Since I had the pleasure to see and review John Wick 3: Parabellum in theaters in 2019, I have had the opportunity to go back and rent the DVDs for John Wick and John Wick 2. And although one can never tell with these sorts of things, John Wick Chapter 4 might be the end of the franchise, or at least this particular iteration of it. So now we may have a complete view of the entirety. It is a rare thing to behold, a franchise which starts out in the realm of ordinary and then gets increasingly better with each installment. The fourth movie is arguably the best one.
This may seem like an odd comparison, but while I was watching John Wick Chapter 4, I was reminded of the evolution of Wes Anderson’s career. He started out as a simple independent filmmaker with a unique style and vision (think Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums). Over the years however, it would appear that his attention to detail and artistry has pulled into his orbit a multitude of exceptional artists until now a Wes Anderson movie is chock full of wonderful production design, costumes, makeup, etc. in all shapes and sizes in every scene. The evolution of the John Wick franchise feels like this progression. It started off with a normal movie but with some rare attention to detail in fight scenes. Famously (and although I haven’t actually done the counting, I do believe it), it is said that the bullets fired out of each gun in a John Wick movie are counted. When the guns run out of bullets, the stunt direction calls for John Wick to take the time to reload his gun in the middle of the fighting. This sort of detail is usually not picked up by most audience members and for that reason most movies don’t bother with it. But I expect it is the sort of detail that artists working in stunt direction notice, and that along with innumerable other details, has likely led to that evolution of the John Wick franchise, where not unlike a Wes Anderson movie, it appears that the cream of the crop in what this movie specialized in, stunt direction and production design, has gravitated towards the team the produces these films. John Wick Chapter 4 is stunning to look at. The team appears to have gotten access to Sacre Coure, the Arc De Triomphe, Versailles, and other gorgeous places in Paris, France. They continue to place Keanu Reeves in interesting and exceptional fights while adding one of the best in the genre to the cast: Donnie Yen (Ip Man).
There are a lot of movies out there in the subgenre of old man out for revenge. I haven’t seen most of them, although I did see the original Death Wish and Unforgiven. I have not seen any of the multitude of Liam Neeson’s “Taken” movies. John Wick lands squarely in this subgenre, but it contains a shrewd understanding of what actually matters when it comes to how these movies work. The important thing to take away here is the tongue-in-cheek game the movie plays with John Wick’s motivations. Usually in this type of movie, the old man is a solitary man who has had some close family member, almost always a young woman, die/raped in some gruesome fashion. This gives the old man the excuse of justifiably killing a lot of bad guys. In the John Wick series, the bad guys kill his dog in the first movie and steal his car in the second. This all goes to show that the movie understands that motivation doesn’t really matter. It’s just an excuse to get you to the action scenes. Frankly, the whole concept of character motivation comes close to being a running joke in the franchise. The movie employs serious character actors like Ian McShane, Lawrence Fishburne, and Hiroyuki Sanada who expound on the deeply traditional manner of the way things are and the consequences of stepping out of line with the powers that be. And then Keanu Reeves, with his unique brand of charm/bad acting goes “Yeah, but they killed my dog”. And then what proceeds are several hours of exceptional stunt direction. The movie doesn’t ask you to believe/feel that all these people need to die. It knows and you know that the plot is just a contrived artifice for stunt direction. As long as the stunt direction is strong enough to stand on its own, and here it is, that is all the audience needs to be entertained.
This is the type of movie that I would love to hear the director’s commentary about. Especially as to which stunts are analog and which are digital. There is so much that is impressive here that some very good stunts can be considered as throwaway. In the first great action platform, taking place in the Osaka Continental (yes, many samurai swords come out into play here), a stuntman takes a tumble head over heels down an escalator. I’m pretty sure that was an analog stunt (that is the stuntman really went down the escalator in that fashion). It is notable how quickly the movie moves away from that stunt and how ordinary it feels amongst all the others.
There are too many scenes that deserve mention here, but I will name a few. For Keanu Reeves, nunchuk fight scene. For Donnie Yen, nevermind a mention of any particular scene, his entire performance as a blind marital artist is notable. Then there is a minor character played by Rina Sawayama who participates in the Osaka Continental fight. I have been routinely unimpressed by how beautiful women who know kung fu are somehow able to beat up men twice their size in movies. But here, Rina takes on two sizably larger men and she does so in a choreographed fight that retains its plausibility. This is not easy stunt direction. Indeed it is as easy as a person being able to plausibly fight someone who is twice as large as they are in real life (Not Plausible!). But she does it, seemingly without noticeable cheating, and everyone involved should be commended. I also really liked the fight in the Berlin rave with the fat man (Scott Adkins in a fat suit). I know I just started watching 2023 movies but I would be gobsmacked if I don’t pick this movie for Best Stunt Direction in next year’s Oscar picks (also for Best Cultural Appropriation for Japanese/French production design as well as Hong Kong martial arts in general). Indeed, John Wick Chapter 4 will be one of the best movies of the year.
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