So I put a lot of time into this project. I started this about six months ago right around the time COVID hit and everything started getting shut down. I'm already a bit of a homebody but COVID literally forced me to stay indoors and find various ways to occupy my time so I decided to sit down and watch all of the movies from one of my favorite actors and personal heroes, Keanu Reeves. Beyond watching all of these movies, many of my recaps (especially the second half of this) also took me quite a while to write, which I know you must be thinking, "wait, it actually took you time to write this unfunny garbage I've been reading for six months?"
Yes. It's taken quite a while to be this unfunny.
So, before getting to some awards I wanted to take just a few paragraphs to discuss some of the lessons I've learned from watching 59 movies featuring but mainly starring Keanu Reeves.
1) Keanu's reputation of being a "bad" actor are mostly unfounded.
This is something I've been arguing for years but now I have incontrovertible evidence. Seriously, if there's one thing that most of my friends know about me it's that I'm a huge Keanu fan and most of them have never really agreed or understood, not to mention that back in the before-times when I was actually able to have conversations with human beings who don't live in my house, my statements about the greatness of Keanu were often met with a mix of skepticism, derision and incredulity.
Is Keanu a traditionally "great" actor? No, he is not and he will never be Michael Shannon, Denzel Washington, Tom Hardy, or any other number of actors whose work I also enjoy. That said, when he's put in a position to do what he does best, the man is excellent. This can be comedic work, as seen in movies like the Bill and Ted trilogy, I Love You to Death, A Happening of Monumental Proportions and Parenthood, or in dramatic work especially when a movie needs a stoic and serious actor such as The Neon Demon or Permanent Record.
And lastly, if you need a guy willing to put in the work, I don't know who else tops Keanu. Just think about how much training was required for his two action trilogies, The Matrix and John Wick.
Speaking of John Wick, Keanu is simply at his best when he's playing someone who has experienced extreme loss. Perhaps it's due to his own personal experiences in life, perhaps not. Just to go back to it for a second, but Permanent Record is still the movie I'd refer to when people say that Keanu is a bad actor, and this movie was made before he suffered some of the more major trauma in his life (at least what the public is privy to).
It's mainly when he's horribly miscast does Keanu seem to fail as an on-screen performer. For example, in The Watcher, it's impossible to take him seriously as a psychopathic serial killer or Knock Knock wherein he's a supposedly happy family man (likewise for Replicas).
2) Please stop making Keanu do accents
Dear God, Keanu's accent work is almost exclusively terrible and it hurt me every time he was dropped into a movie and forced into accents that often come and go from scene to scene. This is especially frustrating when there's literally no reason for Keanu to have an accent in the first place. Like in The Devil's advocate, why force Keanu to be a lawyer from the south? He could have been from literally anywhere and not forced into a shitty accent. And why does his character have a British accent in Dangerous Liasons when the movie takes place in France? For that matter, why isn't there any accent consistency in that movie whatsover from anyone? Are they French, British, American?
At least in Dracula it made sense for him to be putting on a British accent, as crappy as it was.
Anyway, please stop forcing accents on Keanu or if there's no choice for some reason, get him a better dialect coach. But seriously, just stop making him do accents.
3) There's a reason that I haven't seen many of his movies prior to this project
Just a quick stat pulled from my last post - my movie ratings of movies I'd previously watched prior to this filmography versus movies that were new to me is 7.6 and 4.4. Yes, most of the movies that were new to me were garbage and so it's pretty obvious why I'd avoided them to this point. In fact, I only gave a rating of seven or higher to six out of 42 new to me movies. That's not good but it just goes to show that I don't generally waste my time watching shitty movies (unless I'm specifically watching them because I know they're shitty in advance).
4) Keanu might not be great at picking his projects
I honestly don't know how Keanu got roped into some of these movies. Did he owe favors? Was he being blackmailed? I mean in the case of The Watcher, the story goes that his assistant forged his name on the contract forcing Keanu to star in the movie and rather than get into a protracted legal battle Keanu just said "fuck it," and did the movie. Knock Knock? Exposed? Generation Um...? Keanu, what the fuck are you doing in these movies? I get wanting to take some risks or give young filmmakers a chance but there's no way he could have read some of these scripts and said, "yes, this is the part for me!"
On the flip side, I DO like that Keanu is willing to take some risks, which he's able to do at least in part by the fact that he made something like a quarter of a billion dollars from the Matrix trilogy. Small indies like A Happening of Monumental Proportions and Thumbsucker almost certainly didn't have the ability to pay him top dollar for his work so it's cool that he is willing to appear in smaller movies even if they're usually not good.
5) IMDB ratings are worthless
This isn't exactly a lesson from this project, it's already commonly known that IMDB ratings are for shit. Some of the best movies on this list sit with mediocre ratings on IMDB and some of his WORST movies....also sit with ratings that are far too high for what they are.
Feeling Minnesota has a 5.4, The Matrix Revolutions has a 6.8, Sweet November a 6.7, and even Knock Knock has a 4.9. In no sane world could anyone think any of these movies are better than a 3 out of ten, and even then you'd have to have at least a little bit of brain damage to give it that high a score.
6) Keanu Reeves really does star in some of my all-time favorite movies
I ranked all of his movies in my last post and I honestly think that my top 9 (Speed, Bill and Ted Trilogy, John Wick Trilogy, Point Break and The Matrix) are all probably in my favorite 20 or 30 movies of all time. Dare I say, I don't expect to ever see a trilogy of action movies again in my lifetime that will match up to John Wick. And just think, there are going to be two more of them in a few years!
7) I don't like Keanu as a romantic lead unless he has great chemistry with his counterpart
The Lake House - fine! I mean it's not a good movie but it actually seems like him and Sandra Bullock like each other, which makes it pretty stupid to keep your on-screen romantic couple apart for 95% of the movie.
Sweet November - awful! Even though it was his second movie with Charlize Theron, there's nothing between them. And also this movie is straight garbage.
A Walk in the clouds - fine! Actual on-screen chemistry with Aitana Sanchez-Gijon turned this into a better than average movie that I'd actually softly recommend.
Siberia - Awful! It felt like he met his romantic counterpart in the middle of shooting the movie.
8) Keanu CAN play a villain but this is far from a sure thing
One of my favorite Keanu performances in this project is as the redneck wife beater in The Gift where he's genuinely scary or even in the Neon Demon where he plays a seriously creepy motel proprietor but then you look at a flat performance in Man of Tai Chi and a wretched performance in The Watcher and I'd have to say let's keep Keanu as a protagonist.
9) Keanu fucking rules.
Okay, okay, okay, this isn't exactly a lesson. I wouldn't have watched 59 of his movies if I didn't already love Keanu Reeves, but the dude is awesome. He puts in the behind the scenes work to make his movies and, for better or worse, he's willing to take on risky projects and appear in small indie movies where he couldn't have gotten paid much more than scale. This isn't even to mention all of what's publicly known about Keanu in regards to his philanthropical activities and the way he interacts with fans. Keanu is just a guy that you'd want to be friends with.
10) Watching an entire actor's filmography is definitely an interesting way to watch movies.
To be clear, I've sat through a lot of garbage for this project and watched a fair amount of movies I'd never even heard of prior to this. For someone like Keanu who has a 30+ year career I assume that's to be expected. But I also found a small handful of hidden gems that I also never would have seen had it not been for this. After a break and getting back to my giant list of movies to watch for a while, I might start over with another actor I like, and I already have a few in mind.
And with that said, let's get to some awards, the first annual and only Keanu's!
MOST OUT OF WHACK ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE
Nominees
*A Happening of Monumental Proportions - 16% - I rated this movie a 7 and it has more than a handful of funny moments, I get that the movie isn't perfect, it's a little disjointed and ends with a few loose threads left unresolved but this RT score is criminally low for a pretty entertaining little movie.
*Knock Knock - 37% - I rated this movie a 2.5 but there is no sane world in which this should have anything higher than 5% critical score. It's really, really fucking terrible.
*Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey - 54% - I rated this a 9.5 Okay, I'm a little biased on this as I grew up on it but come on, it's still a pretty funny movie.
*Point Break - 69% - I rated this a 10. How can anyone not like this movie?
*Something's Gotta Give - 72% - I gave this a 3. I wrote in my post about this that Nancy Meyers isn't making movies for me, but who is she making movies for? Brain-dead 50 year old women with no sense of reality?
And the Keanu goes to...
A Happening of Monumental Proportions
So this isn't the funniest movie I've ever seen, but at a brisk 80 minutes it is chock full of pretty good jokes and the four minutes that Keanu appears in are seriously funny. I even give this a lukewarm recommend and feel like this deserves a significantly higher RT score.
 |
| Totally cockfucked with appointments all day! |
BEST/WEIRDEST CAMEO
Nominees
*Michael Shannon - Chain Reaction - Flower Delivery Guy - One of his earliest roles, he appears to play a stoned flower delivery guy and hey, I love Michael Shannon and he's a final candidate for the next filmography project.
*Giovanni Ribisi - The Bad Batch - Unnamed Town Weirdo - I believe he appears in a total of two scenes in the movie, one where he walks around mumbling to himself and later dancing aimlessly in the streets. I have no idea why he took this role since he's well established by now.
*Alex Jones - A Scanner Darkly - Street Preaching Weirdo - I think this movie was filmed in Austin, which would make some sense as to his appearance and this movie came out before Alex Jones was ALEX JONES (although he was always an asshole conspiracy theorist).
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| Rotoscoped Alex Jones is still one of the worst people alive |
*Phoebe Cates - I Love You to Death - Club Chick - Phoebe Cates randomly shows up in an uncredited role in this and is seduced by the philandering Kevin Kline, who is her real life husband. Plus, she looks great.
*Anthony Keidis - Point Break - Tone - I've seen Point Break 100 times and I'm just now learning that this character has a name. Sure, it's not as cool as Bodhi or War Child, but Anthony Keidis does get the shit kicked out of him and is later shot in the foot. He certainly makes the most out of one of his only film roles.
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| Punchable |
*Cornel West - The Matrix Reloaded/The Matrix Revolutions/The Private Lives of Pippa Lee - I was confused when he showed up in the Matrix Reloaded, less confused when he also appeared in The Matrix Revolutions, and then thoroughly confused once again when he showed up a third time at the opening dinner party in The Private Lives of Pippa Lee. My man, you are a professor and an activist and not an actor, WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN THREE MOVIES IN KEANU'S FILMOGRAPHY?
And the Keanu goes to...
Cornel West. It's just so fucking weird and I'm just picturing Cornell and Keanu sitting down and discussing philosophy with one another and I just really hope it happened at some point.
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| WHY ARE YOU HERE? |
MOST BORING MOVIE
Nominees
*My Own Private Idaho - I don't know who this movie was really made for but definitely not me. I really hated all of the fake Shakespearean dialogue that came and went throughout but it was hard to pay attention anyway since I kept falling asleep.
*Generation Um... - A movie with no plot where nothing happens for 100 minutes. There is a four minute shot of Keanu eating a muffin and while I love the guy, this is not what one might call enthralling cinema.
*Even Cowgirls Get the Blues - Just a wretched movie that felt like it was nine hours long.
*The Bad Batch - I know I'm repeating myself at this point but how do you make a movie about a dystopian wasteland full of drugs and cannibals and make it mind-numbingly boring?
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| Enjoy the view cause you're not getting much in the way of story |
*Little Buddha - The half of the movie that focused on the family were interminable, but the movie is partially (but certainly not entirely) saved by the story of brown-face Keanu as Siddartha.
And the Keanu goes to...
Generation Um...Sorry, you can't have Keanu wandering around Central Park doing nothing of interest for 20 minutes and pretend you're making art. Everything about this movie is boring and awful and nobody should ever sit through this unless they're also doing a Keanu Reeves filmography.
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| Exciting! |
BEST MUSICAL/DANCE SEQUENCE
Nominees
*Keanu does drugs and gets dancy - The Night Before - Probably the funniest sequence of this movie, and Keanu gets to show off some legitimately good moves.
*Wyld Stallyns vs. Denomolos - Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey - Bill and Ted show up to the Battle of the Bands, defeat Denomolos, and play the song that saves the world which happens to sound oddly similar to God Gave Rock and Roll to You by KISS.
*Wyld Stallyns plays the REAL song that unites the world - Bill and Ted Face the Music - Okay, so forget everything that happens at the end of Bogus Journey, just pretend it didn't happen. I fucking love the final sequence of Face the Music and yes I teared up all four times I've watched the movie.
*Keanu's classmate sings a tribute to their dead friend - Permanent Record - Okay yes, I teared up at this too. The quality of the song itself can be debated but this was such a powerful moment in a shockingly good movie about teen suicide.
*Keanu the crooner - Sweet November - Keanu ends his 12 days of Christmas presents to Charlize by singing at the end of the movie and it's really romantic stupid.
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| I've got you under my skin |
*Everyone dances in prison - The Replacements - Okay, I'm not going to lie, now I'm just trying to fill out the rest of this category.
*Rave Scene - The Matrix Reloaded
And the Keanu goes to...
Wyld Stallyns unites the world. Sorry but if I've watched the same sequence four times in a little over a month and I'm still tearing up at the end, you've done something right.
BEST ACTION SEQUENCE AKA THE "IT CAN'T ALL BE JOHN WICK AWARD"
Nominees
*Keanu Chases Bodhi through the streets - Point Break - Just a really well shot foot chase that ends in the classic shot of Keanu firing his gun into the air (dude, not worth the report you're going to need to write for discharging your weapon!).
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| KHAAAAAAAAAN!!!! |
*John Wick's home is assaulted - John Wick - The very first action sequence in the first movie showcases why John Wick is not a man to be fucked with and teases all that is to come.
*Gunfight at the Red Circle - John Wick - I love the tracking throughout the club from the hot tub to the dance floor and through the various other parts of the Red Circle all accompanied by a sweet techno beat.
*Highway Fight - The Matrix Reloaded - Literally the only good part from either of the sequels, this scene must have been impossible to shoot. So many destroyed vehicles.
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| Never bring a katana to a highway fight |
*Lobby Shootout - The Matrix - Guns. Lots of guns. Neo and Trinity blast through a few dozen security guards and potentially also inspire an entire generation of school shooters.
*Fight at the knife museum - John Wick Parabellum - All the close combat and brutal knife kills that concludes with John Wick throwing an axe down the length of the room and through an already dying man's head.
*Motorcycle fight sequence - John Wick Parabellum - Okay, so they apparently lifted this from another movie called The Villainess. Doesn't make it any less cool.
*Catacombs Shootout - John Wick 2 - Shares some similarities with the Red Circle fight, just more brutal.
And the Keanu goes to...
Fight at the knife museum. I mean this is a really hard choice and I even had to leave out a dozen more action sequences from the John Wick trilogy (the library fight versus Boban and the battle of the Continental stand out) but I just really love this fight as it shows off some really awesome choreography and manages to also have a comedic moment or two thrown in.
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| Very close to ensuring there won't be any baby Wicks |
WORST ROMANTIC PARTNER
Nominees
*Ana Ularu - Siberia - I don't know if this actress is any good in anything else she's in but her and Keanu have absolutely NO chemistry. I honestly think the first time they met must have been right before they shot one of the MANY sex scenes they have together.
*Charlize Theron - Sweet November - I love Charlize Theron and think she's a pretty wonderful actress but in Sweet November I just want her manic pixie dream girl character to hurry up and die.
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| Fucking ugh |
*Sandra Bullock - The Lake House - Okay, this nomination is more for the fact that despite her chemistry with Keanu, this movie features them on-screen together for roughly eight minutes.
*Diane Lane - Hardball - I really don't understand this relationship at all as this movie hints at a romantic relationship between her and Keanu and then proceed to have it go absolutely nowhere.
*Diane Keaton - Something's Gotta Give - Hot young doctor Keanu Reeves falls head over heels for much older woman who basically treats him like shit and eventually leaves him on the spot for Jack Nicholson? To say this stretches all semblance of reality is an understatement.
And the Keanu goes to...
Ana Ularu. It's not even close. Don't watch Siberia.
BEST ROMANTIC PARTNER
Nominees
*Aitana Sanchez-Gijon - A Walk in the Clouds - I have no idea what happened to this woman and where her career went after this movie nor do I care to look it up, but she's really wonderful in this movie and is excellent alongside our boy Keanu.
*Sandra Bullock - Speed - Okay I might be cheating a bit here as I'm not sure you could say she's necessarily a "romantic partner" in this movie, but her chemistry with Keanu is so good that they ended up in the Lake House together several years later.
*Vera Farmiga - Henry's Crime - Not the best movie in the filmography but she's sweet in this and her relationship with Keanu is believable enough.
*Wynona Ryder - Destination Wedding - Again, not the best movie but it's extremely evident that Wynona and Keanu are real-life buddies and this is the FOURTH movie they both appear in. Their constant bickering in the first half of this movie is relatively annoying but I like that their chemistry is basically the opposite of everything in Siberia.
And the Keanu goes to...
Aitana Sanchez-Gijon. I've already mentioned it but I don't love Keanu in romantic roles, but her performance in this movie is part of why I didn't rate this movie much lower. I hope she's doing well.
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| Going for a walk...in the clouds |
WORST VILLAIN
Nominees
Jones - Replicas - He spends the first two acts of the movie unconvincingly playing the boss of a biotech lab and then last act as a way over-the-top "bad guy." It's all just so laughably bad.
Keanu - The Watcher - Keanu sleepwalks his way playing the least convincing serial killer in movie history. Granted, he isn't given a lot to work with but he's about as scary as Hello Kitty.
Brian Cox - Chain Reaction - Yet another villain that becomes unnecessarily evil in the final act. I really like Brian Cox but I have no idea what he's doing here.
Every bad guy in Johnny Mnemonic (Beat Takeshi/Dolph Lundgren/Denis Akiyama) - Dear sweet God everyone in this is just so fucking bad. Beat Takeshi is lifeless, Dolph Lundgren is a caricature and Denis Akiyama, despite a cool laser whip, is abysmal. I might have liked this movie had it been marketed as a comedy.
Ana de Armas and Lorenza Izzo - Knock Knock - The two of them were clearly written by a man who hates women and is probably an incel. But they are also horrible annoying, unrealistic and confusingly evil.
Al Pacino - The Devil's Advocate - Possibly the most controversial nominee but fuck you, this is my list. Al Pacino spends 2.5 hours chewing scenery and giving impossibly long monologues. Peter Stormare's depiction of Satan in Constantine is far superior.
And the Keanu goes to...
Every bad guy in Johnny Mnemonic. I mean, you really just need to watch the movie for yourself but it's like everyone in this movie is trying to top the next guy for how terrible they are.
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| Laser whip >>>> Acting |
BEST VILLAIN
Nominees
*Keanu Reeves - Donnie Barksdale - The Gift - Keanu is legit scary as a wife-beating redneck and while it's evident from the start that he's not the real killer it doesn't make him any less scary.
*Keanu Reeves - Hank - The Neon Demon - Okay, so he's only on screen for less than ten minutes but he's super creepy and gives one of the best monologues of this entire project when he creepily explains how he's renting out room to underage girls and the plans that he may or may not have for them.
*Gary Oldman - Dracula - Dracula - Gary Oldman looks insane as Dracula and is pretty terrifying in \general. He might be the only good part of this movie.
7
*Dennis Hopper - Howard Payne - Speed - One of the only "true" villains of this project, Howard Payne has zero positive qualities and is simply an evil, mad bomber. Dennis Hopper plays this perfectly.
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| Shoot the hostage |
*Anthony Carrigan - Dennis Caleb Mccoy - Bill and Ted Face the Music - Okay, I'm using the term "villain" pretty loosely here as DCM is only a villain for about five minutes before he turns and becomes one of the funniest parts of the movie.
*Hugo Weaving - Agent Smith - The Matrix - Please note that this is for the first movie only. Hugo Weaving plays an uncaring machine inside the Matrix and he's just really, really good.
*Jim Belushi - Boone - The Whole Truth - Are you as surprised as I am that I nominated anyone from The Whole Truth for a Keanu award? Jim Belushi plays a real asshole of a father in this and is scarily convincing.
*Michael Nyqvist - Viggo - John Wick - He's more humorous than he is scary but I mean, how can you bring so much gravitas to a movie with the single word "Oh."
*Diane Keaton - Erica - Something's Gotta Give - "Oh Jordan," you might be saying, "Diane Keaton isn't a villain in this movie!" WRONG! She toys Keanu along for about six months before unceremoniously dumping him in Paris immediately after getting engaged. She also spends parts of the movie both crying and cackling maniacally and is a generally awful person.
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| Pure. Unadulterated. Evil. |
And the Keanu goes to...
Dennis Hopper. He's a major reason Speed is so goddamn good. And yes, I came really close to giving this to Diane Keaton.
MOST FUN OR INTERESTING KEANU LOOK
Nominees
*Prince of Pennsylvania - Keanu looks like a middle aged lesbian.
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| My friends call me Beth |
*I Love You to Death - Keanu looks like a junkie, which is good because that's what he plays.
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| Kinda like me every day during COVID |
*John Wick - The suit, the beard, the hair...I'm not saying I'm gay or anything but damn Keanu, looking good.
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| Iconic |
*Parenthood - Keanu sported a lot of VERY STUPID looks early in his career.
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| Chillin with Plimpton |
*Street Kings - Clean cut Keanu
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| You're under arrest...for looking good! |
*The Replacements - A bit shaggy
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| It's hard throwing accurate passes with all this hair in my face |
And the Keanu goes to...
John Wick - What can I say, the man looks good in a suit.
Well that wraps up awards part 1. Stay tuned for part two where I get to the biggest awards of the season including best and worst performances by Keanu and his co-stars, best scenes, and some more bonus categories!
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