I just want direct conversation about some of my points that’s all
I’m pressed for time but can tell you that I’ve dwelled on this after seeing the first film, and repeat watches:
Some shootouts enter that mode, where headshots are happening so often it almost feels like casualized fist/palm strikes (from a strictly martial arts film) in that they’re just happening so often they become less impactful and almost fly by choreography, so that once things get to grapples, body to body it’s much more intense. So I kind of agree and am not sure how much comes with their direction, or how to improve it without losing something else.
As for
I totally agree here, well maybe 20% less moments of that sort would’ve been fine and still driven the idea. As you might know, the sequels lean this attitude muuuuch more out the gate, but being blown over the top it kinda becomes the new “grounded”
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Doing the sort of complex extremely close-quarters choreography they do in John Wick, etc. with squibs and blanks (re: digital muzzle flash) would not only be more expensive (the first movie was pretty low budget) but also really dangerous and probably have a noticeable effect on how they could shoot and edit their sequences. You can’t point-blank into two stuntmen’s respective faces with actual blanks (you just might kill them!) before transitioning into some judo bullshit still holding onto the potentially still-live gun. You’ve got seven stuntmen + a Keanu in a sequence you want to do with three cuts and one of them’s timing is off and every one of their three squibs has to be reset and their costumes changed and Jesus, imagine the logistical nightmare of making this movie with squibs!
The digital bullshit is why they can make the movie they made anything like how they made it.
It’s OK not to like a thing but gosh
While he was filling condoms with karo syrup Robert Rodriguez should have considered someday making a single good movie (or a single good action sequence, which require a lot more than fake blood!) in his entire career.
Everyone talking up J O H N W I C K is a genre staple. The Extremely Tuff Individual gets the Just How Badass Are They? scene where people are like HOLY SHIT IT’S THE GUY AND HE DID THE THING only they take it to the point of absurdity (like someone killing 80 people to avenge the death of their dog) and that’s why it’s fun.
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They could use squibs for some shots and not for others. Also the logistical nightmare of it is part of the craft of making a good action movie! If Chow Yun Fat can blow off a guys head at point blank and get an explosion of gore in his face in a tea shop twenty years before John Wick I think they can maybe put some more effort into making their effects feel more grounded and practical.
The squibs comment mostly boils down to “this movie is clinical in a way that renders the violence in it trite and meaningless for me” and while it’s okay for it not to bother you, it absolutely bothers me. It totally destroys whatever tension I might feel, and tension is the heart of a good action movie.
Maybe if it leaned farther into being camp I’d be able to tolerate the constant digital effects more. But compositing in a muzzle flash the moment Wick’s gun points at someone is way, way too noticeable for me to ignore, and totally pulls me out of the action movie mindset.
El Mariachi, Desperado, Sin City, and Spy Kids are all classics imo. El Mariachi is one of my favorite action movies ever! It’s so understated and effective. As he’s gotten more of a budget though his practical roots have disappeared so he sucks now.
So, two things:
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The genre staple is usually a one-off comment. Half the characters in John Wick talk about how cool he is, and then every single person who likes this movie has to tell me how cool John Wick is. The repetition is not fun or funny to me, it’s just boring.
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In movies where the protagonist is talked up a lot by incidental characters and extras, typically the triteness of their talk is juxtaposed by how profoundly lazy the action scenes are. Steven Seagal and Chuck Norris movies are full of people singing their action praises, but the lazy fights elevate this action praise from tedium and into parody. Think about the monologue about how much of a badass Seagal is at the end of On Deadly Ground, and compare it to how lazily he dispatches 90% of the enemies in that movie. It’s funny! In John Wick I just find it annoying.
Yeah, the main problem I have with the way it’s depicted in the first movie is there’s no room for comedic silence or good conversation timing.
Take the first scene somebody mentions this: when the guy (mechanic, I think?) talks to the boss about the son killing Wick’s dog. The guy slaps the son, the boss asks why, the guy says he killed John Wick’s dog, the boss gets a horrified expression.
Good! End there! Use this moment to build tension in your film by implying rather than outright stating! But unfortunately the movie does nothing of the sort.
my brain just shut down it may be a week or more in recovery goodbye to all my online friends goodbye
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That’s just because you watched John Wick.
OK I can be easily baited into posting again I am posting again to say “no that’s not it at all what a rude suggestion” goodbye now
goodbye
cherry blossoms float through the frame on a wistful breeze
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that guy isn’t even in the shot when he blows his head off though
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One might say taking a single sentence from an in-depth good faith post and going “haha wow how dumb this gave me brain damage” is also very rude
Yeah that’s called “good editing”, something John Wick could use more of
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this monologue is good because it’s an environmentalism monologue in an action movie
While I love that monologue, that’s not the one I mean. I’m talking about the one where the guard captain guy rattles off how badass Seagal is. It’s not at the very very end, but it’s near the end.
wick movies are like getting to see competition shooting with people for targets and the shooter having videogame like durability so we can see them last long enough against many armed opponents to do lots of cool things. john woo movies are like watching somebody adapt the play gunfights he had as a kid to the big screen. different kind of choreographic needs. not everything has to be like every similar thing that’s also good.
besides the first wick movie was just like the best direct to video action movie ever made, with the best parts being when he’s crying over a dog. 2 and 3 are more like real movies (action wise, they could use more crying over dogs).
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Yeah I think my main frustration with Wick is it hits all but the most important (to me) parts of action movie artistry, which makes the flaws that much more noticeable.
It’s not that I want Wick to be exactly like John Woo, it’s that I want tension and connection, it’s what I crave in action movies, and Wick only has it very sporadically
But when the movie succeeds, I love it. The scene with Dafoe sniping while Wick does cool hand to hand is a superlative action setpiece!
You’re going to really like the third one, I think.
I can sort of agree. Although I think actual squibs will always be better.
ive only seen john wick 1 and 2 but 2 doesnt have enough crying over dogs or stuff like the catacomb shootout where its a 3 gun match with people. between wick regressing further/disappointing his dead wife and everyone in the world being a shadowrunner its a bleak ass movie too
its definitely a lot more downbeat considering wicks reason for getting back in is tied up in bullshit from the life he left behind and also the fact that it establishes he will probably spend the rest of his life killing lots of people
Yeah, I am in the “i don’t really like cgi squibs” camp, but the JW movies don’t bother me too much for it because a lot of what they are doing wouldn’t be safe with squibs and such, yeah. And they look mostly OK. Far better than, for example, when Rodriguez kept using them in Machete.
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I’ve thought of the first John Wick as an excellent update of Brian Helgeland’s original Payback cut (which I love), but instead of being owed money, it’s about Wick’s soul. With phenomenal fight choreography and direction.
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isn’t it weird watching 80s or 90s movies now and the Just How Badass Is This Guy scene is they did 2 years in vietnam, or they just got a medal for bravery in the army one time. now everyone and their grandma has done minimum a 10 year tour in afghanistan
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