JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 4
US, 2023, 169 minutes, Colour.
Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Lance Reddick, Clancy Brown, Ian McShane, Bill Skarsgaard, Donnie Yen, Hiroyuki Sanada, Shamier Anderson.
Directed by Chad Stahelski.
Perhaps a succinct review would be: much the same as the first three chapters, only more, much more so.
This is a film for the devotees who made the first three chapters such box office successes, something of a tribute to the stuntman become director who was able to film action adventure in lively and different ways, Chad Sahelski (kick-boxer expert, coordinator on the Matrix series, Keanu Reeves).
But, of course, there is the presence of Keanu Reeves. While he has been appearing in films for almost 40 years, he is part of the film going public’s consciousness with four episodes of The Matrix and now four chapters of John Wick – getting older now, in his 50s, but still hyperactive, always in black, actually in suit and tie for the final duel of this film, impossibly agile, impossibly surviving onslaughts, and always laconic, with his almost-swallowed drawl, “yeah!”.
On the other hand, the John Wick series is not a must for those who do not want to watch on-screen violence or, as A Clockwork Orange says, the ultra-violence. While there are some pauses for moments of drama and conversation, with some complexities of plot, involving the evil power group worldwide, The Table, its hiring of hitmen, its power over them and their lives, and their wanting to get rid of hitmen they can’t control, there is a great deal of fighting, ultraviolent.
Actually, the film is quite stylish with it sets, the strange hotel in New York City with its manager, Lawson (Ian McShane again, with the concierge (capital Lance Reddick again) and the mysterious turning up at times of Laurence Fishburne. The first part of the film has extensive time in a lavish Osaka hotel, Japanese decor. The second part of the film has willing settings, the streets, Cathedral, but the interiors of a huge nightclub. The third part is set in Paris, Champs D’Elysee and around the Arc de Triomphe, and a climax on the steps leading up to and down from Montmartre, Sacre Coeur. So plenty for the eye.
But in those three sections there are the most elaborate fights and battle sequences, all targeting John Wick, The Table wanting him eliminated, and an arrogant young French Marquis, played by Bill Skarsgaard, determined to be rid of him. But, there are other hit men on John Wick’s trail, his friend, Cain, martial arts star, Donnie Yen, blind, under the thrall of The Table, who have his daughter as hostage. Then there is the rather comic African-American hitman, Nobody, always with his protective hound (who gaze into savage action), played by Shamier Anderson. They turn up, confronting Lee, and each of the star locations. Veteran Clancy Brown plays the Harbinger for the Marquis.
Since there is a bounty on John Wick (as in the other films where a suave announcer lets would be hitmen know where Wick is as well as the millions, ever-increasing, for his capture or death), there are hordes of would-be assassins. They attack in the variety of vast rooms, hotel rooms, Museum like rooms, in Osaka. They swarm in the Berlin nightclub, a vast area with thundering music and hundreds of dancers, they are in cars on the Champs D’Elysee (quite a lot of traffic for the early hours of the morning), car chases, motorbikes, hits and crashes. And, they appear on those Parisian steps, all of them demolished in grim and gruesome fights and close-ups, John Wick battered, wounded, falling down the stairs, but also rising so that he can keep his duel appointment at the front of Sacre Coeur her at Dawn. The duel has its exciting moments – but unexpected conclusions.
So, the fans will be satisfied. The non-fans will not see the film.
Watching films like the John Wick chapters seems to offer the viewers many adrenaline rushes of vicarious sadistic voyeurism.
