John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum

Keanu Reeves returns for a third installment as over-the-top, super-badass-assassin John Wick, on the run this time after killing a member of the International Assassin’s Guild. This series, beyond being the best-of-breed in the action genre, isn’t just all adrenaline and testosterone – there’s more substance to the style here. There are plenty of subtle, nerdy movie references throughout. The opening scenes when John hurdles through the streets of New York looking for sanctuary as the whole of Manhattan’s most dangerous hunts him down, shares similarities with The Warriors. John finds himself in a room filled with revolvers from the 19th century. Desperately, he swaps parts of the revolvers, listens to the mechanisms as he twirls the cylinders and cocks the different hammers. This scene is a homage to the scene in Sergio Leone’s The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. John says the line “Guns. Lots of guns.” This is the same exact line that Reeves’ Neo character has in The Matrix movie! On the library steps, guys are singing Frank Stallone’s “Take You Back (Street Corner Song)” from Rocky. Chapter 3 also marks the second time a Buster Keaton film has been featured in a Wick film. A clip from Sherlock Jr. (1924) is in Chapter 2, while a clip from The General (1926) is featured in this new one.

[R]