Sort of a Review
I have to say that I am a Keanu Reeves fan, I have always been one. So there is the not-so-slight possibility that I am biased. John Wick is a movie tailor-made for Keanu, himself. This laconic loner who is a walking action fiesta is one of the best-played Keanu Reeves roles. Naturally, it bothered me when people sometimes call it a terrible movie, or when people did not pay it the attention it deserved.
John Wick : Chapter two is one of those movies that are made for sheer entertainment.Those who have watched the first chapter, already know that this is a movie about an ex-hitman who is trying to retire, who just can’t catch a break. The director of the movie, Chad Stahelski, having a background in martial arts and having the resume of a stunt coordinator and martial arts choreographer (The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolution) has created a film that is an ode to the action movie genre. John Wick is what an action movie is supposed to be.
Your everyday action movie is filled with jerky cams, jump cuts and about twenty different angles in one scene to keep the illusion going. Whereas the action scenes in John Wick consist of well-choreographed action sequences and stable shots where the actors are waltzing about using their screen-space magnificently. The result of this is that you are not as awfully exhausted as you feel after an action movie, you are usually used to watching. The truth about excessive camera work and cross-editing is that they tend to tire your eyes and brain that you feel like you actually went through all the falls the characters in the movie went through. One might argue that this is how it should be. But John Wick is not as jarring as many action movies, when it comes to editing. What John Wick offers is exhilaration and entertainment, without tiring your faculties. Although the movie ends with a cliffhanger, you are still high on all the pure blissful action, when you leave the theatre.
Another commendable execution in John Wick Chapter 2 is creating humour without trying too hard. The writer, Derek Kolstad, has created this universe constituting of an underground institution with its own norms, codes and etiquette. He has managed to create humour in the day-to-day of this world, without being too obvious. The humour is purely situational and derivative of the narrative and they have not gone out of their way or the script to make it funny. But it manages to make you giggle. You have to keep in mind that, this is not a comedy, hence all those moments are more in the line of gallows humour in a blood-soaked movie.
The action choreography was ingenius in this John Wick: Chapter 2.The fact that Keanu Reeves does 85% of his stunts saves the movie from making obvious attempts make the action seem real. It makes you believe everything you see no matter how unrealistic they are in real life. You believe that John Wick is indeed this god-like assassin who will “kill them all” if that’s what it comes to. The fight sequences are wonderfully choreographed that they carry the impression of a waltz. The fight sequence between Keanu Reeves and Common was genuinely seductive. They had amazing chemistry and the audience is made well-aware of attributes to Common’s character which gives meaning to his interactions with John Wick. There was so much tension when they were in the same shot at the same time.
Drawing itself extremely close to a handbook for action movies, John Wick faced certain setbacks in its narrative. There were points where the movie was too busy creating Neo-bullet-dodging moments that they failed to establish solid plot devices. Towards the end of the movie, certain actions of Wick were not well-grounded in the plot. Although the reasons for these actions were insinuated, the movie does not spend enough time or provide enough information to the audience to actually understand what drives him to act the way he does. The reason for this could have been the fact that the movie is generally fast paced and that one of the techniques the writer uses in the movie is minimal dialogues. To justify the actions of John Wick towards the end of the movie, the writer could have either shown us some background of the politics of this underworld he has created; or use dialogues to convey the audience the consequences of certain actions that took place within the movie.
Apart from its slight weakness in the narrative, the writing in the movie is quite solid. The writer and the director seem to have an understanding of the capacities of the actors in the movie, because all of them deliver good performances, exploring their particular strengths. The action choreography is breathtaking and the movie ranks itself high among best all-time action movies. The humour was effortless, the pace of the movie was thrilling, and the world-building in the narrative is fascinating that we crave for more information about the operation of this world. John Wick is every action-movie fan’s wet-dream.
Thanks to Malinthe.
