"John Wick: Chapter 4" too much of a good thing but still full of really good things

 John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023)

The 2014 original “John Wick” seems so quaint in retrospect. To its bones, it was a primal revenge flick about a retired hitman avenging the death of his puppy and taking out the Russian mob in spectacular action set-pieces. The next two chapters—2017’s “John Wick: Chapter 2” and 2019’s “John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum”—vividly expanded upon this neo-noir underworld of contract killers, while being masterclasses in visceral, elaborate action stunt choreography that just keeps topping the top. It turns out there are still plenty of ways for someone to get shot in the face even in the longest of running times. Now for the western-like capper to this awesomely breathtaking, ultra-violent saga, “John Wick: Chapter 4” gives the initiated a stylish, if exorbitant, almost-three hour finale of the Baba Yaga performing a badass, bullet-ridden ballet.

With his deadpan, Zen-like delivery and unsuspecting kick-ass physicality, Keanu Reeves still somehow doesn’t phone in this fourth go-around as the violently grieving hitman. Branded “excommunicado,” John Wick has been hiding underground with the Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), until he’s ready to get his freedom back and defeat the High Table. New York’s Continental hotel owner Winston (Ian McShane) and concierge Charon (Lance Reddick) try making a deal with the High Table’s newly appointed Marquis, who wants to finally eliminate Mr. Wick and enlists an old friend of John’s to get the job done. The Marquis is played by a suave, sniveling Bill Skarsgård in a series of sharp suits for every scene as this French baddie. Another assassin who calls himself “Mr. Nobody” (Shamier Anderson) is also in pursuit, with his dog in tow, but he could switch sides, depending on the price. Osaka’s Continental manager Shimazu (Hiroyuki Sanada) offers Wick asylum, much to the objections of the concierge, daughter Akira (Japanese-British pop singer Rina Sawayama, captivating in her acting debut). When the High Table’s assassins arrive, Wick will have to evade everyone, in his 42 regular suit jacket, from New York to Osaka to Berlin to Paris (without so much as a PowerBar for sustenance). Perhaps only a high noon duel to the death at sunrise will settle things. Will John get to the church on time?

After some insistent, bloodied knuckle conditioning that gets you hyped up (and homage is paid to the famous “Lawrence of Arabia” match cut), John Wick: Chapter 4” does take a while to actually get started and often lags in between the individual action set-pieces. It may be too much of a good thing, but there are plenty of good things across that sprawling 169 minutes. Writers Shay Hatten (2021’s “Army of the Dead”) and Michael Finch (2017’s “American Assassin”) mostly get the film from one thrillingly off-the-wall scene to the next, like a video game with even more of an anything-goes approach. Being four for four, stuntman-turned-director Chad Stahelski is a virtuoso when it comes to the rhythm and blocking of an action sequence. Great care continues to be taken with choreography and coverage, never getting lost in a million chop-suey edits. The first extended set-piece goes balls to the wall, taking full advantage of its location in the Osaka Continental. Caine, a blind High Table assassin who’s actually an ace with a blade, also utilizes the talents of martial-arts legend Donnie Yen, a great addition so late in the series. That’s just the first act. 

Cinematographer Dan Laustsen (who has shot the previous two “John Wick” movies”) has a stunning visual eye, and in the age of green screen and digital effects, the locational detail is always striking, even if it’s just for a sunrise in the Moroccan desert. One shoot-and-hide Parisian sequence is shot overhead in a house like a maze. A fight and chase throughout a Berlin nightclub (where the dancers barely stop grinding to the rave beat) is electric; it also allows British martial-arts action star Scott Adkins (not Craig Bierko, as it turns out) to be a gold-grilled hoot as Killa, the head of the German Table, in a fat suit like an “Austin Powers” villain. There’s also an insane sequence set in a traffic circle around the Arc de Triomphe that’ll leave your dropped jaw to get flattened by all the cars. 

There really isn’t much more world to build with this graphic novel-level mythology, and that is fine. It’s always cool to see those tattooed “Suicide Girls”-type operators again, this time with a breathy overnight DJ narrating bounties. By now, we probably give John Wick too many reality-check passes as if he’s a terminator from the future or a human feline with nine lives. Mind you, Jonathan comes off more superhuman than he ever has, particularly after falling from high places twice and rolling down the 300 steps of the Sacré-Cœur more than once (another exhilarating action marvel). Even by the death-defying standards of a “John Wick” movie, this one officially becomes a Looney Tunes cartoon, and yet, there are still emotional stakes! “John Wick: Chapter 4” has surely exhausted itself by the end—perhaps a more judicious editor could have refined it—but it’s a nutty, satisfying culmination for this man-like myth if this is, indeed, the end for Mr. Wick.

Grade: B

Lionsgate is releasing “John Wick: Chapter 4” (169 min.) in theaters on March 24, 2023.