Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: John Wick (2014)

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Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 10-25-2014, 11:40 PM:

CINEMA: Capitol City Stadium 12 Digital I'm Probably Forgetting Some Other Adjectives Cinemas, Cheyenne, WY
AUDITORIUM: 10
PRESENTATION: Mystery Meat Digital
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: The place is a dump, but everything worked
RATING: Two and one half stars (out of four)

I was walking through the lobby with no intention of getting any popcorn when a concession girl shouted "CAN I GET YOU ANYTHING?" at me. Which TOTALLY SUCKERED ME IN.

"Okay, medium popcorn and a large Pepsi."

"It would actually be twenty-five cents cheaper to go with the large popcorn."

"Uh, okay."

She produced my soda and what appeared to be the paper equivalent of a 30-gallon garbage bag of popcorn. And I ate every last bit of it because it was the best popcorn I've had in forever. Perfectly buttered and salted. Just amazing.

Before the trailers, a few local ads ran. One was for a credit union that started its ad with something about how well they treat their customers. The ENTIRE AUDIENCE BUSTED OUT LAUGHING.

THE PLOT: It's not what he did, it's who he did it to. Wackiness ensues.

John Wick, believe it or not, starts out with one of the most touching scenes of any movie this year. His wife dies and, post-death, has a puppy delivered with a beautiful note explaining this is her way of giving him something to take care of in life. This in itself could have been a movie. A man and his dog, learning from each other.

Alas, the puppy doesn't last long. Some dumbass Russian kid kills Puppy while stealing Wick's car. "Dumbass" isn't just my opinion. Everyone in the movie thinks he's a dumbass.

Wick goes into revenge mode, and everyone else goes into "Holy Shit" mode, because Wick is "the guy you call to kill the boogeyman". And the action is freaking awesome with amazing sets for about half the movie. And if they'd just gone on with him kicking ass non-stop, it probably would have been great. But no. After killing dozens, his head enemy and his cronies have Wick down. They could shoot him RIGHT THERE, just as Wick's been doing to everyone through the movie up to now. Don't ask questions, just eliminate the threat. But do they? NO. They keep him alive so they can tie him to a chair and have the James Bond-like face-off that always ends up with Dr. Evil walking away assuming his cronies will finish him, which NEVER EVER HAPPENS.

[Roll Eyes]

Then there's another fifteen minutes or so of completely unnecessary movie, but what else is new these days.

Posted by Steve Matz (Member # 1890) on 10-27-2014, 02:41 PM:

This is the Movie that CARMIKE gave a Free Showing of on October 17th to Rewards Card Holders.You could get 2 tickets on a 1st come,1st serve basis. I never got over there to get tickets which I found out later were still available right up to the 7PM Showing. I saw the Prevues the week before and thought it looked like it would be a Good Film. Since I wasn't that Thrilled with "GONE GIRL" I should have gone to this one for Free instead of the Ankle grabbing expierence I had with the concession stand at GG....No next time for this Camper. If they charge you almost 14 dollars for a Medium Coke and Popcorn(with rewards card) Ask them does that also include the KY JELLY [Eek!]

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 10-27-2014, 03:53 PM:

it came across an a R-rated 'Person of Interest' episode - which in my mind is not a bad thing.

I dug it, the action was cool and the style and the cast kept it entertaining.

B+

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 10-27-2014, 03:53 PM:

quote: Sam Graham
They keep him alive so they can tie him to a chair and have the James Bond-like face-off that always ends up with Dr. Evil walking away assuming his cronies will finish him, which NEVER EVER HAPPENS.

This very tired phenomenon in both countless movies and TV shows is perhaps matched only by horror/thriller movies where idiot characters have a very clear chance to kill the monster/killer, but only leave it stunned/injured. The monster/killer is then able to kill more stupid characters minutes later in the story, perhaps even the stupid characters who previously had the drop on him. This schlock is very common when the movie-makers are trying to force the plot into some pre-conceived situation -perhaps dictated as a must have "beat" via the Save The Cat template.
[Roll Eyes]

quote: Sam Graham
Then there's another fifteen minutes or so of completely unnecessary movie, but what else is new these days.

They gotta stick with the Save The Cat clip art style blue print for the screenplay, regardless if plot points are illogically stupid or if the audience has seen the same damned scene 8,789 times already.

Posted by Marcel Birgelen (Member # 6801) on 12-08-2014, 04:59 AM:

While this movie surely had this "Save The Cat" (or rather: Revenge the Dog) pattern going, I found myself mostly enjoying this movie.

Yeah, this scene where John Wick, the master bad ass himself gets captured, chained to a chair and escapes at the last minute is some cliched drivel, which also took me out of the movie. No Bond movie can go without it, but this movie really should. We all know: he would've been dead in this situation, bye bye and roll credits...

This might also be somewhat of a comeback for Keanu Reeves, as most of his previous Hollywood engagements for the last 10 years or so didn't really convince anybody.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 12-11-2014, 11:12 AM:

the upcoming bluray release (Feb. 3, 2015) will feature a Dolby Atmos mix.