until about half way, where you get a sneak peek of probably a new exciting Kingsman film.
THE KING’S MAN MUSIC TRACK LIST
MATTHEW CUBED (Written by Dominic Lewis, Matthew Margeson and Matthew Vaughn)
IT’S A LONG WAY TO TIPPERARY (Traditional) (Written by Henry James “Harry” Williams and Jack Judge)
1812 OVERTURE (Written by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky)
MEASURE OF MAN (Cinematic Version) (Written by Tahliah Debrett Barnett, Amanda Ghost, Jane Goldman, Jamie Hartman, John Hill, Dominic Lewis, Matthew Margeson and Matthew Vaughn) [Performed by FKA TWIGS]
SCOTLAND THE BRAVE (Traditional)
THEMES FROM THE NUTCRACKER (Written by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky)
HAPPY BIRTHDAY (Written by Mildred Hill and Patty Hill)
MEASURE OF MAN (Written by Tahliah Debrett Barnett, Amanda Ghost, Jane Goldman, Jamie Hartman, John Hill, Dominic Lewis, Matthew Margeson, Oakley Neil, H T Caesar – Su and Matthew Vaughn) [Performed by FKA TWIGS featuring CENTRAL LEE]
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Blu-ray Image Quality – 20th Century Studios presents the film ‘THE KING’S MAN’ with a totally amazing 1080p image and shown in a spectacular 2.39:1 aspect ratio. Sourced from a 2K Digital Intermediate and really packs a punch. One thing I thoroughly enjoyed about this prequel was the change of setting and the time period of World War 1 and how it totally opened up the Kingsman franchise visually. There’s a lot of attention paid to small details in costuming, production design, and character makeup. For all of these aspects details are fantastic. The spectrum of colours, like the bold blues, yellows and deep crimson reds. Whites are bright and crisp without blooming. Black levels are nice and inky with some great shadow separation. Scenes in the barn where the diabolical bad guys gather are low-lit but look terrific without losing any depth or small details while avoiding any inherent problems. So all in all, this is a real visual extravaganza treat.
Blu-ray Audio Quality – 20th Century Studios brings us the film ‘THE KING’S MAN’ with a spectacular 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio experience. Dialogue is clean and clear throughout without any issues. The composed film score by Dominic Lewis and Matthew Margeson is very active and totally engaging with some great plays on the classical compositions of the World War One era. From some of the quieter conversational moments inside the Kingsman tailor shop to the high-flying aerial hijinks opening the climactic final act, there’s great channel movement and pinpoint object placement. My favourite moments are the fight sequences, namely the Rasputin dance fight and then the No Man’s Land fight scene. The Rasputin fight is loud, gregarious, and really out there with a lot of whizzbang and then conversely the No Man’s Land fight is tight and deathly quiet but still finds ways to use all of the channels effectively. But then you have the final battle and that’s a lot of activity hitting front-centre-left-right-rear and above - often all at the same time. Overheads get a lot of work for object-specific effects as well as letting some of the larger locations sounds and feel expansive. So all in all, this is a real audio extravaganza treat.
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Blu-ray Special Features and Extras:
Special Feature: THE KING’S MAN: The Great Game Begins [2021] [1080p] [2.39:1 / 1.78:1] [89:33] Here we get to view six special featurettes and they are: A Generation Lost, Oxford and Rogues, All The World’s A Stage, Instruments of War, Fortune Favours the Bold and Long Live the Kingdom. Here Matthew Vaughn opens up by revealing in great detail that he was originally thinking of producing a Television series for the background original story for ‘THE KING’S MAN,’ but he also had an idea for a period film. But most of all Matthew Vaughan wanted to make ‘THE KING’S MAN’ an epic adventure, while making the first Kingsman film for the third franchise film, but with ‘THE KING’S MAN’ wanted to make a historic film on how the Kingsman organisation was first founded. Matthew Vaughan also wanted to show in ‘THE KING’S MAN’ the upstairs and downstairs hierarchy of the Orlando Oxford aka Duke of Oxford estate, but with a twist, in showing Orlando Oxford was a very modern renaissance man where all the staff is treated equally and is also his friends. When Matthew Vaughan was doing the original screenplay, he always had certain actors in mind to appear in the film, and wanted Ralph Fiennes as the lead Kingsman character Orlando Oxford. Matthew Vaughan was initially not very knowledge on how World War One started and so went about reading up as many books on the subject, so for the film tried to show as accurate as possible how the event shook the world. We get to hear the views from the main actors on how their characters should be portrayed in the film. Matthew Vaughan says that to make the film it all revolves round casting, casting, casting and if you don’t cast right, because it doesn’t matter how good the music is, the script, the cinematography, the editing, and if you miss cast, you’re dead. We are informed that they used an 800 mm on the camera and it was the same lens that Sir David Lean used on the film ‘Lawrence of Arabia,’ and Panavision had it all cleaned up for the film ‘THE KING’S MAN.’ When get to the final featurette “Long Live the Kingdom” we see scenes from the recording studio with all the musicians, composers and director and we are informed that they worked on the film score 18 months before shooting of the film started, because director Matthew Vaughn wanted to try lots of different styles of music to finally chose which composed music will suit certain scenes in the film and to give final approval of what music score suits what scene in a particular part of the film. Finally, throughout the different featurettes we are taken through an incredibly detailed, feature length making of for the film featuring interviews with the cast and crew as well as behind the scenes footage, historical photographs and more. Contributors include: Matthew Vaughan, p.g.a. [Director / Producer / Co-Screenwriter], Ralph Fiennes [Orlando Oxford / Executive Producer], Rhys Ifans [Grigori Rasputin], Tom Hollander [King George / Kaiser Wilhelm / Tsar Nicolas], Darren Gilford [Production Designer], Michael Clapton [Costume Designer], Ben Davis, B.S.C. [Director of Photography], Gemma Arterton [Polly Watkins], Harris Dickinson [Conrad Oxford], Charles Dance [Kitchener], Matthew Goode [Morton], Djimon Hounsou [Shola], Daniel Brühl [Erik Jan Hanussen], Valerie Pachner [Marti Hari], Joel Basman [Gavrilo Princip], Stanley Tucci [United States Ambassador], Aaron Taylor-Johnson [Archie Reid], Angus Bickerton [Visual Effects Supervisor], Alex Fordham [Military Costume Advisor / Designer], Jenny Shorcore [Hair & Make-Up Designer], Brian Neighbour [Construction Manager], Oliver Benson [Assistant Art Director], Brad Allan [Second Unit Director / Supervising Stunt Coordinator], Mark Ginther [Stunt Coordinator], Joe Geary [First Assistant Director Second Unit], Alex Boswell [Supervising Standby Prop], Guillermo Grispo [Second Unit Director / Fight Coordinator], Harley Durst [Stunt Double], Joe Baker [Supervising Armourer Second Unit], Adam Bohling, p.g.a. [Producer], David Reid, p.g.a. [Producer], Matthew Margeson [Co-Composer], Dominic Lewis [Co-Composer] and Jack Dolman [Supervising Music Editor]. Please Note: As usual, you can watch each featurette separately or Play All.
Special Feature: No Man’s Land: Silent Knife Fight Sequence Breakdown [2021] [1080p] [2.39:1 / 1.78:1 / 1.37:1] [15:43] With this special feature it concentrates on all different fight scenes in no man’s land in the First World War trenches and a more specific rundown of how the very athletic sequences came together and choreographed to make it look totally horrific and very realistic and also to show how the futility of the conflict was totally pointless, where no one really wins in the end. We get to view some vintage Black and White First World War film clips courtesy of the Library of Congress and the national Archives and Records Administration, USA. We also get special interviews, storyboards, concept art and much more. Contributors include: Matthew Vaughan, p.g.a. [Director / Producer / Co-Screenwriter], Alex Fordhan [Military Costume Advisor / Designer], Brad Allan [Second Unit Director / Supervising Stunt Coordinator], Joe Geary [First Assistant Director Second Unit], Michaele Clapton [Costume Designer], Jon Baker [Supervising Armourer Second Unit], Harris Dickinson [Conrad Oxford], Neil Jackson [Captain Forrest], Chris Cowan [Action Designer], Guillermo Grispo [Second Unit Director / Fight Coordinator], Max White [2nd Unit Fight Coordinator] and Waldo Mason [Prosthetics Supervisor].
Remembrance and Finding Purpose [2021] [1080p] [1.78:1] [26:28] This special feature highlights actual organizations and such that remember and take care of soldiers and veterans. Director Matthew Vaughn says about ‘THE KING’S MAN’ that “This is an anti-war film but it’s not an anti-soldier film,” but more so the courage of mainly the men who died in the First World War. Matthew Vaughn says that he gets very upset that the soldiers especially who fought in the First World War who received very poor pay for what they had to do on the battlefields and the trenches in defending democracy and ‘THE KING’S MAN’ film celebrates all the heroes who fought in any wars and also we should all support mainly The Royal British Legion for all their tireless support they do to support all injured service men and women. This special feature is honouring everyone in the armed services and especially all that have been badly injured and helping them to recover back into society and we also should support The Royal British Legion and Help For heroes who do such sterling work in supporting everyone. Contributors include: Matthew Vaughan, p.g.a. [Director / Producer / Co-Screenwriter], Martin Tye [Veteran, Former Lance Corporal of the Royal Logistic Corps, British Army], Beckie Ingram [Serving Member of The Royal Air Force], Le hardy [Veteran, Royal Corps of Signals, British Army Sergeant Instructor at The Royal Legion’s Battle Back Centre], Ian Thomas [Officer Commanding at The Royal British Legion’s Battle Back Centre], Anthony Cooper [Veteran, Former Kingsman of the 1st Battalion Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment], Naomi Hall [Former Senior Aircraft of the Woman In Logistics for the Royal Air Force], Leon Parker [British Army Veteran / Chef de Parlie], Nick Redshaw [Royal Marines Veteran / Chairman of the Royal Marines Art Society], Megan Harris [Wife of British Army Veteran, Joe Dillnutt], James gardener [British Army veteran of the Royal Army Medical Corps – Commissioned Officer], Annette Penfold MBE [Royal Navy Reserves], Alex Owen [Former British Army Officer, Household Cavalry Head of Armed Forces Engagement, The Royal British Legion], Louis Nethercott [Former Royal Marines Commando / Peer Development Lead, Help For Heroes Recovery College 2017 – 2021], Hannah Lawton [Sports Recovery Manager – Help For Heroes], Carl Shadrake [Former Lance Sergeant of The Grenadier Guards / British Army Triathlete], Peter Dunning [Royal Marine Veteran Athlete of the Wheelchair Rugby / Wheelchair Racing / Paralympic Skiing], Lee Patmore [Royal Navy Veteran Personal Trainer / Inclusion Advisor] and Mark Hepworth [British Army Veteran / Direcror of The Flat Cap Coffee Roasting Company Ltd.].
Official Red Band Trailer [2021] [1080p] [2.39:1] [1:47] This is the Original Theatrical Trailer for the film ‘THE KING’S MAN.’
Finally, ‘THE KING’S MAN’ is a solid enjoyable period action romp and 20th Century Studios and MARV brings us this amazing Blu-ray disc with a pretty delightful presentation in both image and audio presentation. Not to be missed is Rhys Ifans as Rasputin, a diabolical force in getting the Soviet Union to withdraw from the war, to the delight of Germany and the dismay of England. When Rasputin battles with Orlando Oxford, the screen comes alive with Russian-style dancing-swordplay, Rasputin's lusts, and plain old good dialogue. Director Matthew Vaughn allows his actors to express themselves wildly but with a modicum of Brit-like decorum fitting of the balance between dark history and playful replay. Besides the memorable Rasputin swordplay, in the final act, when Oxford uses a new-fangled parachute to storm the supreme villain's high mountain hide out, the stunt work is just short of breathless, coupled with CGI to give a James Bond feel to the spy shenanigans. The major historical figures are Kaiser Wilhelm, King George, and Tsar Nicholas-all played entertainingly by Tom Hollander. I was equally pleasantly surprised by the imaginative re-creation of history and the low-key humour, so evocative of the British stereotype. But most of all actor Ralph Fiennes sure does know his way around the screen. It is quite surprising how terrific the extras provided are, given the film sadly did not have a box office success. But, there’s a feature length making-of on here as well as some other goodies to go along with it. This is a really nice, well rounded disc for a very decent film that I truly loved and so proud to have it in my Kingsman franchise collection. Very Highly Recommended!
Andrew C. Miller – Your Ultimate No.1 Film Aficionado
Le Cinema Paradiso
United Kingdom
