Category: Review

Let’s just start by saying that when John Wick: Chapter 4 — Tempus Bellum  hits the theaters, we doubt you will need too much background from the first three chapters to follow along with the plot.  And just hazarding a guess here, that plot will involve John Wick (Keanu Reeves) plodding along at a syncopated cadence in a dark suit engaging in hand-to-hand combat and shooting lots of people point blank in the face.

But enough about the future of the series and let’s focus on Chapter 3, which involves John Wick (Keanu Reeves) plodding along at a syncopated cadence in a dark suit engaging in hand-to-hand combat and shooting lots of people point blank in the face. We have seen this all before, of course, but the movie is surprisingly innovative in its delivery of gratuitous comic-book violence.  The first major encounter, for example, takes place in the New York Public Library, where knowledge may be power, but a good sturdy book comes in handy if you want to beat someone’s face in.   The action proceeds to an antique weapon shop (which I believe is right next to the NYPL) with extraordinary results.  After a few more stops, including John Wick galloping on horseback through Manhattan, the movie finally slows down to catch its breath, at which point I think I fell asleep for a little bit.  But when I woke up, they were back at it, moving from location to location, piling up the bodies all along the way.

The verdict?  If you have been desensitized to this type of first-person gamer violence, this movie is a clear winner.  L&D laughed out loud throughout — probably for a good two or three minutes straight in the antique shop scene — as a number of scenes were so patently absurd that the filmmakers must have intended them as comedy.  Though I believe we were in the minority of the audience that viewed this as such, I’d like to think our laughter was infectious, and I heard some guffawing across the theater as the film proceeded.

But, wow, this is a violent film.  I would wager that at least 100 people get shot point-blank in the face, many of them wearing some sort of head gear so the damage was not always immediately apparent, and that’s just the people who got shot.  The movie also features more than its fair share of people getting shot in places other than the head, stabbed in and through the head, stabbed elsewhere, hit with a thrown knife, thrown off a building, etc, etc…   Indeed, the variety in which people get killed will certainly overwhelm the uninitiated.  The movie also features extremely innovative canine violence, including multiple dog-on-unit chomping incidents.  Although the body count is probably in the high three digits, the movie also delivers on its fair share of maiming, branding, and cauterizing of the villains and principals alike as part of the parabellum.  Some of it is camp, some of it for shock value, but you are bound to find something unsettling herein.

If you can handle the violence, you will probably like the visual aesthetic.  The rainy city at night is fabulous, we head to the desert at one point, and finish off in some sort of glass museum where the violence takes place with the backdrop of some groovy, flowy lights and what appears to be a psychedelic Rolex commercial looping in the back.  Although some of the big budget was spent on the talent (Reeves, Halle Berry, Laurence Fishburne, Anjelica Huston, Ian MacShane, as well as the knavish Mark Dacascos), most of it seems to have been spent making this the ultraviolent spectacle that it is.

I certainly won’t recommend this movie to everyone, but if this is your type of thing, this is your type of thing.  You’ll laugh, you’ll wince, you’ll jump from your seat, and you’ll probably get a little sick to your stomach.

And, if not, well, here’s L’s takeaway:

Not for the faint of heart, weak of heart or even those having a heart…please set your pace makers to silent mode.

Bingo.

You know it is the movie event of the year when the Thursday night parking is overflowing out of the lot and into the street,  when the theater is filled to capacity, when a group of students mobs us before the event, and when L is so startled by a remark from one of the Marcus concessions employees that he staggers backwards and dumps his complementary popcorn.   This is the Endgame, baby.

At three hours, there is certainly a lot going on in this movie, and L&D walked away less disgruntled than how we felt following Infinity War.  Yet, our verdict is still lukewarm — not enough violence for the kids, not enough sex for the adults.  I was somewhat apologetic after the show because I nodded off for a couple of brief stints, to which L provided a comforting word: “Of course you fell asleep: it was boring.”

So, there it is.

It’s possible that this was a little better than my first impressions, and snooze-it-and-lose it was the cause of my confusion as the film’s final 310 minutes ticked away — I often wasn’t sure whether some unusual plot reveal had been set up while I was napping.  I think in most cases it was just a garbling of the narrative, which naturally stems from trying to fit together plots from 20+ movies all over the Marvel Universe (all of which I have seen, I think).  But it’s also possible that I missed something.  My son also saw this last night, and I was reassured because he didn’t know the answers to the questions I had, either (!).

The principal innovation in this movie is the introduction of blood relatives and the tension between duty to community and duty to immediate family.  This is foreshadowed immediately, as the opening scene shows Hawkeye working with his daughter on junior hawking techniques, just as the great villain Thanos executes his purge from the climax of Infinity War.  Ouch.  The movie then somewhat ironically revisits the Tony Stark – Captain America spat from Civil War before exploring the aftermath of a worldwide genocide (irony might not be the best word choice here, but I’m happy to discuss the choice after you see the film).  These two topics are potentially interesting, but are ultimately glossed over and underdone (I have since learned that they are chocked-full of insider jokes, so maybe the film makers were simply being cute).  Whatever the reason, the movie had a lot of ground to cover, so the real movie begins when the gang hops into its Audi and heads out to what appears to be northern Wisconsin, where evidently Tony and Pepper are living dream.  And away we go.

This is an epic undertaking and I think Marvel did a reasonable job getting all of the monkeys back in the barrel by the end.   There is some very good humor in spots — look for Thor teaming up with the Guardians in a future blockbuster — and some surprises as we move through the plot, but ultimately we’ve seen this Thanos show before and so the whole villain element is just not that engaging.  I found the action mostly dramaless and often tedious, in accordance with L’s adage, “If anything can happen, there is no suspense.”  This doesn’t quite hold in an endgame situation, because some of these story arcs wrap up in their entirety, so there’s that.  Endgame or no endgame, we counted at least three obvious next steps for this story arc, including some involving some of the loose ends they just didn’t get around to tying off.

L&D saw this in 3-D and I was very happy that it looked good and was not distracting.   I forget how much of a premium we paid for the privilege.

Overall, this is the movie event of the year, so we’re happy we saw it.  If you follow the MCU, I’m sure you don’t need our recommendation to see this.  If you don’t follow the MCU, you might need to read one of those online “How to enjoy Endgame if you are otherwise oblivious to the Marvel Universe” primers. Those guides are also available for those who want to jump into the Game of Thrones final season, as well.  I’m sure there is something to be said about that, though I’m not sure quite what.  Perhaps you will be treated to one of L’s essays on the matter.

UPDATE:  And, congrats to L on his good news.  If you see him, give him a punch in the arm and a hug.