Best Keanu: “I understand.”

John Wick: Chapter 4 is a masterpiece.

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I have this fantasy. It’s next March and it’s Oscar time. John Wick: Chapter 4 has the most nominations of any film. Rina Sawayama has just won for Best Actress in a Supporting Role when she hits the stage to perform Eye for an Eye, which is nominated for Best Original Song. Best Actor in a Supporting Role is a tough race with Donnie Yen, Bill Skarsgard, and Ian McShane threatening to split the vote, but Ian pulls it out. Chad Stahelski gets a nod for Best Director, and in his acceptance speech thanks the dozens — dozens and dozens — of stunt people who worked on the film. Production Design and Cinematography are no-brainers. Best Picture, of course, because what film could compare? What even comes close?

And Best Actor. Keanu. Keanu. Because John Wick reportedly says no more than 380 words in the entire movie, but there’s not a moment over those three hours that we don’t know how John Wick is feeling and, at least superficially, what he might be thinking.

It is a fantasy. Because the “Academy” would never endorse a film with such extreme, brutal violence.

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The cheese and somewhat silly premise don’t help either. But I pose this to you: the cheese and silliness are necessary. Because without them, one could lose track of the fact that this is fiction. The world of John Wick is not the real world, even if its underlying themes stir something visceral and true in its audience.

In a world where the titular character not only kills dozens and dozens of people, but does so at close range, using pistols, shotguns, nunchucks, swords, axes, cars, and his bare hands (and legs), it’s important to remember that, in real life, this is not good manners. In our world, kids, this is never justified. John Wick is a metaphor. It’s a myth. It’s a myth that can point to what real life feels like sometimes. But it is not real life.

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As I write this, it’s May 9, 2023. John Wick: Chapter 4 opened March 23, 2023, and I have seen it many, many times since then. I am a more-is-always-better person by nature, a why-drink-just-one-glass-of-wine-if-you-can-finish-the-bottle type, and I tend to go back over and over again to things I like. Like many people I have a cluttered watchlist on several streaming services. But I usually just rewatch what I know I like instead of taking the chance on something new.

I also like going to the movies. By myself. I don’t like having company unless it’s absolutely necessary. I don’t want to worry about someone else and whether they are enjoying the picture. I am there to watch the movie. But I also like having a sense of other people and their reactions, especially when it’s a movie I love like John Wick: Chapter 4.

I live within walking and almost-walking distance of two first-run theatres. Movie tickets are thankfully within my budget. I know John Wick: Chapter 4 is eventually going to leave theatres, so I want to see it as many times as possible (or nearly; I do have some responsibilities) before it goes to streaming, when I’ll inevitably be distracted by my phone, get up to make food, or have to pay attention to other people in the room, and the process of watching the film won’t be nearly as enjoyable.

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One of the first-run theatres near me, the one within actual walking distance, is age-restricted. It was an independent, art house cinema for many years before it was bought out by a major chain. The new owners added a classy bar so you can converse with cocktails before seeing the show and/or bring your drinks with you to your seat.

Before I gave up alcohol, drinking and watching a movie at this theatre was one of my favourite things to do. The last time I think it was one of the newer Star Wars movies. I don’t remember much, perhaps not surprisingly, except that Luke had a gray beard and was on an island somewhere.

You have to walk past the bar before going in to your movie, and if you miss alcohol like I do, the smell is wonderful. (Mmm. Alcohol, how I miss you.). The audience in the cinema excludes an important demographic: those under a certain age that government deems too young to be within a certain distance from drinking establishments.

In the other theatre, there’s no bar, and therefore, lots of moviegoers who seem, to me, just-a-little-bit-too-young to be watching John Wick. Today’s audience included 7 or 8 young men who trotted in together still carrying school backpacks.

Yes, I know, I saw some age-inappropriate stuff when I was their age too. But I am much older now, and I can cast judgment.

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There’s a line in John Wick: Chapter 4 that always makes me laugh, but no one else in the theatre ever does, so I tend to keep my laughter to myself.

“How many did you have to kill to get out?”

“A lot.”

Except today. Today’s audience roared at that one, and especially hard at the other line that always gets a laugh:

“Remember your daughter.”

“Fuck off!”

The dead are gone, Caine tells John at one point. Caine apparently doesn’t think the few moments John has taken to escape into a church, apparently to pray (he lights at candle at the altar) and to talk to his dead wife, are particularly sacred.

After all, what does sacred mean in John Wick? John lights his candle just a few scenes after interrupting the prayer of his cousin-sister-adopted kin Katia, who is similarly kneeling at an altar. His outstretched hand holds the proof of death that he’s killed the man who killed her father. She turns from her prayer and smiles at his good deed.

Once a woman sitting behind me clucked in disapproval after Caine said, “the dead are gone.” The sound that came from her mouth said, “what an awful thing to say,” and it is. What a terrible thing to say to a man in a church who is grieving — or would be grieving, should be grieving, were it not for all the killing that’s taking up so much of his time and energy.

But really, all Caine is doing is offering John an explanation. Your wife is dead. We can’t do anything to help her now. “The living matter.” Caine’s daughter is still alive. By killing John, he can save her.

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There is a strong father-daughter theme in John Wick: Chapter 4. I don’t know why this is the case. In a way, in the context of the John Wick films, it feels new and a bit random.

John Wick respects its women by making them every bit as brutal as its men (and let’s note that people aren’t automatically gendered in any John Wick film and the cast has included notable gender-fluid, queer, and nonbinary folk). But the backdrop of the films is the High Table and its rules, traditions, and Old Ways. This implies not only hierarchy and history, but lineage.

And family. The Marquis refers to his own father, implying he was reared in the regime and bred to assume power, much as others may have been bred to serve that power. Koji and Caine, maybe, were also raised in this alternate society, whether by lineage or adoption. John Wick: Chapter 2 seemed to imply that High Table seats are passed down within families, from parent to child; the dickhead Santino d’Antonio was none too pleased when his father willed his seat to his sister and not him, and had her killed as a result.

But does that mean Gianna d’Antonio felt any particular affection for her father? That’s what’s so different about the father-daughter dynamic in John Wick: Chapter 4 that’s so striking and, for me, slightly out of place. Katia and Akira are both deeply loyal to their fathers, not just out of duty but of love. Caine’s love for his daughter made him want to leave the assassin’s life, much as John’s love for his wife did the same. But why elevate the father-daughter relationship specifically? It doesn’t feel feminist or even deeply thought out. It feels, to be frank, like it was personal to one of the movie’s creators, so they insisted it be put in.

Many women have complicated relationships with their fathers. The John Wick: Chapter 4 spin on it feels old-fashioned, from an era when women were to be protected by older brothers and fathers. They stayed home while the men went to battle. Of course, no one’s keeping Akira from battle, and Katia is the one in control. But it feels like this is almost out of necessity than a matter of course, like if Koji or Pyotr had sons instead, neither of those women would be in a position to run anything. They’d be invisible in the John Wick world, preparing beds for tired assassins and rearing the next generation of killers.

John Wick has no lineage. He has no family. “A man of Mr. Wick’s — station — cannot issue such a challenge,” the Marquis says. His family has always been one of negotiation, of contract. His ticket was torn, because he has no blood ties. He only gets back in because he does Katia a favour. But none of his family will grieve him when he passes. Katia’s not carrying around a locket with his picture; they do not attend his funeral in New York.

So I don’t know.

But I do think I prefer the matriarchs in John Wick: Chapter 3. Halle Berry is a mother to a daughter. Anjelica Huston also seems without obvious lineage. But she embodies power that surpasses her gender.

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I didn’t think John Wick: Chapter 4 was a masterpiece at first. The initial viewing I was certainly on board for most of the film, but didn’t quite get that IGN review that gave it 10/10 and used that word: “Masterpiece.” Then John Wick and the hordes trying to kill him entered that house-under-renovation the night before the duel with Caine. There was the reprise of the bathhouse music from the first John Wick. Then that long overhead shot of John navigating through a series of adversaries through several rooms.

I nearly cried. In fact, I think I did cry. I don’t particularly care if the idea was lifted from elsewhere, or if the scene is in fact stitched together and not actually one continuous shot. It’s beautiful. It’s stunning. The furnishings, the firearms. The sprawled book pages. It’s masterful, brilliant, and since my mind keeps straying back to this point, I’m glad I was sober when I saw it, so I can remember.

May 2023