Culture of Pop

Why We Should Give Keanu Reeves’ ‘John Wick’ a Shot

Keanu Reeves hasn’t been in too many impressive movies lately; 47 Ronin was a bust. However, his new film John Wick looks cooler than ice cold. Of course, it could be another dud, but let’s see why we should give it a shot.

The trailer looks very promising. John Wick is a retired hit man that gets his dog killed and then seeks sweet revenge in the best way he knows how: killing everyone in twirling gun mode. Watch the trailer and tell me you didn’t get a little feel for the Matrix with Keanu dressed in a black suit, wasting ammo in style.

Keanu is occasionally a solid lead for action movies, serious or not, and this looks like a winning role for him in B-movie land. He’s been in some pretty classic action films, such as The Matrix trilogy, Speed, and Point Break, so he definitely has some experience in kicking ass of all sorts. Willem Dafoe is in the film too, and he just makes everything he’s in better (except for maybe Spider-Man).

Taking look at the director, Chad Stahelski, his main work in the industry has been as a stunt coordinator, notably for The Matrix, The Hunger Games, Rambo, V for Vendetta, Serenity, and 300. Not too shabby, huh? On top of that, he was an uncredited stunt double for Keanu in Point Break. If there’s anything Stahelski is accustomed to, it’s producing great stunts and fight choreography. It’s already evident from the trailer that the action will be on point, even if the movie might not be.

Now, even though this is Stahelski’s directorial debut, he’s been around enough great directors while working as a stunt coordinator to know that there needs to be motivation and purpose behind the action (or at least I hope he does). Without purpose or motivation, the action is simply eye candy.

Take, for example, Stahelski’s work in V for Vendetta. Sure, the fight scene is awesome, but the build up to it and what it means makes it even better:

Looking at the early opinions from some critics, this seems to be a worthy addition to the action genre, containing the right components for an entertaining action flick. It could be a guilty pleasure film, but a pleasurable film nonetheless for those that need their shoot-’em-up fix. In all honesty, the badass coming back to be a badass again is definitely nothing new, so it’s really all about execution, and John Wick aims to kill.

The bottom line: the film looks like a crowd-pleasing blood bath delivered by the hands of Neo-gone-hit man. Are you in or are you in?

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RllJtOw0USI[/youtube]

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