Review: John Wick

With a forth film, a television prequel and a spin-off movie all scheduled for a 2023 release, i=the John Wick franchise has certainly grown behind its humble beginnings. In fact, going back to the first film in preparation, I’m surprised just how simplistic the story truly is, but that is in no way a complaint,this is pure blue revenge at it's very core and shows that well-executed simplicity can work wonders for the tone of your film.

The film opens with John Wick's wife Helen already passed on from an unspecified disease, lost and grieving, John's life is suddenly awakened by the arrival of Daisy, a young pup left to him posthumously by Helen to make sure John doesn't have to suffer alone. Slowly but surely John warms to the pup and begins to think that maybe he'll be alright after all.

That is until Iosef Tarasov, son of notorious Russian Kingpin and – unknowing to him – John's former boss, Viggo breaks into John's house, ambushes him in the dark, steals his car and brutally kills Daisy in front of him. With John’s already grief-striken heart torn apart again, he sets off on a mission to avenge Daisy and potentially go to war with an old associate who know all too well what a man like John Wick can do.

Pure and simple revenge, that's this whole story and it works, John's search for Iosef is the ever present central goal making the plot streamlined so the action sequences could fill in the space, allowing for a much more easily accessible movie. There are a couple minor side-stories and the film does seem to come to an end before remembering it has another 20 minutes to go but those aren't terrible flaws and forgivable in the long-run.

What really impressed me about the story was the way it built up this world of assassins and contract killers, rather than just John we get a look into several killers-for-hires throughout the film, including a hotel designed specifically for them, it help showcase a much larger world with a lot more going on than just John's revenge trial and the seeds set in place for future instalments gives us just a hint of things to come

Likewise the characters were solid not for their depth but rather the interest they exuded, we get some great smaller roles from the likes of Ian McShane as WInston, owner of the Hotel Continental and arguably the most powerful man in the film (just see how he handles rule-breakers), Lance Reddick as his mysterious clerk Charon (and a nice cameo from his Wire alum Clarke Peters as a fellow assassin), John Leguizamo in a very small but very memorable part as garage owner Aurelio who immediately recognises that Iosef fucked up and distances himself as quickly as possible, Adrianne Palicki as Ms. Perkins, one of the rare female assassins and utter bitch who's unafraid to break some rules if it gets her paid and Willem Dafoe as Marcus, an older hitman and John's mentor who may or may not be working against him.

Most of these characters are only in a handful of scenes, only really Ms Perkin and Marcus become major supporting characters, but the point stands that all of them serve a purpose towards expanding this world and showing a history between everyone, particularly with John who established a code of respect and reputation with nearly everyone he comes across, it's those little moments that stand out because it's well-delivered exposition that a lesser movie would've just skipped over or delivered poorly.

On the villains side Alfie Allen plays into the early days of Theon Greyjoy where he hadn’t yet learnt humility in the roe of Iosef, an immediate thorn in John’s side and an absolute prick. You can tell that Iosef's arrogance and sheer lack of respect stems from a false sense of entitlement, where his father worked his whole life to get to the top Iosef was born into that world and believes the world owes him a favour. It's a fairly typical character type but Allen's mix of dickhead and coward make it work and the fact that he just kills a fucking dog without blinking shows what a fuck he truly is.

Main villain Viggo was played by Michael Nyqvist who surprisingly made for a very human antagonist. What made Viggo work best was that he had worked with John beforehand and knew just how dangerous he could be, it allowed the film to bypass any unnecessary 'who is this guy' moments and jump straight to 'I know we're fucked' mode. The humanising element to Viggo worked great because it gave him more personality than the standard bad guy, there was more than enough moments where Viggo would try to open a line of communication with John only to have it thrown back in his face and the resulting exasperation and fear that his only son is about to be murdered worked in his favour. It would've been far too easy just to make Viggo a typical cold-hearted bad guy but I like that they made John the cold one and Viggo almost charming in a brutal Russian gangster kinda way.

And finally, of course, Keanu Reeves as John Wick, and I have to say the man fucking pulls off the bad-ass role exceedingly well, so much is made about John being a living legend and he fucking lives up to the legend, that far and away is what works about the character, you believe that reputation. Admittedly I would've liked to have seen more of Normal John before Daisy died, just to get a sense of where he is beforehand but in keeping with the film's streamlined nature I won't hold it against it, truth is that despite what he says, John never full let go of that part of his life, he just buried it and now he has a reason to unleash it again, unable to forget how easy it is to be the killer. Reeves plays the character but not in the sense of brutality, John's coldness comes from just lacking any emotion anymore, the death of his wife has sent him into a depressive state and now with Daisy gone as well he can't bring himself out of it, he has his friendly moments but on the whole this is a very subdued performance which is key to making the character and his dark history shine through.

The film is the directorial debut from Chad Stahelski and David Leitch - though for legal reasons only Stahelski is credited as such - both of whom previously stunt choreographers who worked with Keanu on The Matrix, and it's that background that lends this film the credit it needs, being from an action background they both understand what's needed to make an action scene work, namely that you fucking show the action, the shots in this film aren't long but they're noticeably longer than most action films which try to cut through its poor choreography with so many damn jump-cuts you can't tell what the fuck is going on. This film doesn't have that problem, you see front and centre what's happening, almost every bullet fired hits its target in the same shot, it allows for a much easier to follow movie but also a much more intense one, being able to follow the action doubles-up as being able to feel every hit the film throws at you, a shoot-out in a Night-Club stands out simply because it's the closest thing to The Raid I've seen from a Western production in terms of being unafraid to let things get ugly fast.

While there are some minor issues that come from first time directors, namely some iffy soundtrack choices and a couple iffy lines, for the most part Stahelski and Leitch do a pretty solid job, the whole film is draped in this slickness, a cool blue filter that covers the screen, adding to John's depressive state, the parts of the film that aren't shot at night are shot during pretty damn dull days but it's different, it's a world reacting to its character, there's no sunshine because John's world has literally had its sunshine die out and likewise there's no rain because he's not upset, he's hollow and dulled. The action scenes were almost guaranteed to work because of the stunt background and they deliver with every beat and flow, but it's the fact that the smaller scenes, those incredible world-building moments, that they work just as well is testament to the future of both the directors and this franchise.

John Wick doesn't reinvent the wheel, but it does enough to make it fresh again, it remembers the key ingredients to making an action film work, the story is kept tight, the action is impressive and the lead is a believable bad-ass with Reeves being given the best character he’s had in years. It’s not hard to see why a franchise was born out of this film, and I’m very happy it was.

8/10