by Brett Parker
While I’ve certainly gotten plenty of popcorn enjoyment out of recent action hits, part of me can’t help but wonder if some of them have given a serious beating to classical action formalism. While the quick-cutting grittiness of the Jason Bourne pictures were an exciting jolt, it annoys me how lesser directors have watered-down that style into generic complacency that lacks visual coherence. And while I was thrilled as most people to see Liam Neeson awaken his inner-skull-basher in Taken, it’s troubling how the film’s perverse formula inspired producers to favor macho sensationalism over intricate screenwriting. Perhaps that’s why I’m so bowled over by John Wick, a stylish piece of bang-bang that brings smart precision to every aspect of its formula, making it a gorgeous pleasure. The first time directing and producing team of David Leitch and Chad Stahelski are clearly trying to get their John Woo on, but young bucks trying to honor John Woo is miles more compelling than a Hollywood hack pushing Liam Neeson back into a bad Taken rehash. And this film further confirms for me something I’ve been convinced of for a long time: Keanu Reeves is a real treasure in Hollywood action films.
As the film opens, we witness a sad man named John Wick (Keanu Reeves) as he sulks about an empty house in a miserable trance. Flashbacks reveal that his wife, Helen (Bridget Moynahan), passed away days earlier from cancer. Knowing that she was facing the end of her life, she arranged for John to receive a surprise present after her demise: a puppy named Daisy that is meant to help him cope with her loss. As John tries to warm up to the new dog in the house, he is soon the victim of a home invasion at the hands of violent punks. John was spotted driving around the neighborhood in a vintage 1969 Mustang, and the young thugs beat him senseless before taking his car keys. Before he is knocked unconscious, the thieves make him witness the viscious killing of Daisy, an act that sets off a deep-rooted and terrifying bloodlust within.
It turns out the leader of the thieves is no random punk, but Iosef Tarasov (Alfie Allen), the son of Russian crime lord Viggo Tarasov (Michael Nyqvist), who just happens to be John’s former employer. Once Viggo learns of his son’s violent act, he informs him that he not only violated a retirement truce between the two, but set off a nightmarish killing machine who has nothing to lose. John was once the most notorious hitman in the business, a black angel of death who had a scary talent for killing any target with superhuman precision. “I once saw him kill three men in a bar with a pencil,” Viggo recalls. That means it’s only a matter of time before Iosef ends up with bullets in his head, for John is now set off on a violent rampage where the bodies of Viggo’s men pile up endlessly and a tornado of chaos is heading straight for the Russian crime family’s doorstep.
If the frantic, herky-jerky camera style that passes for action scenes these days has gotten on your nerves, then the ballet-style execution of John Wick’s fight scenes is bound to impress you. The camera placements and movements of the actors evoke the formal excitement of a Fred Astaire dance number and these coordinated bursts of violence can’t help but dazzle. Instead of choosing between bare-knuckle brawling or gunplay, the filmmakers have shrewdly found a way to blend both ideals into a fierce fighting style. Reeves moves about the frame dishing out a visceral and intimate hail of bullets, working a pistol the way Astaire used to work a top hat and cane. While the spoiled film snob inside wishes these fights pushed themselves to be way more elaborate and transcendent, you delight in knowing these scenes lay waste to most half-assed battles stuffing up the genre.
Keanu Reeves is one of those Hollywood stars who gets riddled with jokes about his acting abilities, mainly for the way his stoicism tends to be misused in the occasional drama. Yet in a less confused world, moviegoers would be drooling over the fact that his zen focus makes him quite the modern day Clint Eastwood whenever he shows up in an action vehicle (hence why The Wachowskis channeling his warrior coolness into a philosophical Christ figure felt like a stroke of cinematic genius). His lived-in physique and thoughtful calmness proves fantastic in fleshing out Wick’s existential weariness and lethal focus. Plus after the ultimate effort of dishing out the physical goods in The Matrix movies, Reeves tears through the action scenes here like an accomplished olympian who can vanquish the younger competition around him at will. In the past few years, it’s been observed how Reeves has had difficulty getting certain passion projects off the ground, all while generic flicks have welcomed him with open arms. So perhaps the whole “hitman-getting-back-in-the-game” angle is meant to show how true Hollywood players can’t escape the whole box office game. This is strongly felt through The Continental, the film’s dreamlike Manhattan hotel that serves as a neutral ground for assassins. From the Casablanca vibe drowning the atmosphere to the too-cool-for-school interplay among the inner-industry operators, this fabulous location convinces us that Reeves is immersed in the Hollywood universe to his very core.
While Nyqvist could simply show up and look intimidating as a villain, the role of Tarasov gives him hopelessly cynical philosophies to dish out and the deliciously casual way he does so is a nice counterpoint to Wick’s laser beam focus. Plus I give Nyqvist props for bringing dignity to the fact that Russians are once again being rolled out as the foreign villains of the season. U.S. and Russian relations are getting testy again these days, giving Hollywood the rapid cue to make Soviet souls an evil empire our American heroes can battle endlessly with. In a bizarre way, I don’t think it’s entirely far-fetched to read the film as a cockeyed meditation on U.S. & Russia’s rocky relationship. For our rugged U.S. boy and his Russian counterpart try to respect each other’s boundaries, but end up trying to blow each other to smithereens anyways because, as Viggo observes, there’s too much adversarial hostility in their blood to be ignored. That may sound crazy, but I’m convinced that U.S. and Russian leaders have secretly fantasized about having a bloody brawl in the rain just like the one depicted in the climax.
While speaking about John Wick’s myth, Viggo says “he’s not the boogyman. He’s the one you send to kill the f-----g boogyman!” In a way, that could be the perfect metaphor for what moviegoers are crying out for in their action products. We get impatient with vapid trends and empty hulks, causing us to yearn for an expert to walk in and clean up all the nonsense. John Wick proves that Keanu Reeves is a hell of an expert to get the job done. Just ponder the fact that his character is out to avenge a dog and you can’t help but buy it wholesale. Sure, the plot point syncs up perfectly with America’s fetishistic obsession with pets these days, but thanks to a fierce monologue delivered halfway through the film, Reeves convinces us that fighting for dogs is as worthy as fighting for your country.
