John Wick 2 Review

Action Style

We start off with a healthy dose of car chases and vehicular combat and jump immediately into the heavy ordinance, plenty of gun-fu mixed with unarmed martial arts as well as a steady supply of knife fighting.  With so much attention to gun reloads and Wick checking himself for compiling injury, this movie just about has it all.  

6/6

Action Frame

The director’s experience as a stunt performer taught him a thing or two about the importance of camera placement for action sequences and cinematographer Dan Laustsen kept an active frame following every instant of Wick’s action, thus requiring fewer cuts in the overall flow of the action.

4/5

Lead Performance

Keanu Reeves is a serviceable leading man in just about anything, but he certainly shows proficiency for action films.  At 52 years of age, Mr. Reeves is in shape and dedicated to the genre’s physical demands.  Unfortunately, he does tend deliver certain lines awkwardly in moments of key drama.  Vaya con Dios, Bodhi.  Vaya con Dios.  

4/6

Supporting Performance

Ian McShane and Lance Reddick continue to be class personified as character actors while Common continues to build his non-music industry resume in the entertainment industry with sincere intensity.  Ruby Rose as the mute Ares seems to have taken a couple acting classes after her time in Resident Evil: The Final Chapter.  Laurence Fishburne is here.  Yay!  Now, why is Morpheus important to this story?

3/5

Music

With so many Matrix Easter eggs throughout this film, it would have been nice to have a little more variety than Euro club techno.

2/6

Sound F/X

Vehicles like super cars and motorcycles sound crisp and ferocious and there’s noticeable difference between long barrel rifles, handguns and heavier guns.  Impact sounds from all firearms are distinct deliver major impact.  

4/5

Digital F/X

Digital blood squibs have gotten a bad rap thanks to their poor application in more recent action franchises like The Expendables.  Chapter 2 uses them extensively as well, but this film’s low lighting combined with practical blood splatter on scenery and costumes masks its cartoonish presentation well enough.  I found some of the bullet deflection sparks of Wick’s bullet proof suit to be a tad distracting though.

3/6

Special F/X

Much better job here with all of the ballistics, pyro and close up gore effects.  These effects do a fine job selling the unbridled brutality of every encounter.

4/5

Costumes

Very nice suits, elegant dresses, but certainly nothing out of the ordinary for depicting a whole lot of wealthy people, some of whom know how to kill.  Very average overall.

3/6

Hair & Makeup

Good continuity being maintained by depicting Wick’s ever increasing injury tally.  Everyone else dies too quickly for this to matter for their characters.

3/5

Exteriors

Aside from the car chases in the beginning of the film (which were at night with nothing else standing out in the background), exterior shots were really relegated to establishing shots and not really used for much else.

3/6

Interiors

Budgetary upgrades were used here as evidenced in multiple Continental locales as well as the film’s climactic battle within an insanely well funded art installation.

4/5

Hook

John Wick had one last thing to wrap up from the first film and then he’s retired again, but wait, a plot device keeps him in.  Does he really want to leave the violence because it seems there’s more choice here than he lets on.

2/4

Conflict

For John Wick, conflict is with virtually everyone, but most importantly with himself.  His solitary moments are meant to show him struggling with this life, but it always references his dead wife which strictly redirects to his grief.  The film could have done a better job showing this struggle because he jumps into ultra violence far too quickly and easily to be turned off by it.

3/4

Resolution

This was actually kind of surprising considering the rules laid out in the first film and reestablished in Chapter 2.  What isn’t surprising is the obvious lead in to a third film that the audience doesn’t really need, but would be interesting to see where it goes.

2/4

Dialogue

In this cloak and dagger fiction, speaking in innuendo is all but assumed and sometimes this stylized method of dialogue can lose an audience.  Not so in this film as it comes off as sophisticated and explicit so long as you are paying attention.  My favorite dialogue sequence is Wick’s weapon selection “tasting” at The Continental. 

5/6

Exposition

Another film where the cryptic boogeyman is known and feared in the criminal underworld because of his past, yet the audience’s only reference point is the tragedy of his recent past.  Diving further back would have added much needed depth to a charismatic character.

1/5

Character Uniqueness

Only Wick and Winston happen to be the only characters in this film that are more than simple stone faced killers.  They reveal themselves as more with their demeanor, manners and intelligence.  Every other character is a trope on criminals and evil masterminds.  

4/6

Character Relatability

Everyone can connect with the visceral desire for revenge.  It may not inspire murder as an appropriate response in every instance, but when we feel wronged by such a degree, the need to lash back rises up like a storm.  Everyone keeps trying to dominate John Wick and he simply isn’t having any of it.  In this regard, Wick is an everyman for most feel they don’t have as much say in our own destinies as the circumstances of the world have them somewhat dictated to us.  

3/5