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John Wick 3 and the "Psycho Sequel Issue"

posted 6 years ago by ecarle (14979)
7 replies | jump to latest

This one's maybe more OT than on topic, but I think Psycho is relevant.

On my somewhat meager list of favorite movies of the 2010's, John Wick(the first, the original) is my favorite of 2014. And it was actually one of my easiest choices.

It came outta nowhere in October of 2014. The plot was super-basic, and that was its beauty: John Wick(Keanu Reeves) is a retired super-assassin mourning the natural causes death of his too-young wife. Said wife arranged for a puppy to be sent to John Wick, to give him comfort and hope upon her death.

And then one day the spoiled arrogant-punk son of a Russian Mafia kingpin killed that puppy(in the course of stealing John Wick's cool car and having his goons beat Wick up.)

And the plot began: John Wick is reborn as an assassin, with one goal only: kill the Russian mob punk son who killed his puppy. And John Wick will kill men by the score to get to that punk son. And the Russian punk's father -- grudgingly, resignedly, and with only family loyalty backing him -- sets forth forces to kill John Wick in return.

The movie was wall-to-wall marital arts and gunplay, as John Wick killed everybody in his path in very stylish and exciting action scenes(the co-directors were stunt men, themselves.)

But here was have a first link to "Psycho": Like "Psycho," "John Wick" is simple -- almost elemental in its plot. (Psycho: A woman is killed, the detective hired to find her is killed, her loved ones follow him and catch the killer; John Wick: An ex-assassin comes out of retirement to kill the punk who killed his puppy; forces are arrayed against him to stop that from happening.) Like "Psycho" the simple plot is played out with a maximum of cinematic style and excitement -- and keeps deepening in theme in spite of the simplicity of the plot.

To wit: the formidable, strong and handsome middle-aged Russian mob boss whose son has killed John Wick's puppy, clearly HATES his spoiled, arrogant weakling son. He probably sees John Wick as MORE of a son. But blood ties rule. The father will pit scores of men against John Wick and they will all die, and the father is angry as to why he must sacrifice all those lives: for the worthless punk son he personally detests.

To wit: John Wick -- played by Keanu Reeves, a youthful looking man with a sweet face and a cool manner -- becomes a machine-like killer again not only to avenge the killing of a little puppy, but to avenge what that killing MEANT: the killing of the hope expressed in that puppy as the final gift of a wife dying too young.

To wit: with a certain religious certainty(ironic in a murderous man), the Mafia kingpin tells John Wick that neither he nor Wick were truly righteous enough to escape life without pain: Wick must lose his young wife to (cancer?) and the puppy to the Russian kingpin's son; the Russian kingpin must lose his son and half his Mafia army to John Wick. Its "God's will" as within the more mythic belief system of the modern American film.

"John Wick" also embellished its ultra-simple plot with an ultra-embellished universe, centered around the "Continental Hotel," a plush NYC hotel for hit people in which the house rules are "no killing allowed on the premises" and where transactions are carried out with special gold coins and special passwords. Old Cool Guy Ian MacShane("Deadwood") runs the place and a very elegant black hotel manager enforces its rules.

Armed with visual style, a great supporting cast, a rich visual scheme and a self-created universe, John Wick proved a cult hit AND a real hit in late 2014.

And thus the inevitable happened: John Wick 2.

Most critics were kind to John Wick 2 because it upped the ante on style and slaughter, with John Wick taking on all manner of new assassins in all manner of new brutal fights and shoot-outs.

Now, the fading Keanu Reeves had a franchise to ALMOST replace The Matrix. And I felt good about that. And make no mistake, Reeves is key to "John Wick" working, at least for this fan. His "woah!" stoner dude reputation aside, Reeves is a tall handsome man with a courtly manner and an almost sweet face...and this powered both the "puppy revenge" aspects of John Wick AND its violent scenes, with the great line in John Wick: "People keep asking me if I'm back, and I don't know what to say. But yeah, now I'm thinking I'M BACK!!"

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

But just as it was fun to see "John Wick" become enough of a hit to merit a sequel, others of us noted something: John Wick 2 may have been bigger and more expensive than John Wick, but it missed the elemental key to the whole enterprise: the killing of the puppy. In the original, John Wick's murderous one-man rampage was based on the most humane of reasons: the killing of a sweet puppy and what that REPRESENTED. In John Wick 2, all the slaughter is for "just business" reasons, and the resultant movie(however much a hit) was ...demoralizing and bleak. Something special turned into nothing special.

And they're gonna do it again. A trailer is out for "John Wick 3: Parabellum" which now goes out as a summer 2019 release...John Wick has graduated to Summer Movie Franchise status. And Keanu Reeves is joined by a female star -- an Oscar winner(who gave an awful Oscar acceptance speech): Halle Berry. And something feels wrong about that, right there. Berry is a faded star by now, and rather "rote" casting for action movies. I guess Keanu Reeves was in the same boat, though. Still, Berry sends off a "second tier" vibe that I don't think much helps the John Wick franchise at all.

The premise for John Wick 3 was set up at the end of John Wick 2: Wick kills another(bad) assassin on the premises of the Continental Hotel. That's against the rules. So now, 2,000 assasssins(or so) worldwide will chase Wick and fight him to the death.

Action fans rejoice. "John Wick" fans...sigh.

For this is what Hollywood does with anything original, don't we know. The whole RATIONALE for the original "John Wick" -- a man out to avenge his dead puppy, a crime boss father resigned to protecting his no-good son -- is gone. Murders by the score are the replacement.

Which brings me to the Psycho sequels. "Psycho" -- like "John Wick" but on oh so bigger a landmark scale -- was a surprise that became a hit and played out as a start-to-finish work of popular art that ended perfectly. There was NO reason for a sequel to "Psycho" and yet it got one...and then two...and then three. Each of which devalued Norman Bates and the Bates Motel and everything that was truly great in Psycho until the narrative seemed trite.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

The "John Wick" sequels are better the "Psycho" sequels in that there is clearly more money being put into them. John Wick 2 LOOKED great..I expect that John Wick 3 will, too. But I'm reminded that the late screenwriter William Goldman said that sequels are "whore movies" -- movies made simply to make a buck, and oh so rarely coming close to the power of the original. Best Picture winner "Godfather II" is one of the supposed exceptions, but I don't really think so. I suppose "Aliens" is a successful example -- it turned a Haunted House movie into a war movie -- and there are others. But "John Wick 3" and "Psycho 3" are probably better examples of "whore movies."

Still...I felt good when Anthony Perkins got to make some big money late in his career with the Psycho sequels, and I feel good that Keanu Reeves, by all reports a very nice movie star(he gave The Matrix effects guys some of his points on that movie)...has a franchise to call home. (Rather like much bigger star Tom Cruise with his Missions Impossible.)

And this, which I've mentioned before: my choice to play Norman Bates in Van Sant's Psycho back in 1998 was...Keanu Reeves. Vince Vaughn was all wrong, but some of the more "naturally wimpy" alternate choices offered(like Jeremy Davies from Saving Private Ryan, or Timothy Hutton or even Andrew Garfield, modernly) are TOO wimpy. Keanu Reeves, like Anthony Perkins was a leading man, with very handsome features and a boyishness that hid a certain danger and strength. Norman Bates needed that.

I'll probably see John Wick 3. I saw John Wick 2. But nothing will compare with the pleasurable jolt I got when I saw John Wick back in 2014. True surprises at the movies are rare. John Wick the Original was something very special and very hard to pull off. It needed no sequels, and without another dead puppy, the franchise is pretty empty.

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

I'll probably see John Wick 3. I saw John Wick 2. But nothing will compare with the pleasurable jolt I got when I saw John Wick back in 2014. True surprises at the movies are rare. John Wick the Original was something very special and very hard to pull off. It needed no sequels, and without another dead puppy, the franchise is pretty empty.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

John Wick (1) was indeed a little special: the puppy as the inciting incident together with the film's seeming awareness of Keanu's ultra-laid-back persona made it feel agreeably B-movie-ish, but then the slick, imaginative fights and stunts, and intriguing world-building (assassins hotels with own currency, steampunk communications networks, etc.) put it firmly in the A-movie realm (and in the vicinity of Matrix & Dark City thereby tapping into some more of Keanu's CV). The film satisfied then comfortably exceeded expectations.

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Very well put, swanstep, and how I felt at the time. I'll be frank: I've been reading reviews calling Keanu Reeves a "bad actor" for years, and I never saw that. I saw a handsome young man with a certain courtly reserve, an innate "niceness" -- who could, nonetheless, get rough and physical if evil forces forced him to. This was the whole idea behind his being the lead in The Matrix, and probably why I thought of him for Norman Bates when Van Sant announced his remake. All these years later, as John Wick, Keanu has added the gravitas of older age and a very cool beard to take the whole Keanu thing up a level.

Reeves had a rather brief star career, led by the great action piece "Speed"(and his very charming chemistry with Sandra Bullock) and then solidified by the even greater "Matrix"(another great original devalued by its sequels.)
I lost track of Reeves myself other than to assume that he faded out. But John Wick brought him back in a big, satisfying way and I'm glad he got it.

John Wick came out a couple of weeks after Denzel had satisfyingly taken on the Russian mob in the first "Equalizer" film. I saw them practically back to back, and, as much as I liked "The Equalizer," it suddenly looked pedestrian, slow, and flat-footed versus the super-stylized, light on its feet John Wick.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Kudos too, to the actor who played the aging Russian mob boss whose son Wick is hunting. That actor has since died, fairly young. As someone noted, in John Wick, he looks like "The Most Interesting Man in the World," bearded, macho, fit -- still able to fight hard as an older man, and probably unbeatable in his youth. And also a fatalist about what is going to happen: its kill John Wick or be killed, and he doesn't want either.

A twist to John Wick (I) must be pointed out(SPOILERS.) Wick actually manages to kill the punk son with a half hour left on the movie. The father decides to point Wick TO the kid -- he gives up his own son to death, and asks Wick to "kill the boy quickly." Wick complies, the father thanks him for that(the kid's last words "It was just an f'ing dog!). And the movie seems to have nowhere to go. But the father is riddled with guilt for having turned over his son, and another character(Willem Dafoe) becomes a brutal sacrifice to the father's rage -- which sets up a final act of revenge, counter-revenge and final scores settled. The message: avenging the puppy doesn't end the rage.

All very satisfying in John Wick. But 2 had none of that, just more of everything and no moral center anymore. At least I know that 3 is based on John's having himself broken the rules of the Continental(killing someone there), but that seems a rather paltry premise for a third film.

No matter. Keanu Reeves has another franchise, finally. He joins Cruise and Depp and Damon and RDJ and J-Law among stars who seem only stars IN their franchises (I understand that some Keanu movie opened a few months ago with his lowest opening ever.) In the 21st Century, that's the way it is.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I do believe, however, that pepole *like* having Keanu as a movie star.

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I do. I think he's still got what it takes to be one.

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Bill & Ted 3 (w. Soderberg in the mix) *is* happening:
https://uproxx.com/movies/bill-and-ted-3-release-date-2019/

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Most excellent! Those kids from San Dimas, California(a town where I have relatives, always makes me laugh.) With some lessons on World History and Ingmar Bergman thrown in.

I realize that it was THAT movie that started the Keanu problem("Whoah!") but he was good in that , too.

And as Dana Carvey pointed out of his friend Mike Myers' "Wayne's World" -- "I always thought we were ripping off Bill and Ted."

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

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