The very first John Wick film came as a breath of fresh air at a time when action movies were becoming more and more unimaginative. Many agree that the film completely saved the Hollywood action genre when it was released in 2014. The film brought Keanu Reeves’ reserved and confident presence to a stripped-down plot and captivated audiences with a new and expansive action style. Yes, John Wick went through hordes of mercenaries like in a video game. However, the sense of technical skill with which the character handled his weapons gave moviegoers a special thrill.
It instantly made lifelong fans among cinephiles and was simply called a cult classic a week after release. The pieces accompanying this reinvention of the Hollywood action genre were a chain of influences that started with the gory crime movies of Hong Kong filmmaker John Woo, and ended with Chad Stahelski, the stuntman turned director of the film. At the heart of this great cultural exchange of films was an absurdly brilliant action genre known as Gun Fu.
Birth in Hong Kong Crime Action Movies
The birth of Gun Fu is generally credited to a single filmmaker: John Woo. Hailing from Hong Kong, he found his start in the 1970s in the same film industry that spawned Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan, even working with the latter on some films. Woo started his filming journey with kung fu movies, which were basically the westerns of Chinese cinema, minus the traditional shootings. They rivaled those of western movies in America in popularity and abundance, but they were an isolated action genre with huge stylistic differences. Guns were little more than props in kung fu movies, and the action was based on elaborate hand-to-hand combat scenes that bordered on graceful.
Meanwhile, gunfights were at the heart of Hollywood cinema action. Western movies basically set the original standard for Hollywood movie shootouts. These movies also set a very different set of values in the action hero. Firefights in the cinematic Wild West often gave the best advantage to the fastest draw, and their heroes were often the most lost in this skill. This meant that the action in Hollywood movies was relatively stationary; there were no chaotic brawls with characters scrambling around the screen.
John Woo, who worked in the Hong Kong film industry, was as impressed by the dance-like acrobatics of kung fu as he was by the Mexican stalemates of cowboy westerns. Later in the 1980s, he began to conceptualize an entirely new style of action films that sought to combine Western gunfights with the cinematic conventions of his own genre. The result was a gory, high-octane action movie that became known as heroic bloodshed movies.
In making these films, Woo basically combined the intense physicality of kung fu with the gratuitous gunfights of the western. Heroic bloodshed movies are set in a world of crime, with protagonists who were themselves police or criminal enforcers. They often walked into the enemy’s lair with guns blazing, and these battles regularly ended up close with more guns than you could count. The murderer, a better morningand Hard boiled were some of the important titles that saw the development of this new action genre. Hard boiled even probably contained the earliest form of the gang fight – years earlier The robbery.
The fan club of Hollywood filmmakers
The unique style of cinematic action invented by Woo quickly found fans in the West. And in 1999, The Matrix created the first meaningful blend of Gun Fu with Hollywood action. The Wachowskis who made the film were big fans of Chinese kung fu movies, and by John Woo mainly. They understood the charm of both and tried to emulate it in their own film.
For this they imported top talent from the source. Yuen Woo-ping has played a serious role in Hong Kong’s kung fu cinema, directing many important films such as Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow. With him as a fight choreographer, The Matrix saw his protagonists perform impossible acrobatics. Special attention was paid to the aesthetics of the action – an important aspect of kung fu cinema. These sequences also had an excessive amount of blaring gunfire, which were also portrayed with special care for cinematic beauty.
Of course, the film had one crucial difference from John Woo’s films: it took itself too seriously. Woo started his career in a film industry where comedy and kung fu were the two most prominent film genres. His groundbreaking films such as The murderer reflected this attitude, while maintaining a charm despite the folly. On the other hand, The Matrix frames his outrageous action as surreal rather than silly. It worked, and a truly unique and inimitable film was born.
But this artistic divergence was evidence of a fundamental difference between the cinematic sensibility of Chinese kung fu and American blockbusters. While the dance-like elegance and comedic melody were essential to making a kung fu movie feel at home, serious action was the only way to sell tickets to Americans. The Matrix hit the nail right on the head; Within a few years of its release, Hollywood filmmakers were trying to understand their newfound preferences for action film with groundbreaking new releases. Bourne’s Identity sought a stark realism combined with an extremely competent protagonist, and through this combination gave way to striking action scenes. Security was an action drama in which gunfights demonstrated elite real-world practices that stunned audiences.
Gun Fu Goes Super Saiyan
The directors of John Wick, Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, were there to see the Hollywood side of things kick off in real time. It was stunt doubles for Reeves in the first Matrix film, with Stahelski as stunt coordinator for the sequels. A long history as stuntmen and stunt coordinators made them the perfect minds to shape the John Wick universe.
The duo also had some notable ideas about how to create on-screen action. To talk with that shelfLeitch spoke about the importance of realism in capturing better action scenes.
“Martial arts have become so mainstream now that you can’t fake something like that anymore. Now there will always be someone watching a fight scene who knows how they work, and they’re going to think, “I don’t know if I would do it that way.” So it’s nice to apply martial arts that people can actually practice, that fit the situation, that are done the right way, and to have a cast that is willing to go through the training to make it look real . They can reload and fire a firearm. They can drive vehicles and perform the right maneuvers.”
Armed with these beliefs, as well as the unending confidence of the leading man, Keanu Reeves embarked on an intense period of physical training for John Wick that lasted four months. During this period he learned judo, jiu-jitsu and even 3-gun training with real firearms.
Behind the scenes, Stahelski and Leitch were developing a whole new style of fighting for the screen – something that combined real grappling techniques with realistic firearms practices so that they flowed seamlessly from one to the other. The real training in fighting styles, as well as hours spent doing 3-gun drills, enabled Reeves to perform countless permutations of grapple, slam, and shoot that became the epitome of Gun Fu. His real skill in the martial arts meant that the directors were free from the camera shake ban and the quick cuts. Action scenes could be portrayed frontally, allowing a better focus on other cinematic elements that would enhance the story.
Reeves’ experience of using real weapons also enabled him to paint a truly realistic picture of gun use – one that simultaneously exudes vigilance and careless mastery. This hypnotic tone is present in virtually every action sequence of the John Wick movies, and it’s what excites the viewer about the film’s signature action style, Gun Fu.