Stu already linked this in the MAN OF TAI CHI comments, but I thought it needed its own post. Ladies and gentlemen, this movie I never heard of before is now on my most-anticipated list with a bullet:
The boring 47 RONIN kinda put a damper on the roll Keanu seemed to be on with his excellent directorial debut MAN OF TAI CHI, but not enough to make me skeptical of this one. This is just a great trailer with many classical badass elements: the car, the implications of his past, the dramatic visual reveal of his backstory, the PAYBACK-esque first person narration, the fear on John Leguizamo’s face when he realizes which hornet’s nest his buddies have just kicked.
It’s got two directors, David Leitch and Chad Stahelski, who are stunt performers and coordinators and second unit directors making their directing debut. Leitch has doubled Brad Pitt in several movies starting with FIGHT CLUB, and Van Damme in REPLICANT and THE ORDER. Stahelski was a choreographer for MAN OF TAI CHI and Reeves’ double for the MATRIX trilogy. He’s also a fighter in the gauntlet scene of MISSION OF JUSTICE and in BLOODSPORTs 2 and 3. Speaking of which, Van Damme sequel replacement Daniel Bernhardt is in this too.
Admittedly alot of the movies Leitch and Stahelski have worked behind the scenes on, including the Wachowski production NINJA ASS, have more shaky action than we prefer. But hopefully star/executive producer Reeves’ preference for clarity will win out. In trailer form the action definitely works and there seems to be alot of it. I’m impressed that the gunplay seems so dynamic. It’s been a long time since the John Woo heyday, so usually when the guns come out it seems like a lazy way to avoid real fight scenes.
Writer Derek Kolstad has two previous credits – ONE IN THE CHAMBER and THE PACKAGE – both recent, pretty good DTV movies co-starring Dolph Lundgren. So he’s legit in my book.
The fight choreographers are pretty new, a duo named Nuo and Sunny Sun. They did TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES, I guess? J.J. Perry is credited for stunts but not choreography.
Anyway, now we know what we’re doing October 24th.
September 12th, 2014 at 3:41 pm
http://uk.ign.com/articles/2014/09/10/keanu-reeves-wants-revenge-on-the-set-of-john-wick
Stahelski:
“Then we tried to take a bit of old-school blocking that used to be very prevalent in film — not the five-camera, super shaky, handheld, super tight lenses. We tried to let things live a little bit more, even our blocking, our acting, our car chase stuff. It does take some of the kinetic energy away, but on the other hand it lets you live in the shot a little bit more… just an elongated kind of composure.”
Keanu:
“They wanted me to do stuff that was more jujitsu and also do longer takes with handguns and long guns, you know, so the longer shots, you’ll see me go through the action and shoot a lot of people.”