John Wick is a small indie movie that we’ve barely mentioned. I had to look it up, and it turns out it’s a massive franchise starring Keanu Reeves. Obviously, you know what John Wick is, and Wick is Pain is a documentary about the making of the movies.
I didn’t know what Wick in Pain was, but reading up about it, I wanted to see it. I’ve always been fascinated by the movie-making process, and years back, I would have loved to have been a director in Hollywood. Nowadays, not so much.
Wick in Pain tells the story of how John Wick was made, from Chad Stahelski being a stunt double for Brandon Lee in The Crow, to meeting Reeves on The Matrix, right through to John Wick 4.
The Story
I won’t go into too many of the details about the documentary; I’ll let you find them yourself, but it was interesting.
Stahelski became a stuntman in 1993 and worked on some amazing movies: The Crow, Escape from L.A., Tomorrow Never Dies, Spider-Man 2, Serenity, 300, The Expendables, Spy Kids 4, the list doesn’t end.
Oddly, one of the most iconic scenes in The Crow wasn’t Lee, it was Stahelski. He and Lee were good friends, and Stahelski was asked to double for him after the accident. He was torn, but he did it.
The rest is about how John Wick came about. Stahelski used to direct movies with his mates, and learned about camera angles, cuts and what looks good. He ended up working as a Second Unit Director, but wanted to make his own movie.
What A Pair
In Wick is Pain, Reeves says about how some actors find their director: Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese, Kurt Russell and John Carpenter for example. Reeves said that Stahelski was his director, a partnership that just worked.
They had worked with each other on The Matrix and became friends. Stahelski was a seasoned stuntman, but Reeves was an actor; Stahelski knew how hard he had worked on training for The Matrix.
Any of the cast of The Matrix had worked for about 6 months in training, so it was them fighting in the movie. Obviously, Reeves had the most work to do, but he was committed to the movie.
Stahelski knew he was going to be a perfect John Wick, he wasn’t the fittest guy around, but he was going to do his damn best. They now had to write a script that worked.
Never Kill the Dog
They talked about John Wick and started working on a script and character. They had the idea of the action, but needed a hook to get people invested. There’s a rule in Hollywood: Never kill the dog. So, what do they do? Kill the dog.
One of the stunt guys went to a test screen, the one where they have to fill out a questionnaire about the movie. One of the questions was:
Do you think so many people should have died because of the dog?
About 60% of men thought it was all justified, and about 95% of the women thought it was totally justified. They had their hook, something for the audience to get invested in, and the rest was history.
Overall
As I said, I love seeing behind-the-scenes footage and documentaries, and Wick is Pain doesn’t disappoint. It was so interesting hearing the stories about the budget, the schedules and just the sheer determination of everyone to get through that first movie.
When they finished it, they said ‘Never again!’, then did the second one and said the same thing. John Wick 4 took a different approach, using a new crew and a different stunt double for Reeves, but it maintained the same tone and style throughout.
Whether you rate the John Wick movies or not, this is still an interesting documentary. We all go to the cinema and see a finished, polished product, but the work that goes into a movie is almost unbelievable.
There are so many things that can go wrong, but so many things that work. You have to keep within budget, and you have to get the money from somewhere. There are schedules and deadlines to meet. Sometimes, there are even stray cats that are ruining shots, and you have to build a car hotel on set.
Overall, I have left out a lot for this review, as you will want to watch it and see it all for yourself. It’s a really in-depth documentary, fascinating and a really interesting watch, a total of 5 stars from me.
Wick is Pain is on VoD.
