Ballerina – 2025
Director Len Wiseman
Screenplay Shay Hatten
Starring Ana de Armas, Anjelica Huston, Gabriel Byrne, Lance Reddick, Norman Reedus, Ian McShane, Keanu Reeves, Catalina Sandino Moreno
There is a side quest to the John Wick series. It delves into his backstory as a member of Kikimora, a secret group of assassins / bodyguards. We discover a coven of ballerinas lead by the Director (Huston). From this group we have Eve (de Armas), a woman whose father is killed in front of her as a child. She had previously lost her mother and her older sister is absent from the family. The group that killed her father, aka the Cult, is lead by the Chancellor (Byrne).
The death leads Winston Scott (McShane) to give her the option to join Kikimora. Time goes by, she trains up as she becomes part of their family. She then meets with Wick, asks how she can get out. She means to get out and start killing. He tells her she’d be best to get out and just live. She asks why he hasn’t left. He says he is trying.
Her first assignment is a protection. She passes. Then months go by and she has become an expert assassin. On her way out of a hit, she is attacked by a member of the Cult. Anyone can tell where this leads.
As an assassin, de Armas is smooth enough to present effectively, outside of the obvious weight disadvantage. Wiseman did enough work with his former wife, Beckinsdale, herself a woman of slight build, to make Eve look plausible.
That there isn’t really much of a story here matters less than how it presents. The combat scenes are effective, similar to those in the Wick films. However, it seems that Reeves is in some genuine pain throughout. It’s really doubtful that anyone other than Bruce Willis can show laboring pain yet still manage to win.
The film wins in the last act. It starts with the return of Eve to her hometown of Hallstatt, Austria. This picturesque snowed in town looks like a tourist trap when it’s really a deathtrap. The fight scenes from here out don’t let up. A particular highlight is the flamethrower sequences. This viewer has never seen a fight so long and drawn out presenting so much fire. Those with a triggering complex to flame would do well to avoid.
Byrne is ineffective as the main bad guy. He’s given a few lines of routine exposition and looks bored much of the time. More effective is Moreno, though they make the inexplicable decision to cut her screen time.
de Armas is an actress capable of great presence. She is not given as much leeway with this plot, and she doesn’t have the decades long history of Reeves to charm her way through. Still, there is enough here to move forward if this film makes even half as the other films in the series.
(***1/2 out of *****)
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