By ALEXANDER WHEELER
Features Editor
and
JOSEPH CONWAY
Contributing Writer
Is a film made to entertain or to win awards? Does it happen to be entertaining and also award worthy? Alexander Wheeler and Joseph Conway are here to answer those questions in this week’s edition of Award Great or Award Bait?
This week’s film in question is a film that we didn’t bet on ever seeing, ever. Let alone in a movie theater. The film is none other than Keanu Reeves vehicle, John Wick, directed by David Leitch and co-starring Willem DaFoe, Ian McShane, and the cutest beagle puppy you will ever see.
The film, a straight forward revenge action flick, sees Reeves play a man dealing with the death of his wife while caring for a beagle that she left him. Some plot gets set into motion that reels Reeves back into the hit-man lifestyle that allows Reeves to kick some serious butt.
Alexander’s Opinion:
This film, had little going for it in my mind before I saw it – besides the immense RottenTomatoes score of 90%. I’m glad I had such low expectations, seeing as how much I truly enjoyed this film.
The only film that I can compare this to would have to be Nicholas Winding Refn’s 2011 crime time drama, Drive, starring Ryan Gosling. This film is light on plot, so it doesn’t allow for much forceful and penetrating dialogue, especially from Reeves, but allows Reeves to dig deep into his character’s grief and make his character connect with the audience – which is a rarity for Reeves as of late.
The other big pluses for this film are the score by Tyler Bates which is entirely kinetic (much like the action in the film), the cinematography, and the sound mixing and editing.
John Wick was the most fun I’ve had a movie this year so far.
Joseph’s Opinion:
John Wick is not a movie that is attempting to win Academy Awards, but that does not mean it is a bad movie; in fact we could argue that John Wick is actually a great movie. Movies such as Guardians of the Galaxy, The Avengers and This is The End obtain strong ratings on websites like RottenTomatoes or Metacritic, but they do not win Best Picture when the Oscars come around. These movies are not failures because they were simply made for the enjoyment of the audience.
John Wick does not have performances that will be remembered for years to come, but one thing that truly separates it from other films are the dynamic action scenes throughout the film.
John Wick was directed by David Leitch, and Chad Stahelski, both of these men spent most of their careers so far as stunt coordinators and stunt men; this was heavily apparent seen in the fights and stunts throughout the film. They were fluid and dynamic. Combining gun fighting and hand-to-hand combat, Leitch and Stahelski created one of the most exciting action movies in the last few years.
One of the keys to the excitement was the vulnerability of Keanu Reeves’ character during combat, unlike many action movies in which the hero plows through henchmen like they’re paper, John Wick must struggle through combat, as the villains are much more competent then in the typical action movie.
Though Keanu Reeves most likely will not receive a nomination for Best Actor due to his performance in John Wick, his portrayal of John Wick was still very enjoyable. After 47 Ronin, Keanu Reeves needed a movie to catapult him back to the top of Hollywood, and with a movie like John Wick he may have just accomplished that. Being that this article is about award season, I could see Keanu Reeves receiving strong roles in the near future and possible nominations in the coming years.
One of the biggest issues we had writing this review and discussing the film was the aspect of a film being an Award Great or being Award Bait. John Wick is a great film, but isn’t going to pull any awards this season, but isn’t baiting for any awards either. Even though this is only the second edition of our Great and Bait series, we’ve come up with a new grade to acknowledge great popcorn flicks much like John Wick. That grade is: Appreciate. We appreciate every member of the cast and crew that made this film work, however, we are hard pressed to see where this film would fit in during the awards circuit. Furthermore, we would to say that John Wick is proof that Keanu is back and he’s better than ever.
Alexander’s Predictions:
Sound Mixing and Sound Editing.
Joseph’s Predictions:
SAG (Screen Actor’s Guild Award) for Stunt Ensemble.
