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‘John Wick’ Serves Revenge With Heated Attachment (Movie Review)

I normally don’t do this, nor have I ever done this before, but I can’t help it.  I need to start this John Wick movie review off by quickly discussing the plot of the film from a very high level because it’s actually the very reason why I wanted to see this film.  Keanu Reeves plays a former hitman that comes out of retirement to avenge the death of his dog.  Yes, I said his dog!  Now tell me, how awesome is that?  I sound like a little girl here, but I dare to utter the words awesome sauce!  I love animals so much, much more than most people in life, so when I learned of the premise of this film I just screamed YES!  It’s exactly the kind of film I would go pay to see and given the right circumstance I too would totally extract revenge on someone if they purposely harmed one of my dogs.  Let that be a warning to everyone.  Haha.  So what say you?  Y’all ready to talk some John Wick?  I am!

What impressed me the most about John Wick before even settling down in my Alamo Drafthouse press screening seat Wednesday night was not Keanu’s marvelous lamb chops, but the fact that there are so many stars attached to this picture.  Let’s take a quick moment to recap them all.  In addition to everyone’s favorite time-traveling surfer dude there’s also Michael Nyqvist, Willem Dafore, Dean Winters, Adrianne Palicki, Bridget Moynahan, John Leguizamo, Ian McShane, Alfie Evan Allen (Game of Thrones‘ Theon Greyjoy) and more.  I don’t know how you feel about it, but those names are pretty damn impressive to me considering it’s the directorial debut film of David Leitch and Chad Stahelski.  I hope I can be this fortunate with an all-star studded cast when I direct my first Hollywood feature, but I digress.  Perhaps what is most shocking to me is the fact that one of the movie’s producers is none other than Desperate Housewives‘ Eva Longoria, but I once again call digression out.

So yeah!  This movie really is about a man getting revenge over the death of his dog.  But relax.  There’s much more to it than just that.  Without going into any spoiler territory let’s just say that this one starts out on a “Debbie Downer” note just like Guardians of the Galaxy, and spins into something so completely awesome that you never want to get out of the action packed joy ride you’re on.  You know how they say revenge is a dish best served cold and works best without emotions, attachments and masterful planning?  Don’t buy that for a second!  John Wick effectively works best because of the character’s emotional attachments and loss of them.  It makes him imperfect and not the Michael Myers “Boogeyman” as he’s portrayed.  His character has inherent and obvious flaws and I love him even more because of them.  In other words it’s not a Steven Seagal film where he never gets touched.  You picking up what I’m dropping?

I had an absolute blast with this one so yeah I’m thinking Keanu Reeves is back as an action star.  It really is amazing when you think about how far he has come in the world of action films since Point Break.  He portrays the character of John Wick masterfully here as a empathetic family man, but one that can instantly flip that switch and have a heart made of chrome (masking his pain of course) as he unmercifully and unapologetically takes out his all opponents that stand in his way.  Like a Marvel picture of late, John Wick, although rated-R, balances perfectly between charm, wit, humor, charisma and kick a$$ action.  However, unlike the PG-13 toned down comic book violence of a Marvel film, John Wick is the kind of hardcore violence and action that makes your bones ache and question what you just saw on screen.  Did he just do that?  Oh yes he did!  Some of the kill scenes, albeit very fast paced in nature, can be sloppy because he’s simply reacting to every variable put in front of him (not masterfully planned as discussed in the paragraph up above), but are they all ever oh so awesome.  John Wick uses any and everything at his disposal to defeat his opponents.  Now the question is, does he achieve his endgame and come out unscathed and victorious?  Well, you already know he doesn’t come out unscathed at all, in fact he gets his a$$ handed to him several times, but you have to be a GD fool if you ever think I’m going to divulge the ending.  You just have to see it!  And see it you will.  Let me tell you why.

There’s a reason why Scott Mendelson of Forbes call this one of the BEST action films of the year.  It’s because it is!  And it’s really that simple.  If you don’t come out of John Wick pumped up, then there’s something wrong with you medically speaking.  The film has it all: money, cars (oh the American muscles cars), gangs, guns, girls, violence, puppies and some good old-fashioned hardcore action, something sorely missing from most flicks nowadays because of that watered down PG-13 BS that has saturated our markets to pack in seats for sheer greed only.  John Wick really is that breath of fresh air you’ve been looking for.  It’s not a perfect film by any means, but it’s one of the Top 10 best times I had at the theater this year and I’m really looking forward to revisiting it again as soon as humanly possible.  So RUN, don’t walk, to your local theater this weekend and spend some time in John Wick’s shoes, take it all in and relish in how good it feels to be back!

Brian White

Owner/Writer/Reviewer/Editor, Dreamer, Producer, Agent of Love, Film Lover, Writer of Screenplays and a Devoted Apostle to all things Ford Mustangs (the real ones with V8's!). Some of my favorite films include FIGHT CLUB, MOULIN ROUGE, THE DARK KNIGHT, STAR WARS alongside television shows such as SEINFELD, 24, SANFORD & SON and even the often loathed in the geek community BIG BANG THEORY. Outside of my three lives I live I also enjoy spending time with my girlfriend and our three girls (of the furry kind).