John Wick: Chapter 4

> he's but a ghost in search of a graveyard Marquis Vincent de Gramont AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA !!!!!!!! PEAK !!!!!!!! CINEMA !!!!!!!! It's been a strange year for franchise filmmaking so far. While the very consistent dissatisfaction towards the mediocre MCU got even worse with the release of **Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania** with that film being just flat-out boring and exhausting with the only saving grace being Kang, **Shazam: Fury of the Gods** being another one of DCEU projects which will soon cease to exist and **Scream VI** surprising literally everyone at being actually pretty fucking good even though it is the 6th film in a franchise following a near-dead sub-genre of slasher films, it has been quite a lot of misses for the franchises with only a few making above the cut. Therein comes along **John Wick: Chapter 4**, a film already set on an insane trajectory, wherein everyone’s favourite bruised protagonist has gotten to a supposedly even deeper tenth circle of hell when he tried to climb out of the ninth circle in the previous film. I was a bit, just a teeny little bit disappointed by the previous film i.e. Parabellum but, after seeing this film; it is in 100 years, the one thing that all film critics are going to agree on is that John Wick: Chapter 4 truly was peak cinema. Let’s just put all our cards on the (high) table. Yes, John Wick: Chapter 4 is 169 minutes long. Any one of its many (many) set pieces contains more action all by itself than most entire movies. This thing ain’t just a chapter. It’s a whole damn book; a glorious, nightmarish, biblical compendium which contains all manners of _**ass-kickery**_ and _**gun-fu**_. I’m just gonna come out and say it. This is the best cinematic experience I’ve had in a theatre for an action film in the last decade. This film absolutely floored me. Performances? **Peak**. Cinematography? **Double Peak**. Action Set Pieces? **Triple Peak**. Ending? **GOATED FR**. First of all, performances. If you told me 10 years ago that The Matrix films are going to remain as Keanu’s most consistent and better performances, I would’ve totally agreed with you. Cut to present day, my opinion is going to differ from yours. John Wick is officially the best and most consistent piece of his performances and this film makes that certain. Keanu is mostly silent in this film but then also you can feel everything his character is feeling at a certain moment which makes his performance all the more marvelous. He doesn’t have much dialogues in this film, probably like 15-20 lines in this film but each line is delivered in a way that John Wick (if he existed in real life) would say it. Ian McShane also gives quite a performance here. Amplifying Winston’s place as John’s father figure, he is what I would call, essentially the heart and soul of this film. Laurence Fishburne, although appears very briefly, does a good job and it’s always nice to see Neo and Morpheus just strolling around and talking. And ofcourse, I’m never going to get tired of seeing Hiroyuki Sanada in a film. He comes in, murders people left and right like a badass, and leaves like a king. The standouts to me though, are **Donnie Yen**, **Bill Skarsgård** and **Shamier Anderson**. All of these have never been introduced to the audience before this film and now that they have been, they completely steal the show. Donnie Yen essentially plays the Chinese version of daredevil who isn’t a lawyer but a hitman and doesn’t think twice before a kill. Loved him in the film and the ways Chad Stahelski (the director) uses his blindness throughout the film to show us some really interesting kills. Bill Skarsgård rises up as this franchise’s most menacing antagonist to date who will stop at nothing to get the job done. He plays a French billionaire and my god his accent is just the sexiest. The pronunciation of certain words in the French accent and his control over the table’s resources literally turned the City of Love into the City of Merciless Bloodshed. Shamier Anderson essentially plays what John Wick would’ve been in the younger days. A hitman who works for the highest payday and carries around an emotional support dog who does everything but. Now, the cinematography. This film was a visual spectacle. Everything, and I mean everything looks perfect. There isn’t a single shot in this film that feels dimly lit or out of tone. The work on display is truly fantastic here and I was just amazed at seeing the various color palettes this film uses. This film manages to be the darkest john wick film without sacrificing visual clarity. Every frame is lit up with just the perfect amount of colours suitable for setting the mood of the scene and when that transcends into a bloody action scene, the environment does nothing but enhance the hacking and slashing. I would be surprised if the academy doesn’t nominate this film for Best Production Design or Best Cinematography because _**THIS IS ART MR. WHITE!**_ (who am I kidding, this film is just going to get ignored because it’s a huge summer blockbuster). Where do I even begin with the action in this film. I was a bit worried as to how are they going to show me anything new after I’ve seen literally every possible fight scenario from the previous three films. I was so wrong. There isn’t much new substance here persay but the action here is so well-defined, so well-choreographed, so meticulously detailed, that you just forget that you’ve seen something like this before; and that is what great action films are supposed to do. Make you completely get immersed in the action and John Wick Chapter 4 doesn’t skip a beat. The Ending. Ughhhhhhh. The Ending for this film might just be a masterpiece. I am not gonna spoil it for you but trust me, when you see that ending sequence begin, you will be experiencing the greatest moments of cinematic history being unfolded. It isn’t a huge CGI bombastic action set-piece, instead, it subverts your expectations and becomes something completely different yet something very familiar. A perfect end to a perfect film. Go watch this film, you will not be disappointed.

I don’t need to tell you that the violent action in “John Wick: Chapter 4” is over the top. If you’re aware of the popular neo-noir action thriller franchise, you know that already. If you’re a fan of the smartly dressed, ass kicking antihero known on the streets as the Baba Yaga, you aren’t going to be disappointed in this rowdy, unrestrained fourth chapter. The bar has been raised and effectively met, as this fast-paced film traverses the globe, provides a dose of pure adrenaline, and leaves the franchise’s highest body count in its wake. After being excommunicated and on the run from a network of bounty hunters, John Wick (Keanu Reeves) has had enough and just wants out of the criminal underworld forever. He tries to kill them all but in the process, discovers a path to defeating The High Table with the goal of finally securing his freedom. John visits former friends, alliances, and foes all over the world, bringing trouble to their doorstep. The lethal assassin fights his way through one by one, culminating in a final duel to the death. This is Reeves’ movie through and through, and he’s created what has arguably become one of the more iconic screen characters of the 21st century. It’s great to see old favorites like Winston (Ian McShane), Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), and Charon (Lance Reddick) return, but the addition of new characters Caine (Donnie Yen), Mr. Nobody (Shamier Anderson), and the brutally cruel Marquis (Bill Skarsgård) breathes fresh life into the franchise. The story is weak and the performances not much better, but none of that matters if you’re a fan of pure action and cinematic spectacle. The stunt work (which is heavily influenced by martial arts) reaches absolute perfection, will impeccably choreographed fight sequences that are fresh, inventive, and exciting. The best of the best is a thrilling shootout in the middle of busy traffic by the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. It’s one of those scenes that makes you want to stand up and cheer. Director Chad Stahelski is an ex-stuntman himself, and he knows how to orchestrate exhilarating, handsome action sequences. This isn’t a film with rapid cutting where you can’t tell what is going on, and it’s a return to a classic style that should be welcomed by fans of the genre. You can clearly follow each blow to the body, every bloody gunshot to the head, and every sword through the back. Stahelski’s vision is as close to flawless as one can get, and this is a great looking movie from start to finish. Despite all of the things that are done right, the film’s excessive runtime makes it seem too indulgent. Even with the breathtaking fight choreography and stunt coordination, some of the action scenes go on so long that I started to lose interest. A few are repetitive and exhausting, but the short and well-placed breaks in the form of emotional storytelling bring a welcome respite and a bit of breathing room. “John Wick: Chapter 4” is a film that over promises yet over delivers for action fans. It’s one rousing, wild ride. **By: Louisa Moore / SCREEN ZEALOTS / WWW.SCREENZEALOTS.COM**

Now this is an whole lot better than "John Wick - Paracetamol" (2019) but it is still not very good. This time our wandering warrior (Keanu Reeves) is out for revenge, but not before the all-powerful "Marquis" (Bill Skarsgård), who has managed to get those at the "High Table" to give him complete control of their global operations, decides to seek some of his own - and that includes trashing the New York hotel and putting "Winston" (Ian McShane) out of an home and a job. A rather unnecessary, and fatal, side effect of that activity put's his nose out of joint too; and when the "Marquis" turns his attention on Osaka - possibly the last bastion of support for "Wick", we just know that we are in for a series of never-ending hand-to-hand fisticuffs that are straight out of a video game. Indeed, for almost all of the action sequences here the whole point seems to be: kill as many of the useless, hapless - but heavily armed - enemy as you can whilst perhaps bleeding a little from the mouth now and again. Use your finely tailored Kevlar®️ suit to deflect bullets, blades, flames - just about everything as you, inevitably, survive against constantly insurmountable odds for well over 2½ hours before a denouement that is, admittedly, quite quirky. That involves a sort of Sacre-Coeur version of snakes and ladders but again, luckily, against innumerable would-be assassins who couldn't hit a barn door with an Howitzer at point blank range. Skarsgård isn't remotely menacing - like a poor "James Bond" villain in a perfectly measured suit, Laurence Fishburne features only sparingly and the whole thing has as much jeopardy as the 'Wizard of Oz" (1939). Reeves does not act here, he performs - and the profusion of CGI, the complete lack of any police or domestic military in Japan, Paris or New York to address the increasingly chaotic and damaging carnage being caused in these locations all just wanted me to start shouting "thwack" and "pow" at the screen. There is a delightful twist at the end, but it's a very long time in the coming and to be perfectly honest, I was just a bit bored. I've never really been in love with this franchise, it's all too repetitive and predictable - and sadly, this is just the same.