John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum

MOVIE TITLE: John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum

RATING: R

LENGTH: 2 hours, 10 minutes

Movie Review Mom GRADE: A-

IN A NUTSHELL: I admit it. I love watching Keanu Reeves in anything. I love watching him kick bad-guy butt. This brutal, assassin-filled John Wick franchise is known for its impressively choreographed fight scenes and this third installment doesn’t disappoint.

It also knows it’s over-the-top and ridiculous. By the way, Parabellum is a type of semiautomatic gun. It also means “prepare for war” in Latin. There is a lot of both in JOHN WICK CHAPTER 3.

TIPS FOR PARENTS:

This is a rated R movie with TONS of bloody, brutal violence with an incredibly high body count. Supposedly, John Wick killed 94 people in this movie, yet he killed 128 in the Chapter 2 film. TONS of headshots with flippant respect for human life.
Profanity, including F-bombs.
“Guns. Lots of guns.” – John Wick (Keanu Reeves)

THEMES:

Consequences
Loyalty
Friendship
Revenge
“Who do you wish to die as?” – Winston (Ian McShane)

THINGS I LIKED:

The beginning takes off right where the last movie John Wick Chapter 2 ended and gets your adrenaline pumping from the very first scene.
The cast is great and includes Ian McShane, Laurence Fishburne, Angelica Huston, and Lance Reddick. Surprisingly, John Leguizamo doesn’t appear in this third installment.
Kudos to all of the stuntmen! There is almost non-stop action. Most of it is through long takes of wide shots.
Mark Dacascos was both fierce and funny. The couch scene at the Continental was amusing.
I was super impressed with the doctor’s kindness (Randall Duk Kim).
Halle Berry’s training really paid off. She looks amazing standing still, as well as in full-on action. She actually broke 3 ribs while filming the movie!
This franchise sure has loyal dog lovers. When they were filming in Morocco, there were so many street cats that the crew had to build a giant wall of cages to house them.
Fans of Game of Thrones: Season 4 will get a kick out of seeing Jerome Flynn.
You hardly have time to catch your breath because it’s so fast-paced.
Fans of this franchise rejoiced when a text message was released that said, “You have served. You will be of service. John Wick: Chapter 4 is coming May 21, 2021.”
Asia Kate Dillon did a great job as the Adjudicator you hated, yes?

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE:

If you haven’t seen the first two movies in the franchise, it’ll just feel like a massive fight fest. Well, even if you HAVE seen the first two movies, it’ll still feel like that.
John Wick’s motivation changes after he makes an important decision, which seems odd.
I was excited to see who would play “The Elder” and imagined several classically-trained actors who would be epic in their performance, so I was disappointed that it was Said Taghmaoui, who is way younger than John Wick and many of the other people “under the table.”
It’s pretty ridiculous when people are killed in public and not a single person walking by screams or runs away.
Sometimes the fight scenes seem to go on forever and it’s exhausting.

FUNNY LINES:

“You can’t shoot the bearer of your marker!” – John Wick (Keanu Reeves) * “I didn’t kill you. I just shot you.” – Sophia (Halle Berry)

“You shot my dog.” – Sophia * “I get it.” – John Wick

“He with you?” – John Wick, after he stabs someone * “He was.” – Zero (Mark Dacascos)
“If I didn’t have to kill you, we’d be pals.” – Zero
“Hey, John. That was a pretty good fight, huh?” – Zero
“I’ll catch up to you, John.” – Zero * “No, you won’t.” – John Wick

INTERESTING LINES:

“Life is pain. Life is suffering.” – The Director (Angelica Houston)
“The path to paradise begins in hell.” – The Director
“Sometimes you have to kill what you love.” – Sophia
“Do what you do best.” – Winston * “What’s that?” – John Wick * “Hunt” – Winston

You’re going to want to binge these movies to catch up:

John Wick