Another week, another review. This time i take a look at the brilliantly awesome, action packed Keanu-a-thon that is JOHN WICK. A slickly made, action film with some of the best action sequences in an American movie for quite sometime. Check out my letters formed into words after the jump!....
Action movies have
unfortunately become the go to genre to get families to visit cinemas
thanks to flicks like The Transformers and all the Marvel films. By
this they can ensure that a film will make it's budget back and then
continue to make a profit. This unfortunately leads to the majority
of non $100-mil plus studio action flicks getting released, slapped
with the devil of all the ratings, the PG-13. If an action film is
rated PG-13, it's a straight up guarantee there will be no on screen
blood, no sex or nudity and no foul language. I can understand where
the Studios are coming from because they obviously want to make money
but they're losing a lot of hard-core action fans in the process.
We know that violent
R rated action makes money, just look at these films, OLYMPUS HAS
FALLEN, LUCY, THE RAID, THE RAID 2, THE EQUILIZER, just to name a
few. So it's refreshing that one of the highest rated action films of
2014 and a film we have yet to see in the U.K, was R rated for strong
brutal violence, it kind of brings a smile to this sadists face. Now,
I love violent action films, that doesn't mean I’m fucked in the
head but I guess it comes from growing up watching films like
Commando and Predator and all those Cannon flicks from the 80s, so
those films are the level of violence I expect in major studio action
films. Now I know they need to make money but when you consider a
film like Olympus Has Fallen, a film with a budget of $80mil that
made a profit and became a hit, why can't studio's lower the budgets
and raise the ratings? It's an odd argument to have but it's one us
action fans want an answer to. Taken is a great example of studios
fucking up a franchise. Taken was a brutal, fast paced chase film, it
worked because it was awesome. Then comes Taken 2, toned down
violence, incomprehensible action scenes due to over editing and a
completely dumb-as-fuck story. It was terrible. Taken 3, while less
dumb-as-fuck than Taken 2, still suffered from the A.D.D style
editing where you can't see what the holy fuck is happening during
the action sequences. That's where JOHN WICK wins awesome points.
That’s where JOHN WICK becomes the U.S equivalent of THE RAID,
that's where JOHN WICK becomes the best American action film
since...well, TAKEN in 2008, that was a co-production with France.
That's not taking into account the brilliant work Isaac Florentine
has been doing outside of the Hollywood system with NINJA 2 or John
Hyams' UNIVERSAL SOLDIER: DAY OF RECKONING as those two movies show
Hollywood how shit should be done, but now with John Wick, 87Eleven,
the production/stunt team behind Jason Statham's awesome SAFE (2011),
have brought action choreography back to how it should be done, no
frenetic editing, bloody bullet hits and just badass action all the
way through.
John Wick has a
simple premise that works so wonderfully with the action. Most of
this is in the trailer so i'm not really spoiling anything here.
John Wick has just
lost his wife. Her last present to John is a dog. John is
apprehensive about the dog at first but quickly develops a bond with
the dog. While driving around one day he stops for gas in his 1969
Boss Mustang (an absolutely stunning car btw). While pumping his gas
he's approached by Theon Greyjoy off of Game Of Thrones and asks how
much he wants for the car. John turns him down and drives home.
During the night, John is woken by noises coming from inside his
house. Theon and his gang (Russian Mafia) have broken in. They kill
his dog and beat the shit out of him. Now he's pissed. They didn't
realise who he was until Theon's old man, the head of the Russian
mob, informs him that he killed the dog of John Wick, the most feared
contract killer in the history of contract killers and that he'll be
coming for him. The rest of the film is Wick's roaring rampage of
revenge and it's a glorious sight to behold.
What works so well
in John Wick is how the action flows so perfectly with the plot.
Sometimes, action scenes can feel awkward and misplaced but each beat
of action in Wick pushes the plot further on like it's a scene
transition. The was a problem with The Raid 2 because action scenes
would just come out of nowhere and didn't really move the plot along,
it's a plot device in John Wick. The action choreography is
incredible, these guys are well ahead of the game when it comes to
action scenes and the shoot-outs wouldn't be out of place in a John
Woo flick, they even reminded me of Gun-fu from Equilibrium. I once
read that John Woo once said that in his films, he always saw the gun
as an extension of the hand, and it certainly feels like Directors
David Leitch and Chad Stahelski took that sentence and used it as for
John Wick's incredible ability with a gun.
The Nightclub
shoot-out is the main stand out action sequence in the film as it's
the longest but each action scene has a tone of brilliantly
choreographed fights, Keanu even fights Daniel Bernhardt at one
point.
Keanu has had a bit
of shaky career since The Matrix movies, he's one of those action
stars who's not really an action star but when he shows up, he's full
on badass. He's only really made a handful of action films compared
to someone like Statham or Stallone etc, but each film has been
pretty damn awesome, Point Break, Speed, Chain Reaction, The Matrix
(plus sequels), Street Kings, The Man Of Tai Chi are all pretty
awesome flicks, it's only when he takes on non action roles that
people complain about him, particularly his acting. As John Wick he's
got that troubled killer role down to a Tee. I pretty much enjoy most
Keanu Movies and this one is up there with the likes of Point Break
and Speed as the ultimate Keanu Action Extravaganza.
Playing one of the
best on screen villains since Heath Ledger's chilling portrayal of
The Joker in The Dark Knight, Michael Nyqvist' Russian mob boss
Viggo, is not only a mean bastard but he's also sympathetic, comical
and scared shitless of John Wick for the most part. If only he'd
brought this much enthusiasm to his villainous role in the hugely
overrated Mission: Impossible: Ghost Patrol, he may have made that
film a lot more bearable. However, here, he's great fun, it's almost
as if he watched Robin Hood Prince of Thieves and Die Hard and used
Alan Rickman's performances as The Sheriff of Nottingham and Hans
Gruber as starting off point for Viggo. Brilliant none the less.
Added to the mix is
a host of familiar faces, Lance Reddick pops up as hotel concierge,
Lovejoy himself pops up, Dean Winters from OZ and Sarah Connor
Chronicles pops up as Viggo's shady lawyer, Alfie Alan plays Theon,
as pointed out earlier, Daniel Bernhardt appears as one of Viggo's
men, the brutally named Kirill and finally we get both Willem Defoe
and the sexy Adrianne Palicki both appear as rival contract killers
and both hold their own in the action sequences.
I was absolutely
blown away by JOHN WICK, everything worked for me, the action, the
acting, the directing, the soundtrack, the whole shebang!. For me
it's easily one of the best American action films in a very long time
and one of the best films of last year. Had I seen it before doing my
top 10 of 2014, it may have, no it would have pushed The Guest to the
number 2 slot and landed in at number 1, I thought it was that good.
It gets everything I can award a film on this, if there was an Oscar
for best fight choreography or action sequence, this badass movie
should get it.
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