A serviceable addition to that almost all storied of sub-genres (motion movies about ballerina-assassins), Len Wiseman’s “Ballerina” is a film that was ostensibly made to handle a selected query that’s been haunting the great individuals at Lionsgate since no less than March of 2023: Can the “John Wick” franchise survive with out Keanu Reeves?
In that gentle, maybe probably the most encouraging factor I can say in regards to the sequence’ first correct spin-off is that it manages to reply that query — with an emphatic “in all probability?” — regardless of looking for each excuse to not ask it within the first place. On the one hand, Keanu Reeves may be very a lot on this film, which is about in between the occasions of “John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum” and “John Wick: Chapter 4.” However, the actor’s decorative presence right here emphasizes the extent to which his character had been subsumed into the ridiculously elaborate — and elaborately ridiculous — felony underworld that he shot his means by way of; every of Wick’s mass-murdering efforts to carry it down made it all of the extra apparent that the “The Excessive Desk” is what in the end retains this franchise propped up.
With that in thoughts, maybe the extra urgent query that “Ballerina” exists to place ahead is that this: Can the world of John Wick survive with out sequence director Chad Stahelski? And… nicely, the film doesn’t actually reply that both. Partly, that’s as a result of Stahelski performed a pivotal function in shaping the movie’s motion sequences on set, even when rumors in regards to the extent of his reshoots — and the deficiencies that supposedly demanded them — have been exaggerated. Within the occasion these rumors have been exaggerated, then “Ballerina” would show that Stahelski’s imprint on the franchise is robust sufficient that even a much less expert filmmaker like “Stay Free or Die Exhausting” director Wiseman is ready to replicate it nicely sufficient to maintain the franchise’s spirit alive.
And if nothing else, Wiseman actually does that. “Ballerina” would possibly battle to remain balanced on its toes because it strains to increase its pre-established universe concurrently it introduces a brand new heroine to information us by way of it, however the entire issues that audiences have come to anticipate from the franchise are on full show on this spinoff. One million headshots at point-blank vary? Test. Keanu Reeves placing each of his lungs into each considered one of his strains? In fact. Wacky subtitles that make the mere act of studying really feel prefer it’s freighted with cartoon violence? it.
Whereas there are a number of points of “Ballerina” that really feel so much shakier than something did within the sequence’ earlier movies (most of them having to do with the introduction and motivation of Ana de Armas’ en pointe murderer), “Ballerina” stands tall the place it counts. That’s not solely as a result of Shay Hatten’s Black Checklist script has been efficiently retrofitted to really feel prefer it belongs to the world of John Wick, or as a result of the watered down battle scenes of the film’s first half ultimately give method to a few of the franchise’s most impressed carnage to this point, but additionally as a result of the perfect of that carnage — all of it rooted in 87North’s signature mix of close-up gun-fu — bends over backwards to accommodate a 5’6” actress who weighs lower than Keanu Reeves’ paycheck.
The one survivor of a boring prologue that sees her adoptive father massacred by a shadowy determine named the Chancellor (an imperious Gabriel Byrne), younger Eve Macarro is rescued from the ashes by New York hotelier Winston Scott (McShane), and delivered into the care of Anjelica Huston’s cigar-chomping Director, who runs a ballet studio so hardcore that it makes “Black Swan” seem like “Bunheads.” Along with pliés and pirouettes, Eve is skilled within the artwork of taking pictures individuals within the face, and by the point the motion picks up 11 years into her research, she’s itching to graduate from the Ruska Roma conservatory and get out into the sector. In spite of everything, she’s by no means going to seek out the boys who killed her dad if she simply stays inside doing montages all day.
What’s attention-grabbing about Eve, no less than in concept, is that she’s decided to be accepted into the identical felony underworld that John Wick is hellbent to flee, and “Ballerina” does its finest to profit from that friction within the uncommon cases when these two characters occur to cross paths. Alas, that solely accounts for a couple of minutes of the film’s runtime, and de Armas — disadvantaged the immediacy of the grief that fueled Reeves’ efficiency within the franchise’s humble first installment — isn’t given a robust sufficient basis to meaningfully help her want for revenge. She’s anxious and uncertain the place John Wick is Zen-like and resigned, however her strains don’t have any heft, her character has no humor, and her bloodlust has no plausible emotionality behind it. That proves to be an issue for the worldbuilding round her; the place John Wick’s mission made him a pure tour information by way of the underworld, Eve Maccaro can’t assist however really feel like extra of a vacationer by comparability, and so we glimpse on the internal workings of the Rusko Roma with out actually getting a significant sense of place.
The excellent news is that “Ballerina” has one other place it desires to point out us, and that place seems to be an exquisite addition to this franchise’s ever-swelling cinematic universe. Knowledgeable that the Chancellor is someplace close to Prague, Eve goes rogue by violating the Ruska Roma’s orders, flying throughout the Atlantic, and killing her means nearer to her goal. A short encounter with a bedraggled Norman Reedus fails to register (the “Dying Stranding” actor reveals up for simply lengthy sufficient to overcomplicate the plot), however issues choose up in a rush as soon as Eve is pointed within the course of an idyllic Austrian village referred to as Hallstatt — an actual place, fantastically wedged between a nonetheless lake and a few superb Alpine mountains — that “Ballerina” John Wickifies right into a cultish refuge for ex-assassins who need to create life as an alternative of ending it. It’s the right setup for this franchise to go full “Sizzling Fuzz” when the shit hits the fan within the third act.
And so “Ballerina” halfheartedly pivots right into a story that kinda sorta weighs household towards destiny, and — higher but — transitions right into a film the place Ana De Armas smashes the identical lady over the pinnacle with 20 completely different plates, invents a dozen new methods to completely obliterate individuals with grenades, and turns a pair of determine skates right into a swinging pair of nunchakus that give new which means to the double loop salchow. Eve’s background as a dancer weirdly doesn’t issue into the motion in fairly the identical means (the ballerina of all of it doesn’t prolong a lot past a couple of cues from “Swan Lake,” or the identical cue 10 completely different occasions), however that doesn’t imply the film treats her like a plug-and-play John Wick stand-in. Quite the opposite, its ultra-violence is reliably at its finest each time the blocking embraces de Armas’ variations.
“Change the phrases,” a Ruska Roma teacher tells Eve initially of a movie that’s clearly hedging its bets. “Lean into your strengths, not his.” She’s speaking about Eve’s opponent, however the sentiment applies simply as neatly to John Wick, whose stoicism turned each shootout right into a warfare of wills. Eve doesn’t have fairly the identical internal power, and so she’s pressured to search for exterior assist. Learn: She has to make use of her setting to fuck individuals up. And she or he does. She actually does. The prop work by no means aspires to Jackie Chan ranges of comedian mayhem, however — with the assistance of stunt double and coach Cara Marie Chooljian — de Armas makes use of each useful resource at her disposal to turn into a convincingly harmful twister of demise. The third act finds Eve taking such keen benefit of the world round her that it looks like she’s compensating for the primary half of the film’s failure to do the identical.
Maybe there might be time for that later. At its core, “Ballerina” is a movie a couple of bright-eyed newcomer asking a jaded legend for some profession recommendation, just for John Wick to inform Eve to do one thing else together with her life. However she clearly doesn’t need to heed that warning, and by the point Eve kills her method to the tip credit of this spinoff, I didn’t need her to both. An even bigger, extra assured sequel is likely to be simply what this franchise must get pleasure from a peaceable transition of energy — and to make good on the total potential of a Hollywood motion film that meaningfully tries to iterate on John Wick as an alternative of simply copying his strikes.
Grade: B-
Lionsgate will launch “Ballerina” in theaters on Friday, June 6.
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