Video review: "John Wick: Chapter 3 -- Parabellum"

John Wick is showing his age, as well as accumulated wear and tear, in his third outing. The legendary assassin played by Keanu Reeves, who retired before being pulled back into his own game, has been declared an enemy of the underground and is on the lam in “John Wick: Chapter 3 -- Parabellum.”

That last part means “prepare for war,” so you know there’s going to be plenty of bloody mayhem. Fans will certainly not be disappointed in the body count or spectacular action set pieces, where Wick takes on fellow killers by gun, hand, knives, sword, motorcycle and a few other methods of death.

We meet more members of the secret international society of assassins -- some helpful, some lethal. These include Halle Berry as Sofia, who runs the show in Casablanca; Laurence Fishburne as the Bowery King, who’s in charge of the army of invisible homeless; Anjelica Huston as a ballet director with some dark ties to Wick’s past; and the “Adjuticator” sent from the society leadership to clean things up.

My favorite new add is Mark Dacascos as Zero, who runs a sushi bar by day and leads a cadre of ninjas at night. He’s openly worshipful of Wick, so it’s like he’s fighting his own fanboy. We get the sense Zero but equally pleased with being the man who finally kills Wick, or joins his list of the vanquished.

Reeves is no spring chicken, and with Wick’s growing list of injuries -- he’s been shot, stabbed and pummeled over the course of the few days during which the entire film franchise has taken place -- he moves in a lurching, graceless manner.

Personally I preferred the lean, mean, stripped-down ethos of the first two films, directed by stunt coordinator-turned director Chad Stahelski. It felt like the crew had been left to make their own movie after the above-the-title folks had wandered off for a few days.

With a reported budget of $70 million, “Chapter 3” is definitely edging more toward James Bond than grindhouse. There’s even some noticeable cheating through the use of CG imagery or tricky editing, something I appreciated the earlier films for eschewing.

Still, it’d be hard to deny that Wick is still a blast, a little bit of the ol’ ultra-violence in mainstream form.

Bonus features are pretty decent, though you’ll pay more to get the best stuff. The DVD has just theatrical trailers and two making-of featurettes. Spring for the Blu-ray edition, and you add six more featurettes.

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Review: "John Wick: Chapter 3 -- Parabellum"

John Wick runs like an old man with rheumatoid knees.

Hollywood can do amazing things with faces, but the knees always give you away. Star Keanu Reeves staggers and clomps in a herky-jerky cadence that bespeaks of a man in his 50s who’s more worried about preserving his tendons than achieving maximum speed.

Yes, yes, if you’ve followed the legendary assassin’s journey through the first two movies, you know that Wick’s been repeatedly pummeled, stabbed and shot as he’s pursued by a virtual army of other killers, so that certainly factors into how much he’s slowed down. A couple of other assassins even makes jokes about his lurching ways.

He’s still game for a third go-round in "John Wick: Chapter 3 -- Parabellum,” which is a continuation of the story that plays out over a few days' time, during which Wick has waded through an increasingly deep ocean of blood.

The last portion of the title is Latin for “prepare for war,” so you know things are just getting ratcheted up to another level of ultra-violence.

I liked the raw kinetic energy of the first two movies, which were known for putting veteran stunt coordinator Chad Stahelski in the director’s chair, a then-novel approach that has since been much imitated. (And surpassed, imho, by “Atomic Blonde.”) The fights were in our face, unmasked with no jumpy editing or obvious stunt doubles.

The franchise reaches middle age here, relying more on CGI and other cheats, and with some fights that go on way longer than they should. Same for the movie in general, which feels bloated at 10 minutes past the two-hour mark. These sorts of action-reliant spectacles are best at a tight 101, like the first one.

Still, it’s hard to deny the movie’s still a lot of fun, what with all the Glock blasts to the face, people getting thrown through windows, motorcycle sword fights and chop-socky rope-a-dope. There are just enough talkie scenes to act as a deep breath before we plunge in for more slice-and-dice.

It seems in the last film Wick, who was reluctantly drawn out of retirement after five years, had committed the ultimate transgression against the High Table, the fictional ruling part of a worldwide association of assassins. They have their own little pet rules, with sanctuary hotels in each major city, always called the Continental, where killers can trade in special gold coins for refuge and weapons.

Wick killed a member of the Table on Continental New York grounds, so now he’s hunted -- excommunicado -- with a $14 million price on his head with nowhere to turn for help. A mysterious “adjudicator” (Asia Kate Dillon) shows up and deems that others are at fault too, including Winston (Ian McShane), the gravely manager of the Big Apple hotel, and the Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), who runs the seedier side of town with an army of winos.

They helped John Wick before, and now must pay their own pound of flesh.

Halle Berry is a new face as Sofia, who manages the Continental in Casablanca and owes him an old favor. Ditto for Anjelica Huston, a Belarus matriarch who runs the ballet school where Wick grew up. That at least explains his grace with guns and knives, twirling in place like Nureyev as he takes one life after another.

Wick even gets his own assassin fanboy (Mark Dacascos), who runs a streetside sushi bar by day and commands a cadre of ninja assassins at night. He keeps telling Wick how honored he is to be fighting him, which is a hint of his long-term prospects.

Bedecked in a sleek black suit, long hair and scraggly beard, Reeves is more a force of vengeance than an actual person. But this is not the sort of movie you go to for dialogue and character development. It’s a gleeful orgy of bullets and bruises, film noir as bloodbath.

Drink deep, because it looks like we’re in for a whole lot more of these.