John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum (2019) review

In 2014, Keanu Reeves experienced a major career resurgence when he starred in John Wick, an action-thriller that was co-directed by former stuntmen Chad Stahelski and David Leitch (even though Stahelski was the only one credited by the Directors Guild of America), whom he had previously worked with on the Matrix films. In the film, Reeves played the titular John Wick, a retired hitman with a considerable legacy amongst his peers who ends up returning to his old profession when a group of Russian thugs kill the puppy that had been given to him by his wife as one last gift before her tragic death. Upon its release, the film was a big hit with critics and audiences, gaining considerable praise for its phenomenal action sequences that avoided several of the filmmaking techniques that, in the minds of many, have negatively affected many recent action films (e.g. rapid editing, shaky cam, etc.). Thus, a sequel was soon set into motion and released in 2017, with Stahelski taking sole directorial duties this time around due to Leitch working on other projects. Just like the first film, John Wick: Chapter 2 was a critical and financial success. It nearly doubled its predecessor’s run at the box-office and is generally considered to be a rare case of an arguably superior sequel. And because of the shocking incident that occurs during its finale, we now move onto the third entry of the series, John Wick: Chapter 3, which is the first of the series to have a subtitle via the Latin phrase for ‘Prepare for War’, Parabellum. It’s a film that sees its titular hero dealing with some of the toughest opponents that he’s ever faced in this series, and just like the previous two films, this all results in yet another epic action extravaganza with the legendary hitman who is known to many as ‘Baba Yaga’.

At the end of John Wick: Chapter 2, revered hitman John Wick (Keanu Reeves) ended up breaking the cardinal rule of the hitman community by killing his target, crime boss Santino D’Antonio, within the confines of the hitman safe-haven that is the Continental Hotel. Thus, without hesitation, the crime boss hierarchy known as the High Table quickly declare him as ‘excommunicado’ and place a $14 million bounty on him that is eventually raised to $15 million. Because of this, John now finds himself in a situation where he can’t rely on his usual resources while also being hunted by every single assassin that he comes across. And if that wasn’t enough, an adjudicator for the High Table (Asia Kate Dillon) takes several of his allies, including New York Continental owner Winston (Ian McShane) and local crime lord The Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), to task for aiding him in his recent endeavors. With very few options left at his disposal, John travels to the city of Casablanca, Morocco, where he reunites with Sofia (Halle Berry), the current owner of the local Continental. Just like his situation with D’Antonio in the previous film, John convinces her to honor the unbreakable bond between them via the assassin marker that they’d set up after he had helped her in the past. Thus, Sofia reluctantly joins forces with him on his perilous journey to try and find a way to get out of his current predicament with the High Table. But as John soon discovers, he may end up having to take some truly drastic measures if he wants to get that $15 million target off his back.

One of the most impressive aspects of this series is its seamless narrative, with each subsequent installment’s plot being directly set into motion by the events of its immediate predecessor. John Wick: Chapter 2’s plot was initiated by John’s return to the hitman lifestyle, and John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum is the result of Chapter 2’s finale, where he broke the golden rule of the Continental. And because of this, this film presents John at what is arguably the most vulnerable state that he’s ever been in apart from when his wife Helen died. Now obviously, as these films have very much proven, John Wick clearly isn’t someone who will go down that easy. Still, because this film puts him in a situation where almost everyone’s out to get him, it arguably makes Parabellum the most intense installment of the trilogy because of its non-stop pace. Of course, just like the previous two films, this film is full of amazing action sequences from beginning to end. As always, they’re well-shot, well-edited, and impressively choreographed. All this makes up for the fact that this film admittedly has one of the weaker plots of the series so far. To be clear, it’s still a very well-written action flick that continues the franchise’s excellent tradition of gradually expanding upon its lore and the assassin underworld that it has created. It’s also worth noting, however, that this is the longest entry of the series to date at 131 minutes long, and while there’s never a dull moment in this film, sometimes it does feel like the plot is being stretched a bit thin for a franchise that has never tried to present an overly complicated narrative.           

John Wick has easily become one of the most definitive roles of Keanu Reeves’ career, and just like in the previous two films, he continues to do a phenomenal job when it comes to his portrayal of the stoic assassin. The film even delves a bit into John’s backstory (namely, the events that led to him becoming an assassin in the first place) while also continuing to give Reeves more opportunities to establish himself as one of the best action stars in the industry, because just like Tom Cruise, Reeves isn’t afraid to do most of his own stunts. As usual, he’s joined by a solid ensemble cast headlined by series regulars like Ian McShane as John’s benevolent ally Winston, Lance Reddick as the Continental’s cordial concierge Winston (who even gets to partake in some of the action this time around to brilliant results), and Laurence Fishburne as the boisterous Bowery King. When it comes to newcomers to the franchise, it’s all headlined by Halle Berry as Sofia, John’s old ally from Morocco who’s always accompanied by a pair of vicious attack dogs. As far as the action is concerned, Berry more than holds her own against Reeves and their characters’ complicated relationship results in some solid banter between them, although it should be noted that she ultimately plays a minor role in the larger story. But then there’s the film’s main antagonists, and while the John Wick franchise has admittedly been hit-or-miss over the years with its villains, Parabellum’s key antagonists are some of the series’ best. First, there’s Asia Kate Dillon as the High Table’s Adjudicator, who is appropriately cold and calculating when it comes to managing the hunt for John Wick from behind the scenes. And then there’s Mark Dacascos as Zero, an assassin who is directly hired by the Adjudicator to eliminate John. Like many others in this world, Zero is a huge fan of the legendary ‘Baba Yaga’, which provides the film with some of its best humorous moments that mainly consist of Zero’s various attempts at striking up a friendly conversation with his target.

Thanks to Chapter 3 – Parabellum, the John Wick franchise has managed to pull off the often-daunting task of being a trilogy of films where each installment is genuinely outstanding. Sure, this film could still technically be regarded by some as the ‘weakest’ entry of the trilogy (which usually ends up being the case with threequels), but in this instance, that isn’t even remotely a bad thing. Just like its two predecessors, this film is full of amazing action sequences from beginning to end. And thanks to the continuously excellent direction from Chad Stahelski and another phenomenal performance by Keanu Reeves in the title role, Chapter 3 maintains the franchise’s great affinity for simple but highly effective action-thrillers, even if this one occasionally feels a bit too simplistic despite boasting the series’ longest run-time. But perhaps the most interesting part of this film… is the fact that it shows that this series is far from being over. Yes, while I’m sure that some might have expected this to be the finale to the story of John Wick, the film ends similarly to Chapter 2 by extensively setting up the next big conflict that John will be involved with, and sure enough, a Chapter 4 was recently confirmed for a 2021 release. Plus, there are also quite a few spin-offs in the works, including an upcoming TV series set at the Continental and a rumored crossover with Atomic Blonde, the 2017 action-thriller that was directed by the original John Wick’s co-director, David Leitch. And while some film franchises tend to fizzle out at this point and experience a noticeable decline in quality, it’s very much clear that the John Wick franchise is just as resilient as its titular badass.

Rating: 4.5/5

John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017) review

In 2014, former stuntmen Chad Stahelski and David Leitch teamed up to direct John Wick, starring Keanu Reeves as an ex-hitman who finds himself forced back into the business when a group of Russian mobsters attack him, steal his car, and kill his dog, the latter of which was a gift from his wife before she died to help him cope. The film was a solid commercial success upon release, grossing over four times its modest $20 million budget. It also did great with critics and fans of the action genre, who praised the film for its incredibly shot and choreographed action sequences in an age of rapid-edit, ‘PG-13-friendly’ action. And this year, the legendary ‘Baba Yaga’ is back for another round of vengeful, but also stylish, gunplay in John Wick: Chapter 2. Reeves, of course, returns in the title role as does director Chad Stahelski, though this time around, David Leitch is only serving as an executive producer. Then again, only Stahelski was credited as director for the first film by the Directors Guild of America, even though both directed it. Plus, Leitch went off to work on the upcoming spy thriller The Coldest City and is also being primed to helm the sequel to Deadpool, so I think it’s safe to say that he was just tied up with other projects. But, thankfully, this doesn’t affect John Wick: Chapter 2 too much because, oh boy, this film is one epic action sequel. And that’s because it does two great things at once. Not only does it maintain plenty of the same great elements of the first film, particularly in terms of its action sequences, but it also feels like a natural follow-up, upping the ante in all the right ways without losing the badass aura of the original.

At the end of John Wick, the titular ex-hitman (Keanu Reeves), known by many in the assassin community as ‘The Boogeyman’, successfully avenged the death of his dog Daisy at the hands of the Tarasov family. And after finally getting his vintage 1969 Mustang back as well, which he retrieves from the chop shop owned by Viggo Tarasov’s brother Abram (Peter Stormare) in this film’s opening sequence, John prepares to retire once again, having picked up a new dog (which isn’t given a name in the film) from an animal clinic at the end of the first film. However, he is soon approached by another old associate of his, Italian crime lord Santino D’Antonio (Riccardo Scamarcio), who has come for payment over a blood oath that he and John made years ago, in which the former helped the latter retire from the business. John initially declines the offer, saying that he is ‘retired for good’, but when Santino destroys his home as payback, he quickly finds that he has no other choice. To fulfill his side of the bargain, John is directed to Rome, where he is tasked with taking down a high-value target so that Santino can take their place on the council of crime lords known as ‘the High Table’. But even after John pulls off this job, Santino then betrays him and places a $7 million bounty on his head. News of the bounty attracts the attention of every major assassin in New York, putting ol’ ‘Baba Yaga’ on the run as he goes on his own path of vengeance against Santino.

Just like the first film, John Wick: Chapter 2 features some incredible action sequences that highlight all the great camerawork, editing, and stunt choreography that went into making them. Heck, being that it’s basically set not too long after the events of the first film, this film comes right out the gate with an awesome sequence in which John fights through a bunch of goons to get his car back. There’s that, a big shootout within Roman catacombs, a fight in the New York City Subway, a fight within a hall of mirrors, etc. Bottom line, just like the first film, there’s plenty of standout fights in this film, so much so that it’s admittedly hard to pick just one as a favorite. And as for being a sequel, this basically does the best thing that any good sequel should do; it ups the ante of the story’s stakes without losing sight of what made the first film work so well. As I noted in my review of the first film, I really admired the simplicity of its plot execution. John’s motivations are clear throughout and the set-up of the assassin world is excellent without going into too much detail. From the ‘honor system’ that’s set up at the Continental Hotel, which caters to the criminal underworld but maintains the ground rule of not having one’s business occur on property, to the montage in which John meets with various people in Rome (e.g. a tailor, a ‘Sommelier’ (Peter Serafinowicz), etc.) to acquire his supplies before he goes on his latest mission, these films set up a cool world in which assassins go about their business in a graceful manner. All that, of course, was there in the first film and in this film, writer Derek Kolstad does just enough to further expand this universe without losing the narrative’s charming simplicity.

John Wick… is a badass; simple as that. And Keanu Reeves is badass in the role. From doing his own stunts (while in his 50’s, no less!) to just maintaining a calm and collected persona throughout, a perfect representation of Wick’s highly-effective and tactical approach to everything he does, this may arguably be Reeves’ greatest role to date when it comes to his forays into the action genre. In other words, he was just a perfect fit for this role. And of course, like the first film, he’s got a nice cast of highly memorable supporting characters to back him up. There are some of the returning characters from the first film, like Ian McShane as the diplomatic owner of the Continental Hotel in New York and John Leguizamo as Wick’s friend and chop shop owner Aurelio. And then there’s also some of the new additions to the cast, like Common as Cassian, the bodyguard of John’s high-value target who becomes more of a ‘rival’ to him once John takes out the target, and Ruby Rose as Santino’s mute henchwoman Ares, who John crosses paths with numerous times over the course of the film. Plus, fans of The Matrix will no doubt get a kick out of the scene where Reeves is reunited with Morpheus himself, Laurence Fishburne, who plays a New York crime boss known as the ‘Bowery King’. But, once again, I find that the main villain, Santino, is the weakest link of the film. Again, like Viggo and Iosef from the first film, he’s not a ‘bad’ villain’, per se; he’s got nice set-up in terms of his relationship with John and all. But, also like Viggo and Iosef, he tends to get overshadowed by all the supporting characters.

John Wick: Chapter 2 is one of the best action film sequels of all-time. Of course, that’s also benefitted from the fact that it’s a sequel to one of the best action films of the past decade, the original John Wick. Like its predecessor, Chapter 2 features excellent action sequences that are well-shot, finely-edited, and wonderfully choreographed. But then, of course, the film must deal with the fact that it’s a sequel, and overall, it handles that aspect brilliantly by feeling like a natural follow-up to the first film. The ways in which the story and action are built up from the first film are incredibly well-handled. In other words, the film still manages to maintain the simplistic charm of the first film while also upping the ante in terms of the action sequences as well as raising the stakes for John. On that note, without giving anything away, the way in which this film closes provides us with an awesome set-up for the third film. It ends on such a bold note that I think it’s safe to say that fans of this series will be eagerly awaiting John’s next adventure, whenever it comes out, to see how it all ends. But now, the big question is this; did this film also manage to outdo its predecessor? Well, while I do think that both films are great in terms of how they film their action and for the nice, simple execution of their stories, I think I do have to say that John Wick: Chapter 2 is a superior sequel to what was already a great action film.   

Rating: 4.5/5