The John Wick franchise started out simple. It was a story of former assassin John Wick (Keanu Reeves) getting revenge on the spoiled son of a crime boss who killed the dog John's late wife had gotten him. As such, it came in at a brisk one hour and 41 minutes. But the sequels have expanded the world and each movie's runtime, with John Wick: Chapter 4's runtime blowing its predecessors out of the water at two hours and 49 minutes.
But according to John Wick director Chad Stahelski, the initial John Wick: Chapter 4 runtime would have made the movie one of the longest in Hollywood history.
In a feature from IndieWire, Stahelski said, "Our first cut was three hours and 45 minutes, and it felt like three hours and 45 minutes. We were like, oh, we're so screwed."
To put that in perspective, had John Wick: Chapter 4 kept that three hour and 45-minute runtime, it would have been longer than movies like Lawrence of Arabia, Ben-Hur, Martin Scorsese's The Irishman and The Godfather and The Godfather Part II; though it still would have trailed Gone With the Wind, Once Upon a Time in America and Cleopatra. More recently, Chapter 4's final cut is shorter than 2022's The Batman's runtime, but neither movie is helping the idea that movies are getting longer.
Part of the reason for the massive runtime with the movie's initial cut was that John Wick: Chapter 4 features a number of new supporting characters whose storylines were being given a good bit of time. The trick, according to editor Nathan Orloff, was that even with all of these new storylines, the movie still had to be centered on John Wick. This led to the compressing of these parts of the movie, making sure there was no repetition and "sifting out what we didn't need," said Orloff.
But don't worry action fans, Orloff and Stahelski realized they could not remove any of the movie's 14 action sequences without negatively affecting the movie.
Stahelski was so careful that the movie find the right rhythm he detailed that anytime they removed even just 30 seconds from the cut they would go back and watch the whole movie again to make sure the decision allowed the movie to flow as they wanted.
"That's the only way you know you have the right pace," said Stahelski. "You feel that bump in movies all the time because they were doing it in pieces and not seeing it as a whole."
The strategy worked, at least according to WTW's five-star John Wick: Chapter 4 review. The movie is a non-stop thrill ride of brilliant action scenes and fantastic character dynamics. It all results into what we feel is one of the best action movies of the last decade.
In Chapter 4, John Wick uncovers a path to defeating The High Table. But before he can earn his freedom, Wick must face off against a new enemy with powerful alliances across the globe and forces that turn old friends into foes. In addition to Reeves, the movie stars Ian Mcshane, Laurence Fishburne, Donnie Yen, Bill Skarsgård, Shamier Anderson, Hiroyuki Sanada, Rina Sawayama, Scott Adkins, Clancy Brown and Lance Reddick.
John Wick: Chapter 4 releases exclusively in movie theaters worldwide on March 24.
