This documentary proves its title bona fides in an early scene where Keanu Reeves drops trow to show off all the abrasions, bruises, and cuts on his legs he’s received during filming. Wick IS Pain and these lunatics are doing it for their own amusement… and ours.

Wick is Pain is a documentary about the John Wick films, made primarily by a documentarian with official access to the set. So we get a lot of interviews with Keanu and director Chad Stahelski. It’s about as warts and all as you can get for an official doc… which is to say a little bit warty.

The film isn’t a beat-by-beat(ing) retrospective on every single fight scene in all four films. From the production angle, it focuses more on the first film which was the hardest to make and then hops and skips through themes, casting, stunt work, etc. across all the movies.

Plus watching Good Guy Keanu in interviews and also Lunatic Keanu doing a lot of his own stunts (and cussing up a storm when he messes up). My favorite bit is when he muses over how slow he is compared to the stuntmen he’s working with. That’s some good guy humility right there.

I loved all the on-set video of the actors and stuntmen doing their own fights, including some sequences I’d have sworn were CGI assisted. Like a stunt of a guy falling off a roof, onto a fire escape, and then an awning. The stunt was real but the backgrounds and final street splat were CGI assisted. My eyes popped and I became annoyed at how the Academy has dragged its fee over the Best Stunts category.

This is a pretty cool doc. Not the best “making of” doc I’ve seen but a very solid, very blunt and honest one. It gives me new (and continued) respect for Keanu bending and breaking his body in unhealthy ways. He muses near the end how he’s spent his 50s doing this gig… while I’m having trouble getting out of my recliner without my knees creaking. Cheers to Keanu… and also be careful, dude. One of these days you won’t so easily fall out of your suit of armor.

Score: 86