REVIEW: ‘Wick Is Pain’ Captures The Passion And Beauty In Action

We don’t give action enough credit. Often kept in its lane by genre expectation, action directors and stunt performers deserve to be in every conversation. The second unit directors, fight choreographers, and even the actors who treat fight sequences as important as an emotional monologue, deserve the spotlight. Wick is Pain isn’t just a look into one definitive action franchise around its 10-year anniversary. It’s a love letter to all the people we never see and are not supposed to.

Directed by Jeffrey Doe and executive produced by Chad Stahelski, Keanu Reeves, and Tina Carter, Wick is Pain looks at the 10-year journey of the John Wick franchise. It does so by focusing on the incredible story of what it took to make the film. In never-before-seen footage captured over a decade on and off set, the film chronicles John Wick’s journey from independent film into a global phenomenon that redefined the action genre and launched three megahit sequels.

Wick is Pain spends its entire first act mapping out how John Wick came to be and ultimately why its directors, Stahelski and David Leitch, were so well-equipped to tackle the project. Not only that, but it shines a light on Stahelski’s history as a stuntman, his long friendship with Keanu Reeves, how Derek Kolstad took their ideas and gave them life in the script, and, oh, and how they were broke.

Wick is Pain captures the hardship and joy of bringing John Wick to life.

Behind-the-scenes stories are always fascinating, but when you step back and look at the John Wick franchise, which has four movies, a spin-off television series, and now the Ballerina, a spin-off film releasing in June, it almost didn’t happen. But it wasn’t because the creatives weren’t dedicated to bringing their story to life. On the contrary, their passion is why it succeeded even when funding couldn’t be secured, checks had to be skipped, creative differences bubbled into arguments, and when everyone passed on distribution.

Watching Wick is Pain is like reading someone’s diary. Every person interviewed for the documentary doesn’t shy away from showing the audience their sharp edges, their faults. Often, even when we see stories of resiliency in films, it’s always about the triumph. Wick is Pain is built on the failures and the passion that kept the team getting back up every single time.

To do that, the documentary spends ample time letting the audience see the humanity in its subjects. Their joy, love, vulnerabilities, and history in film and action. This is nowhere more true than when it tackles Stahelski’s history in the action genre. One of the key elements from his past is that he was once Brandon Lee’s stunt double on The Crow (1994). 

The tragedy of that set instilled a level of caution when dealing with firearms, resulting in the best gunfight choreography in cinema. When the scene calls for a real gun, an airsoft won’t cut it. And when you’re using hand-to-hand grappling-style combat with close-quarters gunshots, you can’t use blanks. The need to find a path forward directly impacted the team’s choreography. If a film ever captured that old adage of restriction building innovation, that’s John Wick.

But Stahelski’s perfectionism and creative vision also impacted his relationships at home and with his co-director, David Leitch. The documentary doesn’t sand any of that down. Instead, we see others talk about Stahelski’s passion and dedication, and ultimately that it created John Wick, but took its toll on his relationships. But this isn’t unique to Chad Stahelski, and Wick is Pain uses that add a more emotional pain to the pile of blown-out knees and almost paralyzing mistakes.

John Wick was made under restrictive circumstances, but that pushed it further.

Still, Wick is Pain isn’t only about the production elements and histories. It’s also about how action cinema is just as emotional and robust as others; it just happens through violence instead of monologues. The documentary’s name comes from a moment during filming when Keanu Reeves hurt himself, to which Chad Stahelski responded, “Wick is pain.” That stuck across the films, and ultimately, as the documentary explores the creation, shooting, and post-production processes, it makes sense.

Nothing was easy for the John Wick cast and crew, but what drove them was their dedication to the craft. Stahelski and Lietch, who were directing for the first time, wanted to ensure that no one saw them as only “action guys.” Instead, they wanted to show audiences that they could do more, so much so that the film’s original cut was longer and way more focused on watching John mope around his house.

However, Stahelski’s vision of wide shots developed a visual language for the film, and the dedication to adding new characters only to establish the world of John Wick even further. As an original story, they could build what they wanted. The team utilized scrapped fight choreography from Safe, they broke the rule of never killing a dog, and they kept pushing forward even when the financing was absent. Every step was a gamble, and now, the franchise has done what The Matrix did: it defined a generation of action in the West.

The surprising thing to learn while watching Wick is Pain is that all of the wide-shot one-shot action sequences weren’t always a stylistic choice. Instead, there were ways to get around the budget and time constraints. If you only have a specific number of days to make a movie, clearing one take will hit the deadline. One of the other elements of the documentary that stood out was how many of the actors and crew were described as perfectionists.

Chad Stahelski’s directorial style captures his cast brilliantly because of his stuntman experience.

The attention to detail and need to get a shot just right was something in the DNA of every single person on set, and that was thanks to their action training. If you get a stunt wrong, which we learned in one of the outtakes, it’s dangerous. It can get people killed or injured, and it’s up to everyone on set to respect that. Leaning on practical effects and making every fight (even a shootout) a hand-to-hand combat moment requires perfection, and ultimately, that is what sets the franchise apart from other franchises.

To execute perfect action, the set must not only have the best but also people who trust each other. Each John Wick film had its issues, and as the franchise expanded with each sequel, the teams needed to be even tighter, even if many had moved on from the project.

Ultimately, you can’t say Wick is Pain without directly confronting the fact that those who live that pain the most are the stunt actors. For all of the work that Reeves does as John Wick, someone is there taking even bigger hits for even longer periods. Wick Is Pain takes the time to highlight that the stunt performers are just as vital to crafting John Wick as everyone else. As Keanu Reeves says about his stunt double Jackson Spidel, “He’s playing John Wick too.”

Wick is Pain doesn’t just discuss the pain of its main cast and creatives, but also the near-paralyzing incident that Jackson Spidel went through during a stunt on set. The documentary sets the stakes by showing the footage of Spidel’s fall, which didn’t go as planned. Additionally, it gives the audience Keanu Reeves’ response to it all. He explains that he’s worried for them, and it’s dangerous, but it’s where they want ot be, so he watches and cheers.

Respect across the film team for the genre, prop teams, and stunt people is now a defining factor in the film. While the narrative elements of friendship are key, as the documentary explores them further, it’s clear that action cinema is the focus. Never before have I seen a behind-the-scenes documentary that honors its genre through the lives of its subjects.

Wick is Pain establishes that action is its own language.

Chad Stahelski, Keanu Reeves, Derek Kolstad, David Leitch, and everyone else in the documentary are passionate about action and the ability to tell stories with visuals and capture relationships through behaviors while fighting. How old friends can duel, and the weight in the air hangs heavy, not because of a monologue, but because we know how they feel with how they approach everything.

John Wick is always going bigger than the last. Add in dog-fu, add in a horse, add in Rome, and all of it has worked to create a grand world that has redefined expectations for action films. Still, though, throughout their conversations, it’s clear that John Wick exists as a film because of everything that came before. From Akira Kurosawa to Jackie Chan and the Wachowskis, not to mention a massive amount of anime pulled in, John Wick’s establishing of a cinematic language is on the backs of the giants before it. Chad and Keanu know that, deeply.

Action is a language, and John Wick has a fluent team. Wick is Pain captures the artistry behind violence, the joy, and the struggle of being called to put action on film. Given the toll that action takes on the body of those who choose it as their career, it should be no surprise that the actors and creatives in the genre approach it with dedication that can’t be understated.

Respect for action, for your cast, your crew, and the story you’re bringing to life is central throughout Wick is Pain. This isn’t just a love letter to John Wick, it’s a beautiful dedication to the genre and a peek behind the curtain of the creatives and craft teams that make it all happen.

Wick is Pain is available now on Video On Demand. 

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