![]() ![]() ![]() Wick, on the other hand, isn't totally alone, as he has help from his pals Winston (Ian McShane), Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), Shimazu (Hiroyuki Sanada), Charon (the late Lance Reddick who died unexpectedly March 17) and, reluctantly, Shimazu's daughter, Akira (Rina Sawayama). Also along for the ride as bad guys are action stars Scott Adkins ("Day Shift," "Ip Man 4: The Finale") and Marko Zaror ("Alita: Battle Angel"). And then there's a former friend, Caine (Hong Kong film martial arts star Donnie Yen), a blind assassin who is working for the High Table, although not altogether enthusiastically. He also has a killer dog, a shoutout to the previous films, all of which featured Wick's dog. There's a huge bounty on Wick's head, a number that attracts would-be bounty hunters, including Tracker (Shamier Anderson, "Invasion") who may or may not have other ideas. The High Table has a new Marquis (Bill Skarsgard), sort of the organization's CEO, whose cruelty knows no bounds and whose job number one is to rid the world of the meddlesome and murderous John Wick. They thought they had gotten rid of him at the end of "John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum," but no such luck. Over the course of the last three movies, Wick (still played with an exceedingly grim stoicism by Reeves) has so angered members of the High Table - the Illuminati of the underworld, the organization that controls all criminal activity - that they will do anything to rub him out. Plot? There is one, but it doesn't matter all that much, it's merely a slim thread stitching together a cacophony of gunshots and gut punches. It's an absolutely fantastic piece of filmmaking, one that's going to have tongues wagging long after people have filed out of the theater. The moving camera is suspended well above the activity, looking down as if a child viewing an ant farm. Not that there's anything wrong with that.įAVORITE MARTIAL ARTS MOVIES: Here are 25 films that every action movie fan should see.Īfter all, there's a scene in "Chapter 4" that probably will go down as one of the action set pieces of the year. But "Chapter 4" takes it all to such cartoonish extremes that it makes the previous films look like PBS documentaries. The "John Wick" franchise, helmed by kick-boxer turned stuntman turned director Chad Stahelski, has always valued action over plot, visual pop over cerebral reflection or, heck, even common sense. ![]() Much as with the "Mad Max" movies, "The Raid" films and John Woo's "Hard-Boiled," the stunts are both so athletic and brutal that you have to figure there's an unmarked grave somewhere in the world piled high with the broken bones of battered and bruised stunt performers. Starting about halfway through "John Wick: Chapter 4" (opening March 24), the latest installment in the franchise that has turned Keanu Reeves into the coolest movie assassin ever, a viewer starts to get the sinking feeling that many people must have died so that this film could live. Keanu Reeves as John Wick in John Wick: Chapter 4. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |