Martial Arts

“John Wick: Chapter 2” Honors the Original and Extends Its Aesthetic to New Heights

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The sequel to the wildly surprising gun-fu action flick John Wick picks up right where the original left off, both in terms of plot and aesthetic.  The signature stylistic elements of the original are all here:  extensive worldbuilding, lengthy camera shots, and heavily-choreographed fight scenes more reliant on stunt work than on CGI.  The sequel … Read more

“The Raid” is Martial Arts Action at its Very Finest

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The best action movies succeed by crafting sequences with jaw-dropping visuals and physical stunts, hopefully with characters that we care about and in a way that advances the story. More and more often, action movies in this century lean hard on the crutch of CGI to dazzle us, and usually they are happy to dispense … Read more