This film was viewed on February 16th as an OnDemand purchase. Since I had watched The Equalizer, I figured that I need to see this to round out the Fall films that pertained to this subject. John Wick is directed by Chad Stahelski and David Leitch (who's role as co-director was uncredited) and it stars Johnny Utah on the wrong side of the law as a retired assassin/badass who comes out of retirement to right the wrong of his dog being killed...
Bad choice by the villains
Wick's wife, played in flashbacks by Bridget Moynahan, dies of an unknown illness and he's devastated. She posthumously sends him a puppy to help him get over her death. The puppy takes a liking to Wick, despite the fact that he never seems to feed him or take him for a walk, and naturally Wick gets attached to the puppy. Their first outing together they go for a drive in Wick's wicked awesome 1969 Mustang Mach 1...
Amazingly, it stays pristine throughout multiple firefights.
Wick is allowed access to a private airport and he just drives it real fast back and forth on a runway while screaming. It kind of appears that he's going to kill himself but not really. I'm not sure ofthe meaning of this scene other than to show off what a cool car can do. While at a gas station, a Russian mobster (what a surprise!) takes a liking to the car and offers to buy it from Wick, who in turn tells the dude to go pound sand. Like most Russian mobsters, they don't like being told "no" and later that evening they break into Wick's home, beat him up, kill the dog and take the car. It is now officially on! Now keep in mind that the Russians commit the cardinal cinema sin of leaving the protagonist alive. They killed his dog. They took his awesome car. Why not complete the trifecta by killing him? When villains are that stupid they deserve to be killed.
Which is exactly what Wick does. It turns out the punk that took his car is the son of a senior Russian mob official who previously used Wick's services as an assassin. Wick was the best most badass assassin in the city. Mobster Dad is none too pleased with his son's choice. He knows how good Wick is at killing people but he sends a team to take care of Wick but he dispatches them in about 80 seconds. This is pretty much the whole film. It's like they took DNA from Taken, Bourne and Road to Perdition to make John Wick. Wick gets closer to the mobster's son and leaves a trail of bodies in his wake. He eventually kills the punk mobster and turns his attentions to the father. The finally of the film is Wick and the Russian boss duking it out a la Riggs versus Mr. Joshua from Lethal Weapon.
A kung-fu battle to the death in the rain featuring two men, one of whom in theory wouldn't stand a chance against the other. Since Lethal Weapon was 27 years ago, no one will recall the similarities.
This film was mildly entertaining. I would've like this film 10-13 years ago a lot more but there was very little originality here. Much like The Equalizer and A Walk Among he Tombstones. Of the three, this was the best. It was a much faster pace then Neeson's entry and less stupid than the Denzel's entry. Much like the other two films, there is the climactic end involves rain (it's raining at the end of Tombstones and Equalizer uses a store's sprinkler system as a substitute). There are some cornball moments, like the fact that there's a high class hotel in NYC that caters to the underworld types where they payment is in the form of gold coins (who the f*ck thought that up?). Does the hotel have a rewards program that allow a person to earn points towards free stays like Marriott Rewards or Hilton Honors. Or that there are all these firefights going on in public and cops are nowhere near the place. I'm fine with suspending disbelief but there's a limit.
Ugh! I'm going to have to consider taking a break from these types of films. At least Reeves probably donated a portion of his salary as he usually does after filming this. Or he at least did it as a favor to Leitch and Strahelski, whom he's work with before (they worked with Reeves on the Matrix Trilogy as stunt doubles) since this was their first time behind the directors chair. To say the least, this was a mildly disappointing way to close out the 2014 film viewing season. I had two indie films in my Netflix queue but never bothered to get around to them. Sometimes you eat the bar. Sometimes the bar eats you. Thank you for your time.
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