John Wick - Chapitre 3 - Parabellum

John Wick 3 is without a doubt the best action movie to have come out in a few years. And its so surprising and refreshing to see that movies like this still exist. Most action movies you see is filled with ridiculous amounts of shaky-cam, fast edits and way over-the-top fights. This is perfect. You can see all action clear as day, and by god the stuns in this film are extraordinary. Why the Academy Awards don't award talent like this is beyond me. There were times that I wondered if they had used CGI, because someone nuts must be willing to throw themselves from motorbikes and through glass. But whatever case it is, its a dam joy to watch.

As with the previous 2 installments, John Wick 3 is where Keanu Reeves is at home. This role was just made for him, and watching him stand toe to toe with powerhouses like Halle Berry, Ian McShane, Laurence Fishburne and Anjelica Huston, not only shows how good he is as an action star, but as an actor in general. He hasn't been given a role this good since the Matrix, but those movies never showed how good he was just at acting. He sells this movie.

The supporting cast is all amazing, and I loved how they left their character's hanging, giving us hope of seeing them in future installments. I also loved how more in-depth the movie spent on world-building. The way it brings in different cultures into this assassin guild is done very well.

John Wick 3 is an amazing action movie that never loses its steam throughout, and its 2 hour run times flies past, because of non-stop action that is directed and choreographed to perfection. I can't wait to see if they manage to pull off the 4th like they did here.

8.8/10

I liked the first two movies, both had a meaning behind all the action that takes place, this movie the plot is weak and the fight scenes way too long for the weak plot. Keanu still portrays his character as the Boogeyman really well, I enjoyed it but just felt it dragged on a bit much and the fight scene especially with Halle could have been cut down.

John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum is technically the best of the John Wick films but it is also the worst in terms of story and character development. John Wick's story and motives take a backseat to the world-building and competing motives of the supporting characters. Parabellum is more about the High Table than John Wick's struggle. Overall, Parabellum is a stepdown from both its predecessors, thus making it the weakest of the trilogy so far.

Parabellum has many strengths that overcome its weak writing mainly Ian McShane as Winston, Mark Dacascos as Zero, and the requisite all-out action scenes. Halle Berry as Sofia and Lance Reddick as Charon contribute as well. The subplot revolving the internal struggle of the High Table made for some really good character moments mostly through Ian McShane and Laurence Fishburne. The finale's twist is the film's biggest shock.

Chapter 2 gave a bigger scope to the John Wick world; Parabellum extends it further. Chapters 1 and 2 are hard to top, yet somehow, director Chas Stahelski has perfected his craft with Parabellum. The museum, Kasbah, and room of mirror fights are gloriously choreographed coupled with fantastic direction. Zero is also the best John Wick villain by far. The action scenes drown the drama though and feel gratuitous. John Wick starts on the run but by the end of the film, after Winston's seeming betrayal, seeming because an ulterior motive to temporarily keep the peace against the High Table is possible, we see him eager to directly confront his enemies.

On a side note, Parabellum seems more like an extension to Chapter 2 than as a separate film itself. The ending firmly establishes John Wick's turnaround from avoiding his previous life to facing them, hopefully in a satisfying and definitive conclusion in the sequel.

6/10

About 6 months ago I saw a picture of the set of 'John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum' featuring Keanu Reeves on horseback shooting at motorcyclists. It was such a great looking shot that I have been waiting eagerly to see how it looked in the actual film ever since. It did not let me down. The style this film possesses is insane. It is one of the best looking action films I have ever seen.

The pacing of this film is also incredible. It starts the action immediately and almost never lets up. I can't wait to see what the death count was in this film because it will be truly enormous. The only problem is when the death count is that high the film can struggle to keep the originality up. After a while each death starts to look very similar to the last, and the 50 before that, and it can even become a little tedious to watch.

The only other flaw I came across with the film was that John Wick is on the defence too much. Instead of being angry and on the hunt like the first two films, for the majority of the Chapter 3 he is in survival mode. Still very fun to watch, but it isn't quite the same as seeing him take brutal revenge.

And the film is brutal. I could be wrong but I don't remember the first two entries in the series making me cringe in terms of violence as much. There were some very hard things to watch at times in this movie even for me, and I pride myself on handling those sorts of things fine most of the time. One of them early on got an audible gasp from the entire audience and I saw multiple people having to turn their heads to the side.

'John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum' is two hours of your life that will pass by very quickly. This is as non-stop action as films get. I think this is the third best action series currently producing movies (after 'James Bond' and 'Mission Impossible'). Will it get a third one? The first entry on the trivia page suggests no, however the end of this movie suggests yes? I guess we will have to wait to find out. For now enjoy the hell out of this one.

It is 5 years since the first John Wick film - one that took me by surprise by how silly it was as a narrative, but yet how well it delivered action sequences. The second film was only 2 years ago, and it raised the stakes and went from a man seeking revenge on another group of people, into one where the world was filled with assassins, popping up from everywhere all the time. I remember ending that film feeling like it had gone too far but that the third would probably do more of that. True enough, Parabellum ("prepare for war") sees the whole world filled with assassins, and a huge administrative system around them - but yet the whole lot of them can't seem to cause John Wick too much trouble. As with the first film, this expands the world more than it can bear, and although it looks cool at times, the world makes no sense whatsoever and it hurts the film the more it relies on it (which it does as it expands it).

The simplicity of the first film is therefore gone, and the slick fun is hurt because it feels bloated in scale, and has to work to sell this unsellable world to the viewer. At its best though, the film doesn't concern itself with this and instead has nicely flowing sequences of well-choreographed violence that is well directed and performed. It is brutally violent but it is almost like a ballet to watch it. Having two cast members from The Raid films had the positive impact of having them, but there was a negative too because those films manage to deliver stakes and tension in the violence - something John Wick just doesn't manage to ever do. I enjoyed the flow and pace, but never got caught up in a fight in a way where it had me on the edge of the seat; contrast the fight with Yayan Ruhian and Cecep Arif Rahman, and the fights that the two are involved with in The Raid 1 and 2 respectively - their John Wick fight is enjoyable but their fights in The Raid movies had weight, danger, and risk.

The endless lack of consequence does make it hard to stay engaged with, and it needs it to be cool and slick so that we never connect it to the real world - but seeing people stabbed in a busy train station with people just walking by without reaction does make that hard, for example. It is still slick, quite enjoyable tosh, and very well put together in terms of fight sequences, but it does feel bloated and overlong, and could have done with a tighter world - although I guess they cannot put that back in the box after the second movie took it out. Enjoyable for what it is, but it has a lot of weaknesses that detract while watching.