My Magical Place: John Wick Review

A thing is clearly happening when it comes to action movies at the box office these days. I don’t know whether this is a good thing or a bad thing but it sure as hell is happening, what with the success of The Expendables franchise proving that you can take action heroes from the old school whom we all grew up with but had pretty much lost their relevance and revive their careers and audiences’ lust for some good ol’ skop, skiet en donner flicks at the same time. Why stop there when you can delve deeper and take a star like Keanu Reeves after the mess that was 47 Ronin and put him in an action movie that doesn’t try to lie to you about the depth of its plot? This right here is the future of making movies, you guys!

They totally killed this cute puppy. Bastards!

John Wick is straight up one of the coolest movies that I have seen in a long time. This movie doesn’t beat around the bush because the only beating that John does is kicking bad guys in the teeth. What you saw in the trailer is pretty much it in terms of plot. Seriously, it’s Keanu Reeves’ character, John Wick and his wife died but because she’s an amazing woman she arranged for a puppy to be delivered to their house after she dies so John has someone else to love and doesn’t become too lonely. This is all good and well till some punk, who happens to be a Russian mobster type of guy’s kid kills his puppy when he wouldn’t sell him his car at a petrol station. It turns out John Wick is the most badass of contract killers in the game and he sets out to exact vengeance on the punk kid and all the henchmen who dare stand in his way (which had me thinking why henchmen are such a loyal breed of people anyhow? After seeing my buddies get their teeth kicked in I’d just go home). That’s it. What more do you want out of life?

Keanu Reeves is perfect in his role as John Wick because he’s just the sort of guy who really doesn’t sell the idea of being an action hero when he’s just standing around putting petrol in a car and then later when he’s kicking the snot out of bad guys you can then turn around and totally buy into it. A proper action star in the mould of a Jason Statham would ruin a role like this because he lacks a certain banal aspect that Keanu Reeves has in spades.

John Wick is Chad Stahelski’s first venture in the director’s chair and he does a good job of always upping the ante in terms of the actions scenes. Stahelski comes from a stunt co-ordinating background and has had a hand in many action heavy films over the years, working on projects like The Matrix, V for Vendetta, 300 and even stuff like The Hunger Games. The man sure as hell knows how to make a stylish action movie. This movie might be light on plot but it oozes style and the banter between the characters, although not on the same level and cheesiness as The Expendables is funny enough to have you laugh out loud at moments.

Adrianne Palicki

There are no performances worthy of an Oscar nomination here but the cast is rock solid with names like Alfie Allen (an even punkier kid than his character in Game of Thrones in this movie), Willem Dafoe, Adrianne Palicki, Ian McShane, Lance Reddick and Michael Nyqvist. The cast all deliver on the goods and it all adds up to a fun action romp.

I was a bit late on this bandwagon because, you know, Keanu Reeves and John Wick is almost off of the local circuit so be sure to pop in as soon as you can or catch it on Blu-Ray and DVD soon. If you like action with almost no plot but a boatload of style this one is for you and boy is it fun!

My Magical Place: My thoughts on The Hunger Games

Okay, so here I am, over a year later after its release, and I can finally say that I've seen The Hunger Games. I was never really negative about it at any point but I was also not super amped to get to it or anything. It was just there. Waiting. Whenever I'd decide to watch it something else would just pop up -  I'd have to save my family from a burst geyser or something. I almost didn't watch it yesterday either because my DVD player did a thing and I was too lazy to fiddle with it. Luckily my roommate was on-hand to connect his laptop to our TV.

The first time I heard about The Hunger Games and its premise I thought it sounded a whole lot like Battle Royale (which I've also not gotten around to seeing. It's just there. Skulking.) in terms of kids on some island/forest set-up having to kill each other. I'm not the biggest fan of kids killing each other in my movies or books (I still haven't read Lord of the Flies. It's sitting somewhere. Scowling perhaps?) I'm fine with kids killing adults though. That's fine. Anyway, back to the issue at hand. I liked The Hunger Games and think it's a good movie. It still disturbed me highly though. Straight up Mount Everest levels highly. It wasn't that it was graphical in its violence or anything. Something about it just got to me. Good art is supposed to unsettle you I guess.

Kids killing kids (KKK). Okay (K).

Throughout the movie I sat there thinking, Dafuq is wrong with these people? But this shit's happened on numerous occasions in the real world before and is still happening in some form or another right now. Our history as a species is drenched in blood: war, prejudice, terrorism, racism, sexism and a string of other forms of hatred. Mindless hatred is just something we do and we're good at it. Add the spectator element from the movie and that's us right there. We love being the audience on other people's tragedies. We do show some level of sympathy towards others and their misfortune but mostly we view it with a morbid kind of fascination and think how lucky we are that it's not us going through that shit. The Hunger Games made me feel a certain level of shame in terms of how I'd probably just look on if that sort of thing were to happen in front of me. Just as long as it wasn't me it was happening to. I liked the movie but it made me feel really shitty. Then I watched The Hobbit afterwards, which cheered me right up and I could return to my complacent ways...

I am looking forward to the next movie, Catching Fire, I must say. Those Capitol bastards are clearly riled up by Katniss and that Peeta bloke for showing them up a little. Also, how do you go back to a normal life and shit after having to kill some people who you didn't really have anything against, except those 'evil' career tribute kids who were assholes and totally deserved to die... Even though they're kids, you know.

I figure I should read the books but I feel no real motivation to do that so I'll just wait on the movies and see how that goes.

So It Begins

In terms of fantasy, sci-fi and comic book movies the year 2012 only begins now. Sure we've had the rather lacklustre Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Wrath of the Titans and, dare I add, The Hunger Games to whet our appetites for what is to come, but that's all they were - starters before the main course.

The first of the really big guns has already been rolled out as we speak. Marvel's super team, The Avengers, is assembled and ready to face the threat that Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and his goons (such a cool word) pose to the world (by which they mostly mean the US).

When the world faces its greatest threat, as it does on a regular basis, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), Director of international peace keeping agency, S.H.I.E.L.D, calls together the world's greatest and most mismatched heroes to kick it in the head: Captain America (Chris Evans), a soldier literally lost in time; 'enormous, green rage monster', The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo); 'genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist' in a suit of armour, Iron Man; hammer wielding god of thunder, Thor and agents, Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner). That, my furry friends, sets the scene for all sorts of tomfoolery and kick-assery that both those who read Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch's The Ultimates and those who didn't are sure to enjoy. Do yourself a favour and go see this one in all three of its glorious dimensions. Joss Whedon has done a great job at the helm of this ship and never steers it wrongly. The Avengers is set to be one of 2012's highlights.

From here on out it's G.I. Joe: Retaliation (29 June 2012), which has The Rock as Roadblock. That alone will result in me watching it but it also looks like it will be a good movie in terms of actual merit. As long as it's nothing like The Rise of Cobra all's well in the world. Marvel takes another jab at the Spider-man franchise with Spidy's latest outing in the form of The Amazing Spider-man (06 July 2012). Christopher Nolan's much-anticipated conclusion to his Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight Rising hits screens on 20 July 2012 and Peter Jackson takes us back to Middle-earth before Christmas in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (14 December 2012). In between those we'll be seeing titles like The Expendables 2, World War Z, Resident Evil: Retribution, James Bond doing his Bond thing in Skyfall, Prometheus, Jack the Giant Killer and M.I.B 3 to mention a few.

All I can say is save your 3D glasses from The Avengers and expect the remainder of this year to be a great one at the movies.