‘John Wick’ series continues with ‘Parabellum’
‘JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 3’
Grade: 3 stars (out of 4)
Rating: R for pervasive strong violence, and some language
unning time: 2:11
By JAKE COYLE
AP Film Writer
Movies can be blessedly simple. As the first “John Wick” showed, all you really need is a car, a gun, a dead dog and Keanu Reeves. Who needs “kiss kiss” when you’ve got plenty of “bang bang?”
Alas, nothing in today’s movie-land stays minor-key. Chad Stahelski’s “John Wick” has quickly spouted into a three-and-counting series, the latest of which is “John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum.” What was once a taut, minimalist action movie with an appeal predicated on low-expectations and leanness has grown into a franchise with a typically overcooked subtitle and de-rigueur world-building (the film’s press notes reference “the Wickian universe”).
“Parabellum” finds Stahelski, Reeves’ former stunt double who has directed all three films, moving further beyond Wick’s hardboiled origins and into a more extravagant action thriller. In its ever-expanding fictional realm, “Parabellum” isn’t so dissimilar from a superhero movie, only one with way more blood, a much higher body count and, yes, righteously better action scenes.
It starts right where we left off with Reeves’ uber-hitman. He’s on the run in New York having violated the fiercely enforced rules of the High Table, an international assassin’s guild that sets combat protocol for a vast criminal netherworld, including that no “business” should be conducted in the Continental, the Manhattan hotel presided over with panache by its manager, Winston (Ian McShane).
Along with returning co-stars Laurence Fishburne, Lance Reddick and McShane, “Parabellum” is well-stocked in top-flight character actors. No movie that includes Fishburne bellowing “I am the Bowery!” isn’t without its acting pleasures – including Reeves, himself, who has found in Wick a comfortable match for his spare style and powerfully still physical presence. Also added to the mix here is Asia Kate Dillon (“Billions”), as the Adjudicator, sent to arbitrate violators of the High Table’s code.
But most come to the “John Wick” films for the hyperkinetic videogame action sequences. With a seamless mix of CGI and stunt work, Stahelski fluidly choreographs ballets of bullets and endless violent encounters across a grim cityscape.
There is no doubt that these sequences are quite easily, in form and execution, a cut above what most any other action film is currently doing. But “Parabellum” often squanders its finesse by resorting, countless times, to execution-like killings. As the body count swells, the relentless sound of gun blasts, and the occasional knife stuck in a skull, begins to pulverize. Fans will surely eat it all up, but the “John Wick” films have nothing to say about gun violence despite its absurd abundance.
As laudable as the filmmaking is here, it’s an abdication – and one that’s hard to fathom, given the parade of shootings today – that sullies the whole enterprise.