The Keanu Reeves Project: The Whole Truth

THE WHOLE TRUTH (2016) - Ramsey

Maybe it's because I've forced myself to sit through about fifty movies so far, many of them being truly terrible, that it's starting to affect my overall taste in movies and how I'm rating them.  After all, with very few exceptions, since starting this project in April I've barely watched any new to me non-Keanu movies.

I love movies and while I've watched fewer and fewer "new" (new being defined as anything I haven't seen regardless of release date) movies the older I get, I still try to consume at least a few new movies every month but I've done nothing but watch Keanu movies for five months straight and for nearly all the ones I've never seen, there's no other reason I'd ever watch them if not for this project.  

I've all but abandoned my seemingly endless list of movies to watch so I can strictly focus on this project.  And because my list is almost exclusively movies recommended to me by people whose taste I overlap with, I've definitely "wasted" a lot of time watching crappy movies with Keanu Reeves in them rather than other movies that I'm sure I'd enjoy a lot more.  

So now I'm worried my baseline for what I'd consider "good" or at least better than average has fallen off a cliff since I've had to endure some really painful shit over the past several months.  I mean, I think "Generation Um..." and a re-watch of "Knock Knock" has made me long for anything that even borders on comprehension.  So I come to you today a bit concerned that I kind of liked a movie that was universally panned by critics and audiences alike.  

Let me just get this out of the way off the top (I feel like I tend to say this frequently) - "The Whole Truth" isn't a particularly good movie, but when compared to things like "The Watcher" or "Sweet November" it's a goddamn revelation of American cinema and I'd rather have to sit down and watch this again then ever spend another second watching "Feeling Minnesota" or "The Matrix Revolutions."

You know the drill, full spoilers ahead for a movie you'll never, ever watch.

So "The Whole Truth" is basically a courtroom procedural with Keanu, once again, playing a southern lawyer a la "The Devil's Advocate."  Once again, there's no reason for this movie to take place in the south, specifically New Orleans, other than to force Keanu into yet another awkward accent that tends to come and go throughout the movie.  In fact, one of my first notes was "Louisana Keanu - no accent?" only to follow that minutes later with "Wait, IS he doing an accent?"  I watched 90 minutes of this and still don't know if he was doing an accent or not.

But no matter.  The majority of the movie takes place inside a courtroom and I'd be willing to guess that about 75% of the movie takes place there, with the only parts not courtroom related being flashbacks (a lot of flashbacks) and a handful of scenes of Keanu in his hotel room after the day ended.  The movie even opens with the start of the trial next to some voiceover from Keanu telling us exactly what's going on, thanks for the exposition!

So here's where we start: Keanu is the defense attorney for a 17 year old named Mike, on trial for the first degree murder of his own father, but the first problem is that Mike hasn't said a goddamn word since his arrest, even to his own lawyer, Keanu.  This does not seem like a great way to defend yourself, but we learn that Mike is supposed to be some sort of burgeoning legal genius, following in the footsteps of his now dead father, so he apparently knows what he's doing by not speaking.

On the first day of the trial we get a little insight as to what happened both through opening testimony as well as some flashbacks to the day of the murder and meet basically everyone of importance in the movie:

We've got Keanu once again playing a defense attorney, this time representing 17 year old Mike, presumable father killer.  As far as we know, Keanu's boss is NOT the literal devil.

We also meet Mike's mother, Loretta, played here by a SERIOUSLY UNRECOGNIZABLE Renee Zellweger.  Seriously, I saw her name in the opening credits and when she first appeared on screen I literally asked to myself out loud, "wait, is that Renee Zellweger?"  This was apparently her first on-screen role in over six years and during that time it appears she must have committed some sort of international art heist leading to extensive plastic surgery so nobody could track her down..  You'd think she would have changed her name as well.  If I cared enough I'd go Google this but instead I'll just add a few images:

So you're telling me this is the same person....

AS THIS?

We also meet (in flashback) the dead father, Boone, played by Jim Belushi who I didn't even realize was still alive, let alone still appearing in movies in 2016.  Don't get me wrong, I've always been a HUGE fan of "According to Jim" so it's just great to see him still getting work on the big screen.

Best TV show of all time

Finally, we meet Keanu's co-council, Janelle who shows up to the trial late and it really doesn't matter because her entire use in the movie was almost entirely pointless.  Janelle is there in place of her father, a lawyer Keanu is friendly with and had actually tried to get to the trial only to be saddled with his potentially insane daughter, something mentioned in passing in what can only be described as an incredibly minor and irrelevant subplot.  

Hi, I'm crazy!  Don't worry, it really doesn't matter.

The entirety of the movie is then essentially the whole trial.  Now I'm not a lawyer by profession and I've only received my JD from the "My Cousin Vinny" school of law, but this movie may or may not disregard many of the things I know about jury trials.  But forget all that because that also doesn't matter either.  

The prosecution opens by saying that we're going to hear a lot about how shitty Jim Belushi was as a father and a human being, but that doesn't matter because he was murdered in cold blood.  The defense on the other hand, has no opening because Mike won't talk to Keanu.  I didn't even know you could wave a white flag like that at the onset of a trial, but there you go.  

The backstory is slowly unraveled with testimony from a handful of people, including the first officer on the scene, the first detective on the scene, the flight attendant on the private plane that Boone and Mike had recently flown on to visit colleges on the west coast, and two of Mike's neighbors.

Through flashbacks we gather a few things, all of which are critical to the rest of the courtroom drama and it would be impossible for me to describe this movie linearly so I'll just put this all out there in the event you give a shit:

Boone is a bit of a piece of shit.  He is filthy rich, working as a prominent personal injury lawyer, and is basically the movie version of the St. Louis couple who drew their guns on protestors walking past their house.  You know, these dipshits:

Boone's friends and family

In addition to being a general asshole, Boone verbally abuses his wife Loretta in public and is even spotted by the neighbor's son raping her from time to time.  This is just fucking great because after the last movie I totally needed just a little more raping in the Keanu Reeves Project.  Boone also cheats on her (because of course he does) which we see in flashbacks as he seems to fly private regularly with women who aren't his wife.  We never actually see him engaging in sexual acts with other women but it is not very subtly implied through a handful of flashback sequences.   

The flashbacks to the actual day of the murder are what are pretty critical to the movie, as you might expect.  Until halfway through the movie when Mike actually speaks for the first time, what we gather is basically the following:

Boone was returning from a business trip and Mike was at soccer practice, Loretta is in the shower and when she gets out, Boone has returned home from the trip and now lies dead on the bedroom floor, a knife in his chest and his son sitting over him.  Mike says either "I should have done this sooner" or just "Shoulda done this sooner," his phrasing in dispute in court.  Loretta calls the cops and one officer is the first person on the scene but interestingly, Keanu, who is a friend of the family is the second person to show up, presumably in a lawyerly capacity.  

Have no fear, Keanu is here!

Mike is arrested as he's literally the only suspect and sort of confessed to the crime at the scene although anyone watching this movie with half a brain (hey, that's me!) would already assume he's not the killer because that wouldn't really be a movie.  He then exercises his right to remain silent, including to his own attorney Keanu, for reasons that really don't make a lot of sense, even when we find out what actually happened at the very end of the movie.

As the movie continues, an astute watcher including myself, starts to notice some things seem a bit off and that Loretta was probably the actual killer.  But we also get a glimpse or two that something may or may not also be going on with her and Keanu.  During one flashback, the family has a barbecue in which Boone berates his wife in front of guests (because he's a really swell guy) and she confides in Keanu that she wants to divorce him but he'd kill her before that happens.  

Loretta is called to the stand at one point and refuses to answer specific questions as to what was said between her and Boone on the day of his murder but does mention that Boone had regularly abused her physically and emotionally, including on the day of the murder, although we never actually see Boone hit her in any of the flashbacks.  This is called into question when Keanu then provides evidence to the court of photos of Loretta's injured body on the day of the murder.  I didn't think you were allowed to submit surprise evidence in a trial (thanks "My Cousin Vinny"), but whatever.  

Eventually the prosecution rests with Mike still not having said a goddamn word.  They've basically proven their case - they have both Mike's on-scene confession and his bloody handprint on the murder weapon.  Keanu is trying to put on the best defense he can, but it ain't easy when your client literally won't talk to you.  Keanu goes to visit Mike in his holding cell and pleads with him to say something but all Mike does is write a note saying he wants to be called to the stand.  Keanu clearly doesn't want to do this because he has no idea what Mike will actually say on the stand but is left with no choice when Mike threatens to fire him if he doesn't call him as a witness.

Dammit Mike, nobody ever won an Oscar for NEVER SPEAKING!

The next day, Keanu calls Mike to the stand who describes years of abuse at the hands of his father, including being raped by him since he was 12 years old.  He says these rapes happened frequently including on the private jet they took together to visit colleges.  And while that seemed pretty preposterous to me given the jet they took together wasn't exactly a huge place where this could happen, the movie does a half-decent job at describing how this could have been theoretically possible but I'm not going to bother getting into describing how a theoretical rape could or could not have happened on the plane.  

So while the going theory had been that Mike murdered his father to protect his mother from him, Mike's own testimony shows that to not be true as he was actually protecting himself from all of the abuse he suffered.  At some point we get a flashback of Mike finding his father dead on the floor, putting his hand on his chest and then on the knife, ostensibly to protect his mother from facing charges.  

The trial ends and Mike is found not guilty despite the fact that the entire courtroom, including Keanu, concludes that Mike was in fact the killer.  

This is my surprised face!

After the trial ends, Mike requests to speak with Keanu privately, so they meet up in a private room in the courthouse and Mike presents Keanu with a drawing he'd been working on during the jury deliberations.  Keanu asks him what it is and Mike says, "It's your watch.  I saw it under the bed the day my dad was killed."

Then we cut to another flashback to the day of the murder - Mike is kneeling over his father after planting his own handprint on the murder weapon and then spots a watch sitting at the edge of the bed.  His mother comes over to talk to him, kneeling down in front of the watch and surreptitiously removing it from the scene.  How he later realized it was actually Keanu's watch is still a bit of a mystery, so let's just assume that Mike has an amazing memory.

See, it turns out that Loretta had been banging Keanu on the side this whole time.  This "twist" was relatively noticeable from the few scenes we got of them together and unlike some reviews I've read or heard about this movie, was not completely out of left field. 

The movie ends with not one but TWO MORE flashbacks!

The first is Keanu talking to Boone outside a courtroom where Boone confesses that he knows his wife is having an affair.  Boone gives Keanu a wink and it's sort of implied that Boone knows it's Keanu who is banging his wife.  

You fuck my wife?

The second flashback is back to the day of the murder.  Loretta is in the bathroom, hitting herself with an object Marky Mark "Fear" style.  She leaves the bathroom and waits for Boone to come home, looking out the window, eventually telling someone off-screen "he's coming." she leaves the bathroom and waits for Boone to come home, looking out the window, eventually telling someone off-screen "he's coming."   

Boone enters the bedroom and starts to unpack when he's attacked....by KEANU (I mean at this point you had to see that coming after his conversation with Mike after the trial).  Keanu shoves a knife into Boone (with a gloved hand) and then tells Loretta she has to put her hand on the knife, but that's when they hear Mike who is home early from practice.  Keanu has fled or hid at this point and Mike witnesses his dead father and decides to take the blame in order to save his mother from prosecution, subsequently destroying the original plan to claim Loretta's own self-defense.  That's when Mike realizes there was someone else in the room (from the watch) and that his mother wasn't the actual killer.

So the whole movie was basically Keanu and Loretta improvising plan B to get away with murder after Mike took the blame for a crime he didn't commit and that's the end.

Okay, so some stray observations:

*There's a very, very minor subplot with Keanu's co-council Janelle that is completely meaningless and wholly unnecessary to the movie: she was only hired by Keanu because her father, the guy he really wanted (we don't know why) was busy on another case so he sent her instead.  She was apparently fired from her previous firm for stalking a partner there that she was having an affair with and eventually committed to a mental facility for a period of time.  That's it, that's the subplot, brought up for literally no reason and never mentioned again after the one and a half scenes it's talked about.  I guess this is supposed to explain what she's doing there in the first place, as she eventually learns on her own that Mike wasn't the killer but also suspects Loretta, just like anyone else watching the movie.

Oh hi Janelle, remind me what you're doing here?

*While I assumed early on that Keanu was more involved in this than the movie let on, I didn't really expect him to be the killer until the last flashback to the day of the murder when I assumed we'd see him kill Boone.  The fact that he was the second person at the scene of the crime was always completely suspicious so the big "reveal" at the end was actually kind of satisfying.  Based on critical reviews of the movie, I have a feeling that my opinion there is just a tad bit controversial.

*Jim Belushi plays an asshole really well.  Welcome back from the dead, Jim!

*Does Keanu ride a motorcycle in this movie for no reason?  You bet your ass he does!

Dork

*When we reach the end of the movie, I'm still a little perplexed why Mike refused to talk to anyone, including his own lawyer.  Sure, Mike is the ONLY person who knows (or at least has an idea) of what actually happened, he still hated his father even to go so far as to think on his feet to take the blame for the murder before he notices the watch on the ground.  Maybe best to not think too hard about this.

Box Office Information: N/A Domestic (very limited release?)/$1.7 Million International for $1.7 Million worldwide.   Yet another Keanu movie that was seen by essentially nobody but a handful of critics.  And me.

Rotten Tomatoes: 30% Critic/33% audience.  Okay, I can understand why nobody liked this movie.  It's just not that good.  

IMDB: 6.2

My Movie Rating: Okay, as stated at the top, I think my opinion is probably biased due to all the absolute shit I've sat through for this project and this movie is certainly a lot better than a good chunk of that.  Is that a good enough reason to give this movie a better than average rating?  Yes, yes it is.  5.5.  Sure I've already ruined it for you but for someone that hasn't read this recap, I would give it a very soft recommend.  Very soft.  Like if you literally had nothing to do, go ahead and watch "The Whole Truth."

Keanu Rating: Yeah, his accent goes in and out through the course of the movie (what else is new) but he's  good enough in this that I'm not mad at him.  6/10.

Up Next: It's a movie called "The Neon Demon."  I feel like I might have seen a trailer for this at some point but I have absolutely no clue what it is.

The Keanu Reeves Project - Exposed

EXPOSED (2016) - Detective Scott Galban

So the tale of the movie "Exposed" is an interesting and sad story and I am so glad I went back and not only read some background on it but then went back and watched it again (sort of).

About 60% of the way through my recent watch of "Exposed" I hit the pause button because I started thinking to myself, "why the fuck is this movie so goddamn convoluted?  There has to be something going on here!"  

And that's when I went to IMDB and read some interesting trivia: 

"Exposed" was originally shot as a movie called "Daughter of God," and is nearly unrecognizable from what it ended up as after Lionsgate got their hands on it, edited it to death and almost completely changed the story from a surreal-ish film starring Ana de Armas with Keanu Reeves as a side character into a story starring Keanu Reeves featuring Ana de Armas as a side character in a complete reversal of the films original intent.

This is the second recent movie that a studio has apparently butchered, but if Universal was guilty of negligent homicide for what they supposedly did to "47 Ronin" then Lionsgate is guilty of first degree murder for what they did to "Daughter of God" before turning it into "Exposed."

The final cut, edited beyond comprehension and then retitled "Exposed" turned out to be such a fucking disaster, that the director had his name removed and a pseudonym put in place because apparently he didn't want anything to do with this.  I had read that "Exposed" had done a real whitewashing of the original movie replacing a Latina main character to Keanu so I figured I might as well try to find that cut to see what this was intended to be.  The director (real name Gee Malik Linton) released the original version of the movie on his own via Instagram and so I decided to watch that after having seen "Exposed" because the released version of this movie is a serious fucking mess.

All this said, I suppose I'm going to give a recap here of "Exposed" since that was the final released movie followed by some notes on the director's cut version which is certainly a better movie albeit still a bit mediocre.

As always, spoilers ahead.

The movie opens with Ana de Armas as Isabel, hanging out at a club and she leaves with her future brother-in-law Manuel and some friends and we can see from a 1st person perspective that someone is watching and taking pictures of all of them.

Manuel walks Isabel to a subway station and tells her to get home safe, and we're treated to a shot of her walking through a long tunnel which was completely reminiscent of the very disturbing movie "Irreversible."  

Now if you haven't seen "Irreversible," there's a very horrible scene where noted Keanu Reeves movie alum Monica Belluci walks through a subway tunnel late at night and is violently raped in an uninterrupted 9 or 10 minute long unwavering single shot that I don't plan on ever watching again.  So watching Isabel walk through this tunnel had an incredibly ominous feeling for me and I'm pretty certain this was all intentional, as I'll get to at the end of this recap.

Subway Tunnel - "Exposed"

Subway tunnel - "Irreversible"

Isabel waits for the train but as she's waiting she breaks her heel and accidentally drops her engagement ring on the ground because it's too loose for her finger.  All of a sudden, a very odd looking albino man enters the station and passes Isabel and then literally floats above the tracks.  Isabel can't believe what she's seeing and when the next train comes, the albino man gets on and gives her a look but she decides to wait until the next train.

Yeah, I'll just wait for the next one

All of a sudden it's the next day and the subway station is now a crime scene and outside the station Keanu Reeves shows up as detective WHATEVER HIS NAME IS and finds out that his partner has been stabbed in the back and murdered in the train station.

From here, the movie really diverges into two seemingly very loosely connected stories and a lot of this really has to do with the absolute butcher job that happened in the editing room, eventually leading to the director disowning the movie entirely.  As a viewer, I expected that at some point Keanu's story would intersect with Isabel's story and it does, but it takes a real long and winding road to finally get there.

Rather than bore you with going with this movie linearly and also because that's impossible, I'll do my best to shorten this all and summarize what actually happens from here on as the two stories finally converge towards the very end of the movie.

On the Keanu side of things - he spends the majority of the movie trying to investigate the murder of his partner in a relatively paint-by-numbers police drama.  This involves an entire subplot where he follows around and interrogates several of Manuel's friends including one who may or not have been played by Rajon Rondo, because right after the murder, the cops find Joey's digital camera which has the photos on it that we saw were being taken in the opening scene.  

Still unclear if this was Rajon Rondo or not

We also learn that Keanu's dead partner, Joey, was a real crooked fuckhead cop who robbed drug dealers and occasionally sodomized them with broomsticks, including Manuel.  The main suspect in the murder of Joey is some criminal, Jonathan Jones street name "Black," who also starts following around Manuel and all of his buddies, eventually murdering (both on screen and off) most of them for reasons I never came to understand.  We really never learn Black's motivations here and it's just really, really bad storytelling.  We learn that Black had his own run-ins with Joey prior to the murder, which is why Keanu suspects him in the first place but why Black starts murdering all of Manuel's buddies is never really explained nor does it really matter.

Meanwhile, we also learn that Keanu's wife is dead and he's so fucked in the head that he can't even properly take care of his son, sending him to live with his sister in Florida.  Poor kid, nobody should have to grow up in Florida.  Once again, none of this is really explored and that's just fine because none of this matters either.  Like I said, the final cut version of this movie is the epitome of shitty storytelling.

Keanu gets told by his lieutenant to drop the case because Joey was a scumbag and probably got what was coming to him.  Besides, his widow Janine, played by an almost unrecognizable Mira Sorvino, is getting Joey's full pension and if Keanu digs around too much he could threaten that.  Keanu has a few scenes with Janine and she eventually seduces him and they bone down because sure, if you're going to put Mira Sorvino in your movie you might as well give her something to do.  I also should note that she's actually pretty good in this and one of the more believable acting performances, but who could really care since most of the rest of this movie was garbage.  

Didn't even realize this was Mira Sorvino until the credits rolled

Keanu starts realizing that all of the people in the photos he has are one by one ending up dead (at the hand of Black, which Keanu does not know) and the only one who seems to still be alive and kicking is Isabel but he doesn't know what her connection is to any of this.  Eventually, Keanu arrests Jonathan Jones for the murder (despite any evidence), but he is released and the case is dropped against him because we learn that Joey has been accused of rape by some woman, although I have no idea why that would lead to the case being dropped nor does it matter in the context of the movie.  As I've said already, this movie is a convoluted dumpster fire.  As this part of the movie comes to a conclusion, Black attacks Manuel, shooting him off-camera but as he's trying to finish the job, Manuel pulls a knife and kills Black in self-defense. 

That's sort of where Keanu's story ends until the last 10ish minutes of the movie.  But all of this is actually interspersed with what was really intended to be the actual story, which is mainly about Isabel.

After she sees the floating man she returns to her normal life which we see glimpses of here and there.  She lives with her fiance's family in New York and they are all very religious.  Isabel leads a number of prayer groups at the home and we find out that her fiance, Jose, is serving in the military in Iraq.  They all speak on occasion through video chat and await his safe return home.

Meanwhile, Isabel is a teacher at a pre-school where she begins to become close to one of the kids there named Elisa, who is clearly having some problems at home.  While all of this is going on, Isabel keeps having visions of what she comes to believe are angels who may or may not be the same thing as the floating man she saw in the subway at the start of the movie.  The angel consistently reappears throughout the movie and we're never really sure if this is real or a figment of Isabel's imagination.  

The single scariest movie angel I've ever seen

Then, tragedy strikes and Jose is killed in Iraq and naturally, the entire family, including Isabel is devastated but she quickly returns to work shortly after the funeral.  One day after school, Elisa's mother doesn't come to pick her up so Isabel decides to take Elisa home herself.  When she gets to her apartment, a creepy-ish man answers the door, who we assume is the father and Isabel has a near panic attack on her way out of the building for reasons that we don't know.  She gets home and vomits and the next scene cuts to her at the doctor finding out she's pregnant.  

This is of course impossible because she's been faithful to Jose, who has been deployed now for over a year.  Isabel, not really thinking very clearly, tells the entire family over dinner that there's been a miracle and that she is pregnant.  The family treats this with a mixture of skepticism and derision because they rightfully assume that Isabel has cheated on her now-dead fiance and they kick her out of the house, forcing her to go back and live with her parents in a bit of a shoddy apartment elsewhere in New York.

These are not the faces of approval

Isabel, who apparently has a second job as a waitress, continues to see her vision angel who is actually more scary than protective, and after leaving work one day she sees Elisa dangerously walking in the middle of the street.  Isabel rushes over to pull her out of traffic and notices that she's all bruised up but won't say what happened to her.  Elisa refuses to be taken home again so Isabel agrees to take her back to her own apartment for the evening.  

Quickly cutting back to Keanu, he's back at the police station looking at some evidence that was gathered at the subway from the night of Joey's murder - he's got both Isabel's heel as well as her ring which is actually inscribed with her name.

Back at the apartment, Elisa runs out of a bedroom crying for help because there's a bad man in the house and then we cut to the flashback that actually ties all of this together - 

It's the night of the subway and Manuel walks Isabel to the subway station but hands her a knife for protection.  Isabel walks towards the train but is grabbed and attacked by Keanu's partner Joey, who violently rapes her (still not nearly as an on-screen attack from the aforementioned "Irreversible") near the subway and if you've been following along so far, this is why she's now pregnant.  Isabel, knife in hand, charges after Joey after the attack, stabbing him in the back and rolling him onto the train tracks right as a train comes and runs him over.  

Back in the present, Isabel has a knife once again and stabs the "bad man" in her apartment who turns out to be her father and the angel lady shows up again to witness the entire thing.  Finally, Keanu shows up (I'm still unclear how he tracked her down because everyone he had spoken to up until the point had refused to give him any information) and he sees a family photo in the home, which depicts both the young girl that Isabel had taken in as well as the man who was at the apartment earlier during the panic attack scene.

Let's wrap things up

See, it turns out that there really IS NO Elisa and everything has been one big manifestation in Isabel's mind - she was abused as a child by her father and had blacked out the traumatic effect of being raped in the subway and we've been being "Sixth Sensed"/"Fight Clubbed" this entire movie and basically everything Keanu had been investigating has been one big red herring.  Literally, there was basically no point to about half of the movie, although my intuition about the "Irreversible" connection turned out to be accurate, so hooray for me.  And then the movie ends.

"Exposed" is significantly worse than it sounds, mainly due to the atrociously scrapped together editing job to make this movie appear to be at least a 50/50 split between the two stories of Keanu and Isabel that are tied together by the loosest of threads.  They turned what was supposed Isabel's story of dealing with trauma into a really shitty police drama at the forefront and the story of Isabel as the background and it's just a complete fucking disaster.  

Have you seen this boy?

Because I guess I hate myself, I then decided to watch the director's cut which he made available for free to download because I was so curious to see the original intentions of the movie.  Sure, I'd already spent 100 minutes watching a very shitty movie, so what's another two hours in the long run for the sake of The Keanu Reeves Project?  I'm dedicated to this shit for my threes of readers, dammit!

So, the director's cut is certainly noticeably different than the trash that was put out, and while it's certainly a better movie it's still not great.  There are still many aspects of it that make it feel like a made for TV movie (minus of course all the rape) like all the weird transitions between scenes, but it's so obviously much more about Isabel's story with Keanu as a noticeably less important character rather than the other way around.  The story itself is far more coherent and there's about 25ish more minutes, almost all of it with the focus on Isabel with much of that on her relationship with the child who we find out later doesn't actually exist.

The director's version has a lot more of an air of mystery to it and feels a lot more put together than the released version. There's definitely more exposition in the director's cut including the rape sequence (still towards the very end of the movie) that gives us more of an understanding on how and why Isabel blocked the entire event out and formed these visions of the angels and the child that doesn't actually exist.  It turns out that after Joey had sodomized Manuel, he spent a lot of time following his crew around and wanted to further fuck with Manuel by raping Isabel in the subway.  As the movie progresses, it becomes clearer and clearer that something was certainly fucked with Isabel's family and that this has a lot to do with her relationship with the little girl so when the twist ending happens it's not completely weird and out of left field.

"Exposed" is half Keanu Reeves story, useless as it is and half Isabel's story and "Daughter of God" is more like 75% Isabel's story and 25% Keanu.  But at the end of the day I probably wouldn't recommend either of these movies, but if you had to choose one then the director's version is significantly superior and infinitely more coherent.  

Okay so now that that's all out of the way, some additional side thoughts on "Exposed"/"Daughter of God": 

*This movie features yet another dead dog, the third in this project by my count with one in "John Wick," and another that was killed after being hit by a car in "Pippa Lee."  Manuel has a really adorable pit bull that gets hit by a van and killed in this movie for reasons I don't understand other than as a fakeout because the next scene is the family mourning only to understand that it's over the death of Jose in Iraq and not the dog.  Really, what's the point in killing this dog?

Seriously Keanu, are you just now picking projects based on number of dogs killed?

*This movie is maybe 75% in Spanish, which is yet another reason it was probably a difficult release for US audiences since we don't know how to or don't want to read.  Even Keanu speaks a little bit of Spanish and wouldn't you know, he doesn't even sound that terrible.

*The very end of "Daughter of God" is certainly different - the angel returns Isabel's ring to her after she discovers her father dead on the street.  But that's actually just another vision because the dead person who she sees is not her father at all but one of Manuel's friends, murdered by Black.  She still returns home and murders her father just like in the "Exposed" and then we still learn the truth about the little imaginary girl Elisa.  It's still....weird and I honestly don't know which ending is better/or worse than the other.  Both of these movies have serious problems.  

*As dreadful as this movie is, Ana de Armas is actually quite excellent in it.  Still odd that she's starred in both of the last two movies of this project but I might just be a fan!

Don't mind me, just having a bit of a Fight Club moment over here.

*Joey, the dead cop and awful rapist piece of shit is the same actor who appeared in the earlier entry "Henry's Crime," who I had previously only known from the movie "Whiteboyz."  It's weird watching movies this way because random people seem to show up out of nowhere from previous entries.  

Better movie?

Box office information: $0 Domestic (Never properly released?)/$250,000 International.  Yeah, probably best this wasn't put out for public consumption.

Rotten Tomatoes: 8% Critic/16% Audience.  Yep.  

IMDB: 4.3

My Movie Rating: I have to give "Exposed" a 3, it's mostly a disaster in large part due to really unfortunate editing that completely ruined the director's vision.  That said, the original movie "Daughter of God" is still...not great.  Better, but I still couldn't recommend it to anyone and so that movie gets a 4.5.

Keanu Rating: God I don't even know, he's not really bad in it and has a scene or two where he's pretty great.  I'm just going to give him a 5 for this thing.

Up Next: Technically, Keanu's next IMDB credit is for the movie "Keanu," which I have seen and enjoyed.  But having seen it, I know that Keanu Reeves is only in this for about three seconds as the voice of the cat, so I will not be rewatching for this project.  So we're onto the 2016 movie, 'The Whole Truth," which I have never heard of.  I think I can guess where this is going...

The Keanu Reeves Project - Knock Knock

KNOCK KNOCK (2015) - Evan

Oh to go from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows....the Keanu Reeves project really is a roller coaster of emotions.  It's hard to even believe that the last post in this project was one of my favorite movies in "John Wick" only to have to immediately go to a rewatch of a movie that I hated the first time I saw it and certainly didn't like any better this second time around.

You'd think I would have learned my lesson in the first place and that this would be a first-time viewing for me of "Knock Knock."  For reasons I can't even explain I'd sat through not one, not two, but three Eli Roth movies prior to watching "Knock Knock" that first go-around. Those movies, in order of their dreadfulness were "Hostel Part 2" (which I inexplicably saw in the theater),"Cabin Fever," and "Hostel."  

And what do these movies all have in common?  

They're fucking terrible.

So it's even a surprise to me that one day back in 2016 while trying to determine what movie to put on to watch while hanging out alone in my home I settled on "Knock Knock."  I'm sure the presence of Keanu Reeves greatly impacted that decision but even so, I knew ahead of time it was an Eli Roth movie yet I guess I convinced myself that it couldn't be that bad.  Not with Keanu Reeves as the star, right?

Wow, was I wrong.

First, let me just start off by recognizing that Eli Roth is a bit of a polarizing figure in the movie industry.  He's got a bit of a cult following and some people morons really like his movies.  Other people Non-morons like me have for some reason sat through several of his movies and made the determination that he's a talentless hack.  

A few years ago I almost convinced myself to check out "The Green Inferno" before talking myself off the ledge.  What possible outcome could have come from that?  All Eli Roth knows is gore, and in and of itself there's nothing wrong with gore so long as it is part of you know, an actual engaging story. 

Anyway, as part of this project I am watching all Keanu Reeves movies, even the ones I've already seen before - in some cases that means many times over, which meant having to once again sit through 90 minutes of "Knock Knock."

Spoilers ahead but please believe me when I tell you to never watch this movie.

This is going to be a pretty short recap because this movie is worthless and barely anything happens.

The movie opens with Keanu Reeves as Evan in bed with his wife Karen.  Their kids come in and we learn it's father's day and the kids apparently made him a cake.  I do want to note that the children in this movie are dreadful performers and in the very limited time they were on screen I was really hoping Eli Roth would do something worthwhile for once and have them violently murdered.  But no such luck here.

These two fuckos are very much in the running for worst performers of any Keanu movie

For some reason, the whole family save for Keanu are going away for the weekend, leaving him the run of the house.  He must be happy as a pig in shit because his whole family is absolutely garbage.  Keanu channels his inner "Lake House" for this movie as he's playing an architect again and with his family gone for a few nights he's happy because he can smoke a little weed and get some work done.  His wife is an artist and has some sculptures she's working on around the house and for SOME REASON there are pictures of the entire family EVERYWHERE.  Seriously, it hurt my eyes.  You can even see a few of them in the background from the screenshot above.  Who the fuck keeps this many pictures of their kids around the house?  

Also as a side note - how many goddamn architects are there in America?  This has got to be one of the most overused occupations in movies right next to ad executive (also a role Keanu has played in "Sweet November").  I won't run through the list, but trust me when I say it's extensive.

Anyway, it's raining out and there's a knock at the door, Keanu answers and is greeted by two dripping wet girls, "Genesis" and "Bell" played by Lorenza Izzo (who is real life married to Eli Roth, so she must have a pretty incredible tolerance for idiocy) and Ana de Armas (who I only know from this movie as well as the infinitely better "Knives Out" where she is wonderful).  They tell Keanu that they got lost on the way to a party and he invites them in while they wait for an Uber that Keanu has graciously called for them because as mentioned, they have no phone.

Hello, ladies

I should note, I knew that sitting through this movie for a second time was going to be an absolute chore so I had several drinks before, during and after watching this.  Before drinks to prep myself, during drinks to keep myself occupied with something other than solely focusing on the movie, and after drinks to erase this from my brain.  As such, my notes became, let's just say, less and less coherent throughout the course of the movie (eventually devolving into various forms of me writing "please let this end") so maybe some of my questions actually were explained at one point.  Questions like, "why did Keanu's family go away for a few days in the first place," "why don't either one of these women have phones?" and "are these the worst two child actors in movie history?"

So the three of them sit around Keanu's living room, he brings them towels and talks about how he used to be a DJ but the two women quickly turn the conversation to sex and start attempting to seduce Keanu, but he's really not having any of it.  He continues to try to change the subject but they can't stop talking about how hot Keanu is and how they love to have threesomes.  Eventually, the Uber shows up but when Keanu tries to find the women to get them out of the house, they're naked in his bathroom and coerce him into a threesome.

Talk to the hand

You'd think this might sound interesting but I assure you it is not.

The next morning (because sure, they sleep over), the two of them are absolutely manic and basically destroy Keanu's kitchen and refuse to leave.  He starts getting more and more angry with them and eventually he tosses them out of the house.  But that night, he hears a loud noise and discovers that the two of them are back and they've broken into the house.  They knock Keanu out and tie him to the bed, and film themselves raping him and it's all really terrible.  Not in the sense that Keanu is being raped, although yes that's terrible, but in the sense that this movie is absolute trash.  Then they tie him to a chair and makes him play various games and it's all just just an exercise in how to not make a movie.

I too felt like a hostage in my own home at this point

At one point they also tell Keanu that they're actually underage (I don't see how this could even be possible) and they tell him that this is all retribution for him taking advantage of minors.  There's a lot of conversation about Keanu being a pedophile and if you've been watching this as a viewer and made it this far into the movie, you deserve some kind of award.  Genesis takes off and makes herself look like the joker and god I hate this movie.

Do you want to see a magic trick?

At some point, Louis, a friend of Keanu's and one of the only other characters in this movie, shows up and sees what's going on.  In an awfully written and delivered line, Keanu shouts at his friend, "Be careful Louis, they're crazy!"  And in an awfully written and delivered line Louis replies "I'm from Oakland, I know two ghetto ass hoes when I see them!"  A real line from this movie.

Kill me.

Louis tries to get away from the women, who have completely trashed the house by this point including all of Keanu's wife's artwork, and in the process trips and falls, breaking his own neck and dying in the process.

The next morning they drag Keanu out to his backyard where they've dug a grave and they roll him into it and start to bury him alive leaving just his head exposed with the rest of him under a pile of dirt.  Keanu begs for his life and the women tell Evan that he was just a game and that they thought he'd be the first guy to say no to them.  Before leaving, they post the video of him being raped to his Facebook page (it's impossible to tell from the video that this is not a consensual act), steal his dog, and leave the house.

Don't worry Keanu, we're almost to the finish line

I'm amazed I haven't ripped my own eyeballs out by this point.  Keanu screams as he can't reach the phone to delete the video and as the movie ends we see his family return home where his son says, " Daddy had a party!"

The end.

As for my scattered thoughts:

*I honestly don't know how anyone funds Eli Roth, especially after this abomination.  At least his earlier "work" if you can call it that had a modicum of substance (even that is generous).  This is just a blob of nothing.  I feel like Eli Roth was trying to do his own take on "Funny Games," yet another movie infinitely better than "Knock Knock" yet he lacks any understanding on what makes that a good movie.  Things like tension, suspense, character development, etc.  Genesis and Bell are just two manic psychopaths that contribute zero to this movie.  Do you like movies about people terrorizing innocents for no reason?  Go watch "Funny Games."  

*Despite the above note, this movie was actually inspired by a 1977 grind house movie called "Death Game," and no, I will not be watching that. 

*Um, how awkward and uncomfortable to film a sex scene with the director's real life wife?  No thanks.  Keanu actually discussed this on an episode of Kimmel, where he's clearly unaware of how impossible it was to promote this movie.  I really do feel like this whole thing was an excuse to get Ana de Armas to take her clothes off on camera.  The clip of Keanu describing the sex scene is embedded here:

*If I didn't know any better I'd have assumed this was written and directed by some incel from the depths of the internet because this entire movie appears to come from that sort of mindset.  Women are only good for sex and they're all crazy!

*I lost track of how many times the words "knock knock" were actually spoken aloud during this but I know it's several.  That's never a good sign.

*This movie features one of the worst monologues of this project so far that it rivals the $10,000 hooker speech from "Johnny Mnemonic."  The "Free Pizza" monologue is just so poorly written and delivered by Keanu and embedded here for your viewing pleasure.  But I'll warn you in advance, you're not getting these two minutes of your life back.

I have nothing left to say, this movie is fucking rotten.

Box Office Information: I am guessing this went straight to streaming because this movie made $36,000 domestically and $6 million international.  That sounds about right.

Rotten Tomatoes: 37% Critic/21% Audience.  These scores, once again are far, far too high.

IMDB: 4.9

My Movie Rating: 2/10.  Just an abysmal waste of time and I don't even want to spend more of my life writing words about this.

Keanu Rating: 3/10.  Did you watch the monologue above?  I've watched nearly 50 Keanu movies so far and for the life of me I do not understand how he chooses his projects.  Like....why Keanu?  Why did you agree to this?  WHY?

Up Next: The 2016 movie, "Exposed."  Never heard of it and by now I've come to realize that's not a good sign....

The Keanu Reeves Project - John Wick

 JOHN WICK (2014) - John Wick

I've said many stupid things in my life.

During my freshman year of college, a new fast-casual burrito place opened up just off campus.  Not only was I told that their burritos were the size of my head, but they were also doing a promotion during their opening week and giving out coupons for free burritos, of which one of my friends had "procured" a few hundred through....less than innocent ways.  While I was hanging around his dorm room early into my first year of college he offered a handful of free burrito coupons to me.  

What college student turns down a bunch of coupons for a free gigantic burrito?

Me.  Because, as I said out loud at the time as I shook my head and refused the offer, "I don't like burritos."

Apparently 18 year old me thought this was disgusting

That fast-casual burrito place was called Chipotle, and in the subsequent 20 years following that asinine statement of mine, I've probably spent upwards of $15,000 there, including my frequenting of the location just off of campus three or four times a week for the entirety of my college experience.  

I don't know why I was sure that I didn't like burritos at the start of the year, enough to turn down a free one, but I said it anyway.  I mean, all Mexican food is delicious, a burrito is Mexican food, thus burritos are delicious.  This is very basic logic that even most children understand.  

Along the same lines, back in early Spring of 2015 I was out doing a little day drinking with a few of my friends and we found ourselves back at my place trying to find a movie to watch.  My buddy Russell suggested we rent this Keanu Reeves movie called "John Wick" to which I said something along the lines of, "Really?  That movie looked pretty stupid."  I had seen the 30 second commercial a handful of times but all I could remember was Keanu saying, "Yeah, I'm thinking I'm back!" and thinking that it looked really cheesy and lame despite my Keanu fandom.  On the other hand, Russell was always a bit of a martial arts movie connoisseur and clearly knew something I didn't know.  

"That movie looked pretty stupid." 

See, I say a lot of dumb things.

Plenty of words have been written and many videos have already been created about "John Wick," and nothing I have to say at this point will be creative or unique and certainly will be the worst written thing you'll have ever read about the movie.  

So, spoilers ahead although unlike all recent posts (several of which were far too long), I won't be doing a full-blown recap of "John Wick," because if you've somehow found this blog post then I'm going to go ahead and assume you've seen "John Wick." And in the off-chance you haven't by now, what the fuck are you doing reading this?  My writing is terrible, my recaps are bad, stop being stupid and go watch the fucking movie!

Nothing will ever be able to recreate that first experience of seeing "John Wick."  

That first time I watched the movie, I couldn't even believe how good it was.  For me, the first "John Wick" completely upended American martial arts movies.  I'm not going sit here and act like I know everything there is to know about foreign (mainly Asian) martial arts movies - I will leave that to Quentin Tarantino, but I've seen my share (again, mainly in part due to Russell) and I can say that the first "John Wick" movie was nothing like I'd seen from a domestic movie before.  From the "Gun-Fu," to the head shot accuracy and a hero who actually, you know, has to reload his weapon, "John Wick" just felt like something really, really different from any action movie I'd seen to this point in my life.

And of course, it was really fucking awesome.

The premise of "John Wick" is pretty simple - retired assassin's wife dies tragically, he is posthumously gifted a puppy from her and is beaten and robbed by a group of Russian gangsters who also steal his car and murder his dog just days after her funeral.  John Wick spends the next 90ish minutes killing an untold number of Russian gangsters (actually, John Wick's kill count in this movie is approximately a modest 77 people) on his way to getting revenge on those who wronged him including but not limited to the dog killer and all his friends, the killer's Russian gangster father and tons and tons of nameless baddies who are all clearly no match for the world's greatest assassin.  

2 down, 75 to go

It's all pretty simple and if that's all you knew about the movie you might think it is just your run of the mill shoot 'em up type movie.  But you'd be wrong.  You'd be so wrong.

While the premise of this movie is pretty simple, the actual storytelling component of it is is done so much better than any other movie in this genre.

The first time I watched "John Wick," during the first 20 or so minutes before all the action begins, I remember wondering "what the fuck is this movie?"  I'd barely paid any attention to the trailers (aside from the "I'm thinking I'm back!" line) and so I didn't really have any idea what was to come.  The first 20ish minutes of the movie are very quiet and very slowly paced as the tension begins to build.  We know nearly nothing about John Wick other than his wife is dead and he really likes his car.  It isn't until the conversation between Viggo (played brilliantly by the late Michael Nyqvist) and his son Iosef (also played spectacularly by Alfie Allen) that we get an idea of just who John Wick is - "That nobody....is John Wick."  In a movie with almost 100 on-screen kills (including the ones committed by characters not named John Wick), the first bullet isn't even fired until almost 30 minutes have elapsed.  

Originally, I had incorrectly assumed that this had been based on a comic book or a graphic novel based on the use of what I called "action subtitles," and was surprised when I learned this was an original script initially intended for a man 15 or 20 years older than Keanu as the title character, which basically would have made this movie "Taken."

Babayaga 

Then there is the world building.  There's The Continental to the gold coins (whose actual value is still a bit of a mystery, explained a bit further in the third movie) and the world of underground assassins.  There are a host of ancillary characters, all of whom have a history with the titular hero like Jimmy the cop, Perkins the assassin, Aurelio the car guy, the hotel concierge and the Continental owner Winston.  Every one of these characters has a purpose and a history with our hero that doesn't need to be fully explained in order for them to be meaningful to the story. "John Wick" does a magnificent job in leading the viewer down this story of the world that John Wick inhabits without having to constantly hit us with exposition on why things are the way they are.  If anything, as the movie progresses into its sequels, this is one of my only complaints of the franchise.

Even the score to this movie is amazing, whether it's the music in the down moments of the movie or the fast electronic beats in scenes like the Red Circle shootout.  

Oh, and there's the actual action sequences themselves which are some of the best of any American made movie in this genre.  The very first fight sequence of "John Wick" might still be the best one in the entire franchise as it establishes exactly how dangerous John Wick is.  In the middle of the night a dozen men dressed in black ambush John Wick in his own home and John Wick shows us for the very first time why he is the Baba Yaga, the Boogie Man.  It's far more "simple" than anything that follows in this first movie as well as the sequels but it completely sets the tone and gives the viewer a clear understanding of what John Wick is all about.

Up until this point, we've only heard about how dangerous the man is.  After all this is a guy who can kill three people in a bar with a pencil, but we haven't actually seen him in action.  In fact, we've seen him at his lowest point, getting beaten up in the middle of the night by a group of Russian thugs armed only with baseball bats.  But the ambush scene features John Wick using an array of tactics to fight off his attackers - close range gunplay and a mixture of fighting styles that ends in a brutal knife death before the doorbell rings with a cop at the door.

Noise complaint?

Speaking of a cop at the door, this movie is funny.  Not like, big ol' belly laugh funny but there are at least a handful of genuine laugh out loud moments, like when John Wick goes to the church (actually a front for the Russian mob), and shoots a man on the ground after the fake priest says that Viggo will kill him if he lets John into the Vault.  A simple "Uh huh" is downright funny, as are other moments like the concierge retorting that their laundry "isn't that good" after John returns from killing 20ish people at the Red Circle.

As I said near the top, I'm not a good enough writer to express exactly how great this movie is and how much I love it so I'll just end this part of my post here and move into scattered thoughts:

*I've always assumed (perhaps incorrectly going by IMDB) that the casting department on John Wick had some sort of established relationship with HBO since "John Wick" features a handful of familiar HBO faces - Lance Riddick (concierge) and Clarke Peters (Harry) both from "The Wire," Alfie Allen (Iosef) from "Game of Thrones," Thomas Sadosky (Jimmy the Cop) from the wretched "The Newsroom," Ian McShane (Winston) from "Deadwood" and Dean Winters (Avi) from "Oz."  There's a very good chance I'm missing at least one or two people.  I just skimmed through the casting department for "John Wick" and I don't see any overlap with any of these shows at first glance, so perhaps the casting department just really likes HBO.

*Speaking of Dean Winters, how can you not love this guy especially in "John Wick"?  He's one of my two favorite recurring characters on "30 Rock" as Liz Lemon's idiot ex-boyfriend Dennis and now he's probably most famous for his work in Allstate commercials, but he's legitimately great in "John Wick" as well.  I particularly love the final fight sequence of the movie where Avi pleads Viggo for a gun so he can face off against John Wick.  This man, who to this point in the movie has shown no prowess towards fighting, thinks he has a shot to take on a man who has now murdered almost 80 of his associates.  Good luck, buddy.

MAYHEM

*I'd seen this movie more than ten times until I realized that Francis, the bouncer outside the Red Circle who is the only person John Wick spares in the movie, is played by former professional wrestler Kevin Nash.  As a huge pro wrestling fan in the 90's I am ashamed how this got by me for so long.  Given that John Wick spared him in this movie, I'd LOVE to see him come back in some fashion in a future movie.

When you're NWO you're NWO for life.  Unless John Wick kills you.

*Speaking of comedy, one of my favorite non-action parts of the movie has to be when Jimmy the Cop shows up after John Wick kills everyone in his home.  "Noise complaint?"  "Noise complaint."  So good.

*I don't like using this space as an area for trivia you can find elsewhere on the internet, but I do just want to point out here that Keanu Reeves trained for 8-10 hours a day for four months with former Navy SEALs in preparation for his role as John Wick.  This is part of why I love Keanu Reeves, the man is crazy dedicated when he takes on roles like this.

*Maybe this also falls under the "trivia" category but fuck it - this movie was made and produced by stunt people and all of their work definitely shows in how this movie was shot.  I couldn't even imagine what this would have looked like if filmed by other people and I think it's awesome that Chad Stahelski (Keanu's former stunt double in "The Matrix") was given this opportunity. 

Box Office Information: $43 Million Domestic ($47 Million inflation adjusted)/$33 Million international for $76 Million worldwide on a $30 Million budget and was just the 79th highest grossing movie of 2014.  See, it wasn't just me who wasn't that interested in seeing this in theaters.  I think "John Wick" found its way into cult status after being released on Blu-ray and VOD, otherwise I don't think this box office would have come close to justifying a bigger budget sequel.  I'll get to "Chapter 2" in a soon to be published post.  

Rotten Tomatoes: 87% Critics/81% Audience.  To be honest, I'm quite surprised that audience score isn't in the 90's.  That said, it's rare that you find a movie like this with scores this high.

IMDB: 7.4

Keanu Rating: 10/10.  Beyond his performance in this, I just give him all the credit in the world for the training he went through to star in this movie.  He's funny when he needs to be, but his grief after his wife's death at the start of the movie might honestly be some of the best work he's done on screen through his nearly 30 year career.

My Movie Rating: 10/10.  "John Wick" is one of my favorite movies of all time and I've found myself in many a conversation trying to rank the three (so far) movies in the franchise.  I used to believe the order was 2, 1, 3 but sometimes 3, 1, 2 and sometimes 2, 1, 3.  It's nearly impossible to determine which one is actually the best, but what the original has going for it (at least from the first experience watching it) is a real sense of the unknown and an amazing story.  By the time the sequels start coming in, budgets are much higher as are expectations.  For that, I'm going out on a limb and calling this the best movie of the three, although I reserve my right to change my mind later.

Up Next: It's the Eli Roth movie, "Knock Knock," which I've unfortunately already seen and even worse for me, have to watch again!

The Keanu Reeves Project - 47 Ronin

47 RONIN (2013) - Kai

I've apparently hit the long awaited "martial arts" Keanu period with "47 Ronin" being the 2nd out of 3 action movies in a row, sandwiched in between the pretty good movie "Man of Tai Chi" and the ridiculously awesome movie that will follow this one (hint: it rhymes with Ron Thick).

I didn't know much going into my viewing of "47 Ronin," this movie was totally new to me and all I could remember about it was that it was roundly panned by critics when it was released on Christmas in 2013.  I did a little bit of research after watching the movie and learned a few interesting things.  For instance, director Carl Rinsch was handed the reigns of this gigantic Universal movie with a $175 million budget despite having no previous experience outside of a handful of shorts and commercials.  Apparently, Rinsch was a young protege of filmmakers Ridley and Tony Scott, and so that must have had a lot to do with it.  What's interesting to me though, is this is still the only major movie directed by him even though it came out seven years ago.  Was this such a disaster that it killed his career entirely?

One other thing that I read is that "47 Ronin" was rife with problems, going through numerous rewrites and reshoots, partially due to the fact that the original version didn't feature enough Keanu Reeves and Universal basically said, "why are we funding this gigantic movie filled with Japanese people that American audiences don't know?" because cynically or not, they probably thought American movie audiences are full of morons who won't watch foreigners on film, even if they're speaking English.  The movie ended up blowing past its allotted budget and eventually ballooned to a reported $225 million.

I also did a little light reading about the real legend of the 47 Ronin, something that is apparently in the mythology of Japanese Culture.  I don't know how deep this goes like if children read about this in school the same way I read about Americana "legends" in elementary school.  In third or fourth grade I can recall having lessons on stories about Pecos Bill, Johnny Appleseed and Paul Bunyan.  Perhaps Japanese schoolchildren do the same with the 47 Ronin. 

With that said, there have already been about a half dozen movies (mostly Japanese) about the legend of the 47 Ronin and the Keanu Reeves starring "47 Ronin" was the first (and probably last given it's poor box office) to come out of Hollywood and this one apparently dramatically strays from the original legend.

But no matter, we've got a Hollywood movie to make!

Before getting into a full recap I have to say, I did not hate this movie and don't think it's critical ratings are entirely justified.  Yes, it's a white guy unnecessarily placed into Japanese mythology as a savior figure.  Yes, the movie sort of plods along at points.  Yes, there is definitely some silliness, like the entire pirate sequence I'll get to below.  No, some of the logic doesn't always make sense.  

But, the story is totally sound (even if the first half of it is basically season one of "Game of Thrones"), the acting is fine, the visual effects are mostly good (you'd hope so on this budget) and most of the action sequences are pretty fun.  

As always, full spoilers to follow as I write too long a recap for "47 Ronin": 

The movie opens with a long voice over that basically explains why a white guy is living in feudal Japan - a young white looking guy escapes from a forest with scars all over his head and is taken in by the ruler of this particular province, Lord Asano and his daughter Mika.  It's mentioned that they think he either is a demon or was raised by demons, because apparently the forest he ran out of is just rife with them.  

Fucking demons, am I right?

Cut to several years later and the kid is grown up and it's now adult Keanu playing Kai.  Despite the fact that he can never be an actual Samurai due to him not actually being Japanese, he is apparently Samurai-adjacent and he accompanies Asano's actual Samurai to a hunt where he helps kill a giant mystical beast thing.  Even though he is almost entirely responsible for slaying the creature, none of the Samurai show him any respect even though he completely saved a few of their lives.  He gets called a "half-breed" a bunch and is generally shown a complete lack of respect by everyone, which makes me question why he was even invited along in the first place.  Kai also notices that the hunting party is being followed by a mysterious white wolf, which we'll see more of shortly.

Cobra Kai - Beast Hunter

The hunting party goes home to Asano's palace and everyone is happy that this mythic creature is dead and we learn that Kai is also in love with Asano's daughter Mika.  Mika is not given a whole lot to do in this movie other than look hot and be in a lot of distress.

It's important that the hunting party was successful because the Shogun is coming to town for a visit and they can't have demon beasts ruin his vacation.  This whole thing felt very early season one "Game of Thrones-y" but no matter.  The Shogun basically rules all of feudal Japan, so he's essentially the Robert Baratheon of "47 Ronin."  So the Shogun shows up with a giant party with him, including one of Asano's rivals, Jaime Lannister, I mean Lord Kira.

Lord Kira isn't exactly on the up and up and Kai notices that one of his traveling companions has the same strange eyes as the white wolf, except this time the white wolf isn't a wolf at all but a human woman.  Kai tries to alert Asano's top lieutenant, Oishi, that Kira's got a witch with him, but just like all the other Samurai, Oishi basically tells Kai to go fuck himself.  Kai is truly the Rodney Dangerfield of feudal Japan.

The next day there's a big festival which includes a fighting tournament, because as I mentioned above, the first 30 minutes of this movie is "Game of Thrones."  Hell, even Kira's champion fighter might as well have been called The Mountain.

Where's Oberyn Martell when you need him?

Japanese Mountain comes out to fight but Asano's fighter is nowhere to be seen.  Kai goes looking for him and discovers that he's under some sort of trance, most likely cast on him by Kira's witch.  Kai doesn't want his lord to be disgraced by not putting out a combatant, so he puts on some fighting gear and a helmet that covers his face and heads out to fight Japanese Mountain.

Kai starts to fight but gets his helmet knocked off and the fight comes to an abrupt ending because the Shogun is like "who the fuck is this white guy?  He's not a Samurai!"  The Shogun doesn't suffer fools, so he orders Kai to be executed for his malfeasance (there's a notable lack of people explaining their justifiable actions in this movie but I suppose you don't talk back to the Shogun), but ends up sparing him when Mika runs over and pleads to stave off the execution.  

That night, Lord Kira and witch are up to some shady shit.  She conjures a spider and then transforms herself into a floating piece of fabric, enters Asano's bedroom and drops the spider on his face.  This basically causes him to go crazy and have a vision that his daughter is being attacked/raped by Kira and in his madness, Asano attacks Lord Kira who is actually not up to anything other than sleeping.

I'm still not sure of how smart this plan was, had Asano's attack not been stopped by random guards, Kira himself could have been killed from his own plan!  But, no matter.

The Shogun, who has already seen far too much bullshit for one day, is pissed off that Asano would dare attack a guest in his own home.  The Shogun is completely unaware of the Kira and the witch's antics and general tomfoolery so he tells Asano that he's disgraced himself and his familty and the only thing he can do now is kill himself to save his honor.  

Again, instead of trying to explain more justifiable actions, in this case "I was under a spell," Lord Asano commits ritual suicide, leaving all of his Samurai as well as Kai to receive their punishment from the Shogun.

I sentence you to a lifetime of watching the Keanu Reeves movie "Generation Um..." on repeat

Luckily for them, the Shogun spares their lives.  However, they are forced into giving up their titles as Samurai and become Ronin, which are essentially lord-less Samurai with no homes, titles or anything else.  They are also forbidden for seeking vengeance against Lord Kira.  The news is worse for Kai, as he's tied up and dragged away by Kira's men.  And the news is even worse for Mika.  In order to squash any beefs with Asano's province, she's to marry Kira to join the two houses.  More "Game of Thrones" with this whole arc.

Lastly, the news is also bad for Oishi.  As Asano's right hand man, Kira doesn't trust him at all and has him tossed into a pit for a year.  

A year passes and Oishi is freed and immediately goes off to find Kai, who has apparently been sold into slavery.  This is where this movie goes off the rails just a little bit - Oishi discovers that Kai has apparently been sold to pirates and finds him aboard a pirate ship in a fight to the death against some sort of giant mutant monster person.  

I think you stumbled into the wrong movie, mutant dude

Kai dispatches of the mutant, but has also gone completely insane and attempts to kill Oishi when confronted by him.  Oishi gets Kai to calm down and gives him the bad news - all the Samurai or Ronin now and the love of his life, Mika, is set to wed Kira.  

Then for some reason, one of the pirates goes apeshit and starts shooting at them.  I should also note that the pirates in this movie run the gamut from your standard-fare "Pirates of the Carribean" looking dudes to...well, people that look like they fell out of a "Mad Max" film.

I promise you this is a screenshot from "47 Ronin" and not "Fury Road"

Oishi and Kai escape the ship and run back to find the rest of the Ronin, who are all hanging out in the forest together like Robin Hood's band of Merry Men. 

Oishi, now being free from his year long pit imprisonment, is pretty pissed.  Even though he was forbidden from seeking revenge on Kira, what the fuck else is he supposed to do, build a tree house?  So he makes a big Braveheart speech to the Ronin and tells them they're going to find and kill Kira.  Of course, even if they succeed, they'll still die because as I've mentioned already, the Shogun isn't going to put up with people breaking his rules.

The Ronin, ostensibly having been just living in the woods for a year, have no gear and no weapons, so they travel to a place that is literally called "The Village of the Swordmakers," which sounds like a pretty convenient place to find weapons, unless of course that's just an ironic name for the place.

When they get to the village, the entire place is near deserted and trashed, and the only people walking around just happen to be some of Kira's own Samurai.  The Ronin, led by Kai, kill all of Kira's men and steal their weapons, but it's not enough.  Kai knows another place to find the best swords so fine that even Hattori Hanso would be jealous.

Kai explains to Oishi that they have to travel to some magical forest to procure the weapons, but Oishi thinks that the magical forest is just a myth and doesn't think Kai knows what he's talking about.  But Kai explains that he knows about the forest because that's where he was raised after being abandoned by his low-born mother.  

What you might expect the magic forest to look like

All the Ronin and Kai head to the magic forest, which is full of ghosts and mist and other shit you'd expect to find in a creepy magic forest.  They eventually find their way into a cave or something and Kai warns Oishi that no matter what, not to draw any weapons while they're in this place.  Kai ventures off on his own where he's confronted by some sort of demon or alien thing, and he's not super happy that Kai fled the forest so many years ago.  

Screenshot from "47 Ronin" and not "Star Wars"

Back in the room where Oishi is waiting around, the other Ronin enter and a huge battle happens with a bunch of the alien demons, but Oishi stands strong and doesn't draw his sword.  Meanwhile, Keanu uses the powers taught to him by the alien demons and passes his own test by using magic powers to grab a sword before his own opponent can.

Ronin vs Alien Demon Samurai creatures

All the Ronin survive this challenge and are rewarded with brand-spanking new swords.  After a failed ambush of Kira and his men, the Ronin decide to attack him at his own palace during pre-wedding celebrations under the guise of entertainers.  There's a big battle between the Ronin and Kira's men, followed by a fight between Kai and Kira's witch (in dragon demon form) followed by a fight between Oishi and Kira himself. 

 

Kai wins, Oishi wins, Mika is saved and all the Ronin have avenged Asano.  They return to their former home but there's still a bit of bad news.  The Shogun shows up and he's not exactly thrilled that his order was ignored.  Oishi kneels before him and asks that his men die with dignity.  The Shogun says something about how everyone should be executed, but they followed the old ways of the Bushido and honored Asano to avenge the treachery that killed him.  He then says that he no longer sees Ronin, he sees Samurai.

Unfortunately, the Shogun still can't let this shit stand so he allows all of the Samurai, including Kai, to commit honorable suicide.  He gives them a day or so to get their affairs in order, which is basically just an opportunity for Kai and Mika to share a scene where he tells her he'll follow her through a thousand lifetimes to find her again, and then all of the Samurai gather in the temple square and kill themselves, except for Oishi's son who the Shogun spares in order to continue the bloodline.

100 lifetimes for her?  Sure, okay.  But 1,000?

The end.

All in all, I kind of liked this movie, or at least I liked it more than many, many other movies I've watched for this project so far.  Sure, it has all of the problems I listed at the start and it's pretty predictable, but I really liked the ending, in that all of the Ronin/Samurai still have to kill themselves, especially because I could totally see a big budget Hollywood ending going in a completely different direction, even if that meant taking a big dump on the mythology of the 47 Ronin.

And also, this movie just looks good.  Much like "Man of Tai Chi," many of the shots in this movie are absolutely beautiful and there's gotta be something to be said of that, even if the movie itself isn't spectactular.

Just a few scattered thoughts on this one:

*The witch is given a lot of fun shit to do although there are seemingly no rules to what she's capable of.  Of all the magic she performs  in this movie, I think my favorite is when she uses her hair as chopsticks.  I wish I could do that.

*Okay, I mentioned it already but it needs to be stated again just how stupid and out of place the entire pirate sequence was.  Why couldn't Kai have been sold off as a farmhand to work the fields or something?  Fucking pirates?  Ugh.  I seriously hated this part of this movie.

Box Office Information: $38 Million Domestic ($43 Million inflation adjusted)/$113 Million international for a worldwide of $151 Million.  It really did mostly bomb for the domestic audience and was only in theaters for about three weeks.  That international number really saved this thing from being a total bomb, although the reported cost of making this thing rose to $225 million even though the stated cost was $175 million, still a lot of money.

Rotten Tomatoes: 16% Critics/48% audience.  Like I said, I feel this critic's rating is really unfair and that audience score looks more in line with what I'd expect.

IMDB: 6.3

Keanu Rating: 7/10.  He's actually in this movie far less than I had expected, and this is after it was reshot and re-edited to death to get him in it more, I can only imagine what it was like before that.  This really should and could have been Oishi's story, which is why I'm pretty certain the Kai character doesn't even exist in the original mythology of the 47 Ronin.  All that said, Keanu is fine in it, and is still showcasing his action skills.

My Movie Rating: 6/10.  I kinda liked this movie and I'm not ashamed to admit it!

Up Next: A little movie called "John Wick."  I've never heard of it.