Such a breathtaking film were the words that escaped my mouth the moment the credits rolled out. I have never seen anything like it! It’s got the thrill, the action, the sassy humor, the whimsy.
Literally everything I could ever want a film to offer me. And the funny thing is that I genuinely didn’t know what to expect when I decided to watch it. A film about ballerinas is fine in my books. A group of ballerinas getting caught up in some dangerous situation? Okay. But ballerinas having to use the very skills they’ve spent years perfecting to fight for their lives? Well, that certainly got my full attention.
Synopsis
This film follows five American ballerinas, Bones (Maddie Ziegler), Princess (Lana Condor), Grace (Avantika), Zoe (Iris Apatow), and Chloe (Millicent Simmonds), who travel to Budapest for a prestigious dance competition with their instructor, Miss Thorna (Lydia Leonard). Unfortunately, their journey goes horribly wrong when a series of mishaps leaves them stranded in the middle of nowhere.
They eventually find shelter at a remote roadside inn run by Devora Kasimer (Uma Thurman), a former ballet prodigy whose seemingly hospitable establishment quickly starts feeling very, very wrong. And their instincts aren ’t wrong as the girls soon discover that the inn is connected to a criminal operation, leaving them trapped in an environment where survival becomes more important than making it to their dance competition.
Review and Rating
I Was absolutely entertained from beginning to end.
This is one of those films where I knew from the beginning that I was going to enjoy myself. It doesn’t take itself so seriously that it forgets to have fun. There is violence and moments where I was genuinely tense, but there is also this wonderfully ridiculous sense of humour running underneath everything. And I loved that because sometimes action films become so obsessed with proving how serious and gritty they are that they forget the primary purpose of watching a film like this, I mean I came to be entertained.
Now, the ballet fighting concept is insane but brilliant and I have to give the filmmakers credit for this because who looks at ballet and thinks it could make an excellent combat system? Apparently, Vicky Jewson did. Frankly, it works better than it has any right to.
The film takes movements associated with ballet, precision, balance, flexibility, footwork, discipline and transforms them into elements of survival. The girls don’t suddenly become professional assassins who magically know how to use every weapon on earth. They use the physical abilities they already possess and that makes the action feel distinctive.
I don’t know if it’s just me but there’s something oddly satisfying about watching graceful movements become violent. A pointe shoe that was supposed to help create beautiful art suddenly becomes a weapon. Years of physical discipline that seemed completely unrelated to survival suddenly become exactly what these girls need.
It is ridiculous and creative and I was absolutely here for it.
Literally, the girls were actually fun to watch. What I enjoyed the most was that the group doesn’t begin as one perfectly united sisterhood. They have personalities and have disagreements, have rivalries and different attitudes towards one another.
Princess, for instance, is not exactly the easiest person to tolerate. She’s privileged, self-absorbed and has enough attitude to fill the entire inn. Meanwhile, Grace is deeply religious, Zoe is compassionate, Chloe is quieter and more observant, and Bones is the more formidable presence among them.
That dysfunction actually makes their eventual cooperation more satisfying. They don’t suddenly become best friends because the plot needs them to but have to learn to rely on one another because the alternative is dying because nothing builds teamwork quite like armed criminals trying to kill you.
Maddie Ziegler surprised me. Bones could easily have been reduced to the stereotypical badass female action hero who walks around looking permanently angry and beats everybody up but, there is something more grounded about her. She feels like someone who has spent her entire life being told to discipline her body, perfect every movement and push through pain. That background translates surprisingly well into the physical demands of the action sequences. And considering how physically demanding this film is, the cast deserves credit for committing to it.
I also appreciated what the film does with Chloe. Millicent Simmonds, who is Deaf herself, helped advocate for Chloe to be written as a Deaf ballerina rather than simply a hearing character. That was a particularly interesting choice because it isn’t simply treated as a character trait. It becomes part of how we experience certain moments with her. And I thought that was a thoughtful addition to a film that could easily have been nothing more than stylish violence.
And Then There Is Uma Thurman, playing a former ballet prodigy who is now connected to a criminal operation? Excuse me? Yes.
Her presence gives the film another layer of delicious absurdity because she brings a certain authority to Devora. And knowing Thurman’s history with action cinema makes her casting feel like a little wink to the audience. There is something wonderfully theatrical about her character. And considering how strange the whole premise is, I think the film needed someone who could inhabit that strangeness without making it feel embarrassing.
All in all, the action and the humor were my favourite combination.
What really won me over was the film’s ability to move between danger and humour without completely ruining either. One moment I’m watching someone fight for her life, and the next I’m laughing at something so ridiculously sassy that I almost forget these women are surrounded by criminals. That balance is difficult to get right. Too much comedy and the danger stops feeling real, on the other hand, too much seriousness and the film loses the playful charm that makes its premise enjoyable.
This film walks that line surprisingly well.
Finally, I genuinely enjoyed this and that’s because it gave me something I hadn’t seen before. It took ballet, something associated with elegance, delicacy and painstaking beauty and asked what would happen if those same skills had to be used for something much uglier.
Now the answer was bloody, ridiculous, stylish and incredibly entertaining. The film is basically whimsical without being childish, violent without becoming completely joyless, and funny without destroying the tension. Most importantly, I was having fun and having fun is all I need from an action film.
So yes, I stand by what I said when those credits rolled:
What a breathtaking film.
Rating: 9/10
Posted Using INLEO
