Maybe it says something about the soft bigotry of low expectations towards Keanu Reeves movies, but this thing has received very positive reviews for what is—essentially—a fairly standard revenge film. Still, there are hundreds of small surprises and upgrades that make it feel a lot more satisfying and worth watching.
What Works: “John Wick” starts off pretty ho-hum as we watch retired hitman—-you guessed it, John Wick—-mourn his recently deceased wife, but even in these early scenes the film is showing us it’s a hybrid of familiarity and uniqueness because John’s wife isn’t dead from some underworld hit, she dies of cancer, and the plot of the film takes off not to avenge her death, but rather his dog’s death. A man losing his dog kick-starting a plot where seemingly hundreds of people die in the pursuit of his revenge is just strange enough to be interesting, but John Wick toes a thin line between self-parody and dead-serious action flick. It’s not totally somber (I liked Lance Reddick and Ian McShane as drily funny proprietors of a safe zone hotel), but never goofy either.
The directing and editing of the action sequences in particular is top notch. It’s exciting but elegant, sleek but personable, and nimbly choreographed but coherent. Maybe whoever directs the next Marvel movie can watch “John Wick” and see how to stage and cut an action sequence so we can actually tell what’s happening and see it clearly.
What Doesn’t: To buy into this we have to accept two massively big coincidences: 1. That the exact same hooligan who would randomly come across John at a gas station and decide to rob him for no good reason is the son of a mega-crime boss Wick used to work for. [Talk about a small world.] 2. That John Wick can kill untold numbers of expertly trained men in various traps they set for him, but three street thugs can so easily get the drop on him in his own home…the exact same place he kills a dozen armed-to-the-teeth mercenaries a few minutes later.
What I Would Have Done Differently: There should have been some motivating factor in getting John Wick (it is kinda fun to say that name) robbed by the crime prince except just dumb luck. Maybe if the whole thing was premeditated or set-up by someone in even the loosest of ways, we would more willingly go along with it.