Argylle’s success as an action comedy is chequered

Matthew Vaughn takes his already hyperactive spy movie sensibilities and turns them up to eleven with Argylle, a sugar rush of a spy thriller if your sugar happens to be of the Bolivian marching variety. Tiptoeing a fine line between self-indulgence and self-parody, Vaughn embarks on a wild, metatextual rollercoaster ride that twists and turns so wildly, it is as likely to leave you dazed and confused as it is to leave you shaken or stirred.

Argylle introduces us to the world of Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard), a successful yet reclusive author whose fictional world of espionage collides with her secluded reality in the most unexpected and spectacular way. When Elly encounters Aidan (Sam Rockwell), a bona fide spy, on a cross-country train journey, she and her cat are thrust into a globe-trotting adventure to uncover a shadowy conspiracy that blurs the lines between her imagination and the real world. Along for the ride is the star of her blockbuster novels, impossibly suave Secret Agent Argylle (Henry Cavill), acting as her surreal and sardonic Jiminy Cricket-style conscience.

Bryce Dallas Howard is having an absolute blast as Elly, although she’s arguably more fun as the timid author reacting to the violence erupting around her than the more seasoned character she becomes later in the film. Her chemistry with Sam Rockwell, who slips into the slapstick charm of Aidan with practiced ease, is a delightful dynamic, injecting a dose of humour and heart into the often chaotic storyline. Henry Cavill, likewise, gets to cut loose and send up the po-faced Bond archetype with a deliciously tongue-in-cheek take on the concept of the ‘celebrity spy’ archetype, adding an additional layer of meta-commentary to a film that’s already hyper-self-aware. Vaughn’s unmistakable directorial style is in full, unadulterated flow in the kinetic action sequences, the playful tone and vibrant energy, and the multiplying, fractal plot twists that proliferate like a magician pulling rabbits out of hats with gleeful disregard for plausibility.

In almost every respect, Argylle‘s strengths are also the source of its flaws. The plot is overly convoluted, with an excessive number of twists that can leave the audience feeling more dizzy than dazzled. The film’s hefty two-and-a-half-hour runtime is one where you feel every minute, with some sequences or schtick dragging on longer than needed, making you wish for an editor with a licence to kill some darlings. The visual effects and fight choreography, while often impressive, are occasionally unpolished and undermined by Vaughn’s fondness for a more cartoony aesthetic. With such a crowded plot, a healthy guest cast is often underused, but the likes of John Cena, Ariana DeBose, and Dua Lipa give it a good go when they get the chance.

Unlike the sleek tailoring of the Kingsman films, Argylle constantly seems like it might come apart at the seams under the bulging muscles of its own ambition. The film’s meta-narrative twist, while novel, doesn’t feel quite as clever as the classic Romancing the Stone or the more recent The Lost City, both of which played with authors caught up in real-life adventures with more grounded and coherent storytelling. Where Romancing the Stone thrives on the chemistry between its leads and a straightforward adventure plot, Argylle gets bogged down by its excessive narrative layers and tonal shifts, something The Lost City managed more successfully, albeit with a more straightforward story to tell. Vaughn’s penchant for over-the-top action and lowbrow humour is evident, but here it feels more like a carpet-bombing barrage than a series of surgical strikes, leaving the audience often as overwhelmed as they are entertained.

In the end, Argylle is more Inspector Gadget than Q-Branch’s finest: technically ambitious, ingeniously impressive, and wildly creative for sure, but prone to malfunction in unexpected ways and occasionally backfiring at the crucial moment. The cast and crew are clearly having a blast making it, and that sense of joie de chaos does spill off the screen into the audience. Like a few too many vodka martinis, you’ll have fun, you’ll feel dizzy, but don’t be surprised if you’re left nursing a hangover.