Review: Ballerina

Ballerina is a bit of a frustrating film in that it has many ingredients that work conceptually, and visually, yet central pieces of the pie are missing; leaving you in the end with a half-baked dessert. Ultimately the flavor is there but it satisfies the craving none at all. 

Director Len Wiseman (Underworld, Live Free or Die Hard, Total Recall) knows how to film action without a doubt, and I imagine he was chosen to helm this particular spin-off in part because he knows how to film an action heroine with his Underworld directorial and producer credits. 

Though objectively, it feels like a missed opportunity to hire a director who helmed a well enough liked female led franchise from two decades ago – perhaps surprising to fans and audiences that the two Underworld films Wisemen directed were not critically well received – over some fresh talent, some newer blood. To explore a bit of out-of-the-box thinking when it came to style and substance in regards to potential directors. 

Undoubtedly Wiseman knows how to film himself an ass-kicking heroine but his approach is also strangely clinical at times in terms of storytelling and his sense of style leans far more into those early 2000s gray and blue tones that feel at odds with the colorful neon stylings that made previous John Wick films so visually memorable. His warmest film to date was 2007’s Live Free and Die Hard, which was arguably the last decent Die Hard. But when the follow-up was the positively dismal A Good Day to Die Hard starring Jai Courtney and set in Russia the bar wasn’t hard to leap over. 

I say this as someone who really enjoys Wiseman’s work overall, including Live Free and Die Hard despite its many strange, baffling, and frankly annoying editing choices. I’m perhaps one of the few that shrugged their shoulders at the downgrade in rating change. After all, it wasn’t its Rated R rating that made prior Die Hard films good, it was a mix of action, Bruce Willis, and strong secondary characters. And though Underworld Evolution has a truly harsh 17% on Rotten Tomatoes – understandably – I recall the film very fondly. The series made Kate Beckinsale a bonafide rare female action star, particularly in the 2000s only rivaled by her peer Milla Jovovich who happened to star in Ultraviolet the same year Underworld Evolution released. 

Perhaps that was what Lionsgate was hoping for when Wiseman was brought on, that he would turn Ana De Armas into the next Beckinsale, or the next Charlize Theron, or Milla Jovovich. But looking back on Wisemen’s approach to the films of his directorial catalogue I’m not surprised by the actual results of Ballerina. Which leans more to the messy, breakneck pacing, creatively choreographed, well filmed action set pieces of Total Recall (2012) than his much more fun work on Live Free and Die Hard and Underworld Evolution. 

It makes one long for the potential what-if of a director like Gina Prince-Bythewood, director of The Old Guard and The Woman King; films that included some of the best and underrated action sequences of the last decade. What could Prince-Bythewood have done with this material? 

What flare she could have brought to the story that seems so cold and detached from itself. The Woman King is similarly saturated in ultra violence, though of a more realistic kind than Ballerina – which isn’t a fault of Ballerina itself, the John Wick films have grown increasingly more and more ludicrous with each installment. Yet the colors of The Woman King are vibrant, the energy is kinetic when called for, visceral when necessary and painful when needed. Prince-Bythewood furthermore understood when to let emotion and pause earn over action something sorely lacking in Ballerina in which we jump from action set piece to set piece never allowing the character of Eve to develop, pause, contemplate or barely breath. 

Instead of creating a chaotic fast paced energy it leaves you strangely detached from her journey completely. 

Anjelica Huston’s enigmatic Director of the Ruska Roma – introduced in John Wick 3 – tells the audience that Eve’s power is her pain, giving her the killer instinct needed to become what the Ruska Roma call “the Kikimora” a so-called protector of good spirits and destroyer of bad spirits. 

Protector of what? For who? To what end? Who decides what people deserve protection? With money? Some sort of honor system? The Director? The High Table? 

These things we never learn, and therein lies one of the film's biggest weaknesses. 

John Wick as a franchise has built itself on shakier and shakier worldbuilding since Lionsgate realized they had an unintentional and entirely unexpected hit on their hands with the smash success of the original 2014 film. In a way, the hidden in the shadows, paint the walls as we go approach to worldbuilding didn’t deter or hinder the franchise too much. The way the world of John Wick worked was less important to the audience than how John Wick would survive that world itself. Each new colorful character added was a mostly happy edition, and the show-don’t-tell aspect allowed for the whole enterprise to feel mysterious and refreshing. 

Sometimes, less is more. 

Not so here. 

As we followed John Wick’s adventures the world laid out may have been mysterious but it was clear-cut. We didn’t need to know the inner workings of the high table because John Wick wasn’t a high table member. They operated above him and therefore above the audience as well; a group of shadowy figures omnipresent to the narrative and ultimately not as important as John’s mission in and of itself. John himself was already a member of this world, he wasn’t new, when he reenters that world in John Wick (2014) nothing is explained because he already is a part of its fabric. 

A knife returning to the knifeblock as it were. 

However Eve is new to the world at hand, she knows nothing about the Ruska Roma nor the very bland cult that is at the heart of her motivation and the film's mystery. 

“Does she even know who her parents were?” Sharon Duncan-Brewster’s Nogi asks somberly of a returning Ian McShane’s Winston Scott. He of course replies no, Eve does not know who her parents were and sadly by the end of the film, we never truly learn who they are. He was a Ruska Roma assassin and she was an assassin cult member can I make it anymore obvious? About amounts to the answer both Eve and the audience is given which is lackluster given so much is built up around the existence of this assassin cult and her parents part in it. 

Since the existence of this cult and the Ruska Roma are at the heart Eve’s motivation and narrative, quite suddenly the worldbuilding of the franchise matters much more. Eve seeks revenge against this cult, headed by a rather bored Gabriel Bryne’s The Chancellor, for murdering her father. We learn her father took her away from the assassin cult and thus they came to murder him and bring her back. 

Why? 

After four John Wick movies, a spin-off television show – remember The Continental? – and now a spin-off movie, what exactly makes an assassin cult different from the global assassination organization we’ve been following since 2014? What makes them different from the Roma Ruska who also train children to be killers? That they do so whilst residing in a scenic secluded mountainside instead of New York teaching ballet? If this is meant to be the assassin cult equivalent of Midsommar go for broke. This is the John Wick universe after all; be loud, be weird, be colorful and strange and kill someone with a pencil. 

When Laurence Fishburne exploded onto screen as the delightfully campy and Shakespearen Bowery King in John Wick 2 his place, and the place of his followers was clear. Various New York homeless work under him as an underground crime boss, an alternative to the rich, bougie, and strictly regulated upperworld assassin guild John and Winston are a part of. The contrast was electric as it was effective. Not simply because seeing former costars Fishburne and Reeves reunite was a delight – though it undoubtedly was – but because John and Bowery contrast each other so well they add further texture and color to the world of John Wick. 

Who even is this assassin cult? Cults believe in things, to a heretical level. What does this cult believe in? Murdering people for money? The franchise has that in spades. Do they believe in not murdering people for money? Are they against the high table? There’s a mention of a long standing truce between them and the Ruska Roma but what’s that about? Who even are the Ruska Roma? What do they do? They claim to be protectors yet John Wick is their most famous student which seems hilariously at odds with what we both know and have seen in four John Wick movies. 

If these two groups are the center of the story, the world in which our protagonist exists entirely new in, they must be explored, developed, given some sort of depth. An assassin cult that lives in the European mountains is just set dressing; it is a reason to have De Armas kill someone with ice skates – which while wonderfully creative, could happen at her local New York ice rink. 

Why does it matter if Eve’s father took her away? 

Well Norman Reedus’ Daniel Pine’s character so helpful explains, “it’s a cult, no one gets out.” Which I suppose just has to be enough, but surely makes for rather boring antagonists. Which leads into the next issue hidden underneath the film's brilliantly choreographed fight sequences. 

Eve has no true side characters that are her own nor memorable. Reeves’ John Wick series was surrounded by character after character of unique figures decked out in identifiable costuming and each both likable and dislikable by measure. 

When has Ruby Rose ever been as engaging as the mute assassin working for Riccardo Scamarcio’s delightfully smarmy Italian crime boss Santino D’Antonio in John Wick 2? Did Halle Berry not steal every scene in which she chewed and spat back out at Reeve’s feet as the bitter and tough as nails Sofia Al-Azwar in John Wick 3? Which also introduced Huston, and including an always welcome Mark Dacascos as a snarky and controlled manic killer in Zero? Asia Kate Dillion’s The Adjudicator may not be the best antagonist the franchise ever had, but they were certainly one of the best dressed ones. 

And in the final – heh, sure – John Wick outing we had Donnie Yen and Hiroyuki Sanada as Caine and Shimazu Koji. Yen brought his undeniable charm and inherently likeability switching things up from the more straightforward killers pursuing John – Common was fun in John Wick 2 but no one was rooting for him let’s be honest. Whilst Sanada brings his regular levels of gravitas and warmth needed as John’s longterm friend. The audience doesn’t need to know their shared past, just the chemistry between Reeves and Sanada is enough to make us believe it. Similarly with Koji and Caine’s meeting and bout, the obvious action intensity is there but so is the sense of history Yen and Sanada are able to embody their characters with. 

This isn’t even accounting for the various other fun and memorable faces seen throughout the franchise like Adrianne Palicki as Ms. Perkins, John Leguizamo as Aurelio and Willem Dafoe as Marcus in John Wick (2014), Clancy Brown and Bill Skarsgard as the Harbinger and Marquis Vincent respectfully in John Wick 4, Yayan Ruhian and Cecep Arif Rahman as two of Zero’s pupils in John Wick 3. 

Where are these types of characters in Ballerina? 

Where is Eve’s supporting cast? The characters she plays off of? You have Rila Rukishima (The Wolverine) in your movie and you waste her in a bit role? It’s not as egregious as Endgame wasting Sanada as a no-name yakuza member Hawkeye’s sad mohawk cuts down in act one but it's frustrating all the same. 

Similar is casting Academy nominated actress Catalina Sandino Moreno as Eve’s third act plot twist sister and giving her absolutely nothing to do but be the “team lead” character before unceremoniously killing her off for seemingly no real motivated reason. 

Why was act three not the sisters fighting against each other for some sort of emotional stakes? Or the sisters fighting together against the evil assassin cult leader? Why include the sister twist at all? Eve was already motivated to kill the Chancellor because of her father, the twist adds nothing to the emotional stakes of the film itself, nor reveals any new information about the cult, or Eve’s family to the story. 

Norman Reedus’ Pine is all set-up to be a somebody in the story before unceremoniously getting picked off and revealed at the end to be alive all along in recovery. Eve barely gets a moment to speak with him, build some sort of rapport, even a scene where they protect the macguffin child together. 

There is a scene in which Pine is protecting his daughter Ella seemingly mirroring Eve’s own training from act one of the film. There was a perfect set-up for Eve to help him as the audience has seen she has direct experience doing just this, in this specific setting even. It feels like a missed opportunity. 

In the four proceeding John Wick films John doesn’t actually speak much, allowing other characters to do most of the talking. This works, John’s stoicism, exemplified by Reeve’s own natural dead set jaw and his piercing eyes suits the character at hands allowing others to add the color, and vibrancy the story needs to keep its pace. John Wick feels like a monster on a mission, endlessly destructive even after his revenge in John Wick (2014) is completed. As such his ending in John Wick 4 feels earned and like peace because god damn what John Wick really needed was to rest. 

John’s motivations after the initial film always grew more and more muddled as the films themselves grew more and more convoluted, but what held all the pieces together was Reeves' performance, Stahelski’s razor sharp direction, and the interesting characters that built out the rest of the runtime. 

Eve in turn as a protagonist loses all potential as the story she inhabits is a much more derivative one. 

“You killed my father, prepare to die” without the intrigue, fun, or energy. The story over complicates itself by inserting a lackluster assassin cult that has no clear beliefs or motivations, not giving Eve any interesting secondary characters of her own – the most fun ones are on loan from John Wick 1 through 4 or John Wick himself making a rather bafflingly though enjoyable third act appearance – and centering on one-part mystery one-part revenge plot one part save the child mission – the child of Ella is entirely pointless and the subplot was done better in Gunpowder Milkshake – and no parts connecting the tissue. 

From all this one would think I loathed this movie, yet in reality I found myself mostly whelmed by it. 

The action was great, and truly some wonderfully creative set pieces were a joy to watch – such as the aforementioned ice skate killing sequence, though my personal favorite was Eve attaching a grenade necklace to a man, flipping herself over a table and his body exploding in a glorious moment of truly fun violence. Where was that energy the whole movie? 

Also refreshing was the witty comedic moments, often played in the background such as the scene in which Eve breaks another assassin's face with a remote. Each hit changing the channel of the television behind her which showcases various sitcom related violence in the background contrasting with the real violence at the foreground of the shot. It was genuinely welcomed to watch an action film think about its jokes and not rely on quips in order to deliver an easy audience giggle. 

While I still struggle to buy De Armas as a bonafide action heroine I applaud her commitment each time she tries. Her most successful outing in my opinion was in No Time To Die as Paloma where she seemed to be having fun. Whereas in Ballerina and in Ghosted – yes I have watched Apple TV’s Ghosted – she seems to be carrying the weight of proving herself. There’s no charm in either latter performance as there was as Paloma, and I would love to see her next try as an action star playing a character that allows for her natural charm on screen to shine. Let De Armas be playful, snarky, and fun, we already have a stoic assassin in the John Wick movies, his name is John Wick! Why make Eve so similar with an actress so lackluster in the stoicism department. 

I kept wondering how someone like Melissa Barrera would embody the role; having now three films where she’s screamed, grunted, fought, and been covered in blood in Scream (2022), Scream VI and Abigail under her belt. Barrera also has a closer cold deadened weight to her gaze that Reeves has perfected if Eve was meant to embody a similar personality type. 

But writing fanfiction where Prince-Bythewood and Barrera were chosen for an alternate timeline version of this film is pointless. The film isn’t terrible, it’s certainly watchable. The direction is strong, the script by Shay Hatten (John Wick 3, Army of the Dead, John Wick 4, Rebel Moon Part One and Rebel Moon Part Two) is simply one of Hatten’s weaker outings. 

It’s both overly complicated yet lacking in any intrigue, genuine expansion of the lore and mythos of the franchise, teases a sequel that may never be and I’m certainly not rushing to view, and feels entirely like a missed opportunity. There was a better film here underneath the missteps. 

John Wick as a franchise began with a very simple but powerful revenge story with a twist, this time the dog dies. Sorry to Eve’s father, but I felt more for the dog.

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