John Wick

John Wick (2014)

86% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 113 reviews)

Runtime: 101 minutes

Directed by: David Leitch, Chad Stahelski

Starring: Keanu Reeves, Michael Nyqvist, Alfie Allen, Dean Winters, Willem Dafoe

From: Summit Entertainment

Here it is, my review of a movie that has done quite a bit better at the box office than expected, and that is a great thing, as this motion picture is something well worth seeing, and I am glad I got to see it on a giant screen. Onto the Letterboxd review; I'll be back tomorrow night with something or another.

I'll be honest here, it wasn't until relatively recently that I had even heard of this movie. I'd definitely be interested in it once I heard the plot and then saw that people here were going wild for it. But believe it or not, I know someone who worked on the film, albeit in an uncredited PA role on set. I just know him from the online world but I definitely had to see it for that reason; it turns out he managed to work on something that's pretty awesome.

I am sure by now most know the plot (John Wick is played by Keanu Reeves and he's an assassin; his wife dies of cancer and he receives a puppy as a gift. The dog is killed and his '69 Ford Mustang Boss 429 is stolen by some Russian punks; quite understandably he gets PISSED and returns to the lifestyle to get revenge) so I won't spend much time on that. It's definitely not complicated, and that is OK, as the fun is seeing Wick get revenge and oh boy does he ever.

Much to my relief not only was the action great and plentiful (it was like an unrelenting action hammer once it got going), but it was actually shot where it was clear and you always understood what was going on. Not of the shaky-cam nonsense or Michael Bay ADD editing going on. You have some tremendous action setpieces, the best being in a nightclub and featuring an appropriate soundtrack there, although the music as a whole was nice.

It's a very colorful world and it's brought to the screen in a nice manner. Keanu is great as the unstoppable lead but the cast overall does a swell job, especially Michael Nyqvist at his Donald Pleasence-est, to steal a comment. It's a neo-noir with style and to think that it was directed by a pair of longtime stuntmen, neither of who had directed anything before, and they made one of the best movies from this year that I've seen this year. The film is inspired by the past but is wholly original and they delivered in a confident and more than competent fashion.

What I saw and did not expecting was how well the world-building was and how interesting it was. Without spoiling anything there were many nice little touches and the universe of assassins is quite interesting.

For you meat and potatoes action movie fans who prefer the films of old which were simple & weren't pretentious and had many cool moments, this is something you must watch.