... I think Stahelski just became no.2 on my favorite directors list. and I haven't even seen the movie yet :D

http://www.forbes.com/sites/drsarahbond/2017/02/13/fortune-favors-the-bold-5-greco-roman-reasons-to-see-john-wick-chapter-2/#24a4e75636e6

http://www.lsunow.com/daily/rev-ranks-john-wick-chapter-contender-for-year-s-best/article_9c5e2da8-f303-11e6-9dfa-db4d9b3d4d1c.html

https://www.flickeringmyth.com/2017/02/keanu-reeves-the-modern-king-of-action/

https://scroll.in/article/829479/film-review-john-wick-chapter-2-is-a-delirious-ride

http://www.thehollywoodnews.com/2017/02/17/chad-stahelski-masterclass/

http://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/john-wick-chapter-2/47347/chad-stahelski-interview-john-wick-2-highlander

http://www.vulture.com/2017/02/keanu-reeves-is-our-greatest-action-star.html

http://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/keanu-reeves/47151/celebrating-the-movies-of-keanu-reeves

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/movies/589531/Now-Keanu-really-knows-kung-fu-says-his-John-Wick-director

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/john-wick-chapter-2-review-keanu-reevess-trigger-happy-sequel/

http://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/john-wick-chapter-2-movie-review-keanu-reeves-starrer-offers-consistently-great-action-3288420.html

http://www.dailydot.com/parsec/john-wick-2-costume-designer-interview-luca-mosca/

The director may have had his tongue firmly in his cheek while dreaming up his more outlandish escapades, but Reeves is deadly serious about this career change from heart-throb to grizzled martial arts hero.

According to Stahelski, the superfit 52-year-old is now a better fighter than many of his stuntmen. He reckons he can match a good number of them behind the wheel of a car too. That trust is apparent in every beautifully lit frame.

With less capable fighters, directors are forced to fudge the action with shaky cameras, close-ups and quick cuts. Here Stahelski uses long takes and wider shots to revel in his leading man’s acrobatics. You can see Reeves’ hands on the wheel of Wick’s 1969 Mustang as the thrilling opening chase turns into a full-on car-fu fight. He’s just as impressive in the fist and gun scraps.

You can imagine a pack of frustrated stunt doubles twiddling their thumbs on the sidelines as Keanu effortlessly hurls and blasts his umpteenth mobster.

*****

“He’s as good as most stuntmen in a car, maybe even a little bit better, and I know plenty who can’t fight as well as him," says Chad Stahelski of his leading man.

“The best way to fake being good is just to be good. Rather than training him as an actor who learns 20 moves, we made him a stunt guy. Something just clicked. He’s not an actor any more, he’s a martial arts guy.”

“...we came up with every way we could possibly ram something. We figured that Keanu’s a very good driver, so when he whips around the corner - you call it a sliding drift - that’s really him, the door’s off so you can actually see him.

“That’s really him hitting the dude in the car, that’s really him doing the head on, that’s really him backing into the guy.

“We just really wanted to see Keanu Reeves smash into things.”

That last, by the way, is a huge part of the John Wick appeal for me. Sure, stuntmen could do the stunts and and other actors could play the role well. But there's something next-level satisfying about seeing Keanu do it. His face displays such great levels of emotional payoff, and on a personal level I just truly, deeply, love seeing him kick so much ass after being so unfairly maligned for so long. After seeing everything he's become and his seemingly total lack of regard for limits, my affection and respect for this man are becoming kind of ridiculous.

I got a kick out of this too:

"If John Wick could be a trend-setter a little bit, bring action back to cast members actually doing their own stunts. Let cinematographers see the action and light it, instead of turning up and shaking the camera, that would be the biggest compliment."

Sounds like someone's not too impressed at all the precious Marvel films with their smoke-and-mirrors fight scenes.

---

“We just really wanted to see Keanu Reeves smash into things.”

---

yesss

And that Reloaded poster. :D

which reminds me. I wrote this impromptu fic on Facebook, and LucaM said I should post it here; I'll maybe create a dedicated Keanuspawn section of the site eventually, but until then, this is my take on John Wick vs Agent Smiths.

--

this is the sort of thing where the joy and beauty lies in the action, watching John Wick mow down hordes of Smiths with satisfyingly accurate headshots. And then he watches in disquieted horror as the dead Smiths flicker and return into their original forms of the people they hijacked, and he realises that with every kill, an innocent person dies. But the Smiths keep coming in a sneering flurry of black and white, like rabid penguins in a relentless march of death, and John hops desperately from building to building to escape them, racing up and down stairwells, leaping across roofs and tumbling to the ground, pausing every now and then to twist around and blast Smiths into oblivion before they can grab him.

They corner him in an alleyway. It's a dead end now, with nothing but hard brick behind him and nothing but an impenetrable mass of Smiths swarming before him and blocking his only escape. One of them steps forward, grinning. "Missster Wick," he says, unaware of how this doesn't piss him off the way calling Neo "Mr. Anderson" does. "Asss you can see, you have no way out. This is where it ends. This is where... everything... ends."

John Wick meets the Smiths' shaded eyes with stubborn defiance, dropping his depleted shotgun with a clatter to the ground and pulling two revolvers from their holsters. He raises them towards the Smiths, jaw set and face steeled, ready to make his last stand in the final shootout he will ever have-

And then The Matrix crashes, as Windows 10 tries to install an update.

Furthermore, I would recommend everyone to get a similar experience. It's quite interesting how a community that different but with one shared interest organizes itself.

Thank you Anakin.

http://www.avclub.com/article/now-you-can-own-your-own-john-wick-murder-pencil-250937

the comments. the frikkin comments :D