John Wick Movie Review

John Meyers lives and writes in Maryland. His work has appeared in Smokelong Quarterly, Spartan, the Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, The Louisville Review, and elsewhere. John was a 2018 Best Small Fictions nominee. His website is hammeredinmetal.com

In the movie John Wick, the lead character John Wick moves through the rooms of his house like a damaged robot. He drinks coffee, broods, and experiences flashbacks in which his wife succumbs to a terminal illness. John Wick’s house is a modern masterpiece featuring floor-to- ceiling windows, elegant knick knacks, and tasteful furniture. It’s a place where bad guys show up one evening to attack John Wick and kill his dog. I enjoyed this movie until the violence started. I enjoyed the quiet version of the house, where John Wick drinks coffee in a kitchen without dead bodies. But that’s me. I don’t think John Wick cares whether he drinks coffee alone or with a dead body at his feet. I think he is preoccupied with the things a Hollywood action hero is supposed to be preoccupied with: who will love me now that my wife is dead; who is trying to kill me; how do I live? If I lived in John Wick’s house, I would move through the rooms in a more thoughtful manner. I would appreciate the high-end coffee maker. I would appreciate the gigantic windows overlooking the town below. I would live comfortably in rooms flooded with ocean blue light. No one would arrive in the middle of the night to kill me. No one would kill my dog. If someone decided to make a movie starring me living in John Wick’s house, very few people would pay to see it. There would be no action. No exploding heads. No killing. Just me living quietly, alone. Lots of close-ups of me pouring coffee, walking around, staring out the window.