JOHN WICK 3 : PARABELLUM - Wednesday 15th May 2019.

I saw 'JOHN WICK 3 : PARABELLUM' at an advance screening at my local multiplex earlier in the week and here we see the third and allegedly final instalment in the 'John Wick' fast paced neo-noir action thriller film series, that launched in 2014 with 'John Wick' then its sequel in 2017 with 'John Wick : Chapter 2' and now 'Parabellum'. All three films have been Directed by Stuntman and movie maker Chad Stahelski with the first two films in the franchise grossing US$260M at the global Box Office off the back of a combined US$65M Production Budget, and positive Critical acclaim. The films title 'Parabellum' is taken from a Latin adage 'Si vis pacem, para bellum' which when translated becomes 'If you want peace, prepare for war'. The phrase is used above all to affirm that one of the most effective means to ensure peace for a people is always to be armed and ready to defend oneself. Seemingly a television series spin off titled 'The Continental' based on the characters and safe haven location for assassins and hitmen of the film series is in the works with Keanu Reeves, Chad Stahelski and David Leitch Producing. Released in the UK, the USA and in Australia last week, the film cost US$55M and has garnered positive Press.

And so following hot on the heels of the last instalment we find John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is on the run as he is being hunted down for a global US$14M open contract on his life, and for breaking a central rule - taking a life on Continental Hotel grounds. Wick's unauthorised victim was a member of the High Table - a Camorra crime lord, Santino D'Antonio, who ordered the open contract. John should have already been executed, except the Continental’s manager, Winston (Ian McShane) has given him a one-hour grace period before he’s officially declared 'excommunicado' ie. membership revoked, banned from all services and cut off from other members. In the pouring rain he runs half way across Manhattan with his trusted dog beside him, jumps in a taxi, and orders the driver to take him to the New York Public Library.

Concealed in a fake 19th Century Russian art book Wick retrieves a marker, a crucifix neck chain and five gold coins. After a brief one on one fight with an assassin looking to cash in on the cool US$14M (the 7ft3in. tall Serbian professional basketball player for the Philadelphia 76ers, Boban Marjanovic), whom John dispenses with fairly quickly using his Russian art book, he returns the now bloodied tome to its place on the shelf, dusts himself down and promptly leaves.

Leaving the library, Wick is spotted by a group of Chinese assassins which leads them down some back streets, alleyways and eventually into a warehouse where are kept cases and cases of antique weaponry - swords, daggers, knives, axes, pistols, rifles, shotguns all neatly arranged in glass display cabinets. Here Wick takes on six or so men in very close quarter combat, and the knives are thrown thick and fast in every direction in one of the most impressive set pieces of the film series so far. Needless to say Wick survives while the others all perish from their multiple stab wounds.

Meanwhile across town, The Adjudicator (Asia Kate Dillon) a member of The High Table, turns up at The Continental wanting to meet with Winston (Ian McShane) the Hotel Manager of the past forty years. She orders Winston to relinquish his role at The Continental within seven days for allowing Wick one hours grace period before he was declared officially excommunicado. The Adjudicator also visits The Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne) because he gave Wick the seven chamber hand gun that he used to kill Santino D'Antonio on the grounds of The Continental. She delivers him the same message . . . or suffer the consequences. In the meantime Wick visits The Director (Anjelica Houston) a figure from his past who is also a member of the High Table. He hands over the crucifix necklace to her which acts as a form of currency so permitting him one wish which she is obliged to honour. Wick asks for safe passage to Casablanca.

Having arrived on a slow boat from New York to Casablanca, Wick visits a local branch of The Continental and meets with Sofia (Halle Berry) a former close friend and female assassin from his past who owes him a favour. Wick hands Sofia the 'marker' he retrieved from the library - a medallion which symbolises an unbreakable bond by one person to fulfil a task requested by another. Wick asks Sofia to honour the marker by helping him locate The Elder - the most senior member of The High Table.

After pointing a gun at Wick and some forthright words across the table, Sofia reluctantly agrees to take her former friend to see a local guy who might just be able to point Wick in the right direction. That mans name is Berrada (Jerome Flynn) who in a round about way provides Wick with the Elders location - a long walk in the desert and just when you have reached the point of exhaustion, you need to keep walking until he finds you, retorts Berrada. In exchange for this valuable, albeit cryptic, information, Berrada demands some form of compensation, which he wants in the form of one of Sofia's trusted dogs. She tells him that its out of the question, to which Berrada becomes quickly agitated and promptly shoots the dog. Luckily for the dog, it was wearing a bullet proof vest which also conceals a pistol. With the help of her two trained canine friends who are adept at biting, gnawing, leaping, running and jumping, Sofia and Wick fight their way out of the heavily fortified building in another bullet ballet set piece before venturing in to the desert.

Having honoured her 'marker', Sofia leaves Wick to continue his long walk in the desert alone, through the day and the night before collapsing due to exhaustion sometime the next day under the blistering sun. Needless to say John is found face down in the sand by a passing traveller and taken unconscious draped over the back of a camel to The Elder's lavish Bedouin like tent. The Elder (Said Taghmaoui) gives John a choice. He can either die or accept a mission to kill Winston, the long term Manager of The Continental and Wick's friend and ally, on behalf of The High Table in exchange for the removal of the bounty on his head which has subsequently been upped to US$15M. John accepts the mission and as a show of his commitment to The High Table, severs his ring finger and hands his wedding ring to The Elder.

While all of this going on, The Adjudicator recruits an assassin, Zero (Mark Dacascos), and his gang to act as enforcers for The High Table. They visit both The Bowery King and The Director, kill several of their henchmen before inflicting physical punishment on both of them as a consequence for helping Wick. Wick arrives back in New York minus a finger but donning a brand new suit of clothes. He is confronted almost immediately by Zero and his gang but manages to escape on a motorcycle. After killing the pursuing motorcycle riding gang members in another impressive chase and be killed set piece, Wick is followed in hot pursuit by Zero to The Continental where Wick takes sanctuary by placing his hand on the bottom step leading to the entrance of the Hotel.

Wick speaks with Winston who tells him he is aware that he is there to kill him. The Adjudicator arrives, however, Wick refuses to carry out the kill order and Winston refuses to surrender his position at the Hotel. Consequently, The Adjudicator declares The Continental as 'deconsecrated' with immediate effect, so permitting killing on the premises once again, before requesting an armed unit of killers elite from The High Table to converge on the Hotel armed to the teeth to take down Winston and Wick once and for all.

It's not long before two bus loads of heavily armed and armoured men with night vision eye wear and bullet proof everything converge on The Continental. With the help of the hotel's Concierge Charon (Lance Reddick), John takes on The High Table's forces inside the hotel with Winston's blessing and full and unhindered access to the hotel's private armoury, which contains all the latest cutting edge weaponry. 

Ultimately Wick, Charon, and various hotel staffers defeat the High Tables own private army, before Wick is confronted by Zero's gang once again. Wick eventually overcomes the two gang members in a fierce hand to hand, toe to toe, head to head battle royale eventually overcoming the pair, before facing off against Zero in the hotel's glass encased boardroom and killing him.

Seeing from her own private suite within the confines of The Continental that her now largely dead or dying team are no match for the one man army that is John Wick, The Adjudicator contacts Winston and offers to negotiate. Eventually she agrees to allow Winston to remain at The Continental, but states that Wick remains problematical. At a roof top meeting, Winston shoots Wick several times at close range. He falls from the roof of the hotel several storeys to the streets below. A short time later they observe Wick's body is gone, though Winston casually assures The Adjudicator that he won't get far. Wick's dog runs out of the hotel and catches up with the Tick Tock Man (Jason Mantzoukas), one of the Bowery King's men, who has retrieved Wick in a shopping trolley and brings him to the heavily scarred Bowery King - stitched up from the seven deep and potentially life threatening scars inflicted by The Adjucators enforcers. The Bowery King speaks to the injured, but still breathing Wick, saying just how pissed off he is with the antics of the High Table, and both express a desire to take it down once and for all.

I enjoyed 'John Wick Chapter 3' as much as I did the previous two instalments. This is a no holds barred fast paced in yer face actioner that owes its success to the vision of the stuntman turned Director Chad Stahelski as it does to the hard hitting keeping it real lead Keanu Reeves, who proves once again his action acting chops knows no equal, other than perhaps Tom Cruise. The action comes thick and fast and every fight sequence is choreographed in spectacular bloody, violent and creative fashion to the Nth degree. The antagonists succumb to Wick's ire in all manner of inventive ways - whether its death by book, by horse, by motorcycle, bullet, cartridge, knife, sword or axe the body count just keeps on rising and really makes you wonder how John Wick can possibly survive such a relentless and unforgiving physical onslaught - but he does, and that's what we pay our coin to see. And then of course there is the occasional gesture or one liner that adds a hint of humour to bring the action and gratuitous violence right back down to Earth. For sheer action escapism, high body count, expertly choreographed creative fight and chase sequences, and gun fu and knife play aplenty backed up by a strong supporting cast, you can't go much further than 'John Wick Chapter 3 : Parabellum' . . . . and the dog is pretty cute too! For lovers of the genre, catch it on the big screen - you won't be disappointed.

'John Wick : Parabellum' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-