Ballerina (2025)
The past can be a trigger.
Action is back on the menu thanks to an article that mentioned tonight’s was available on a streaming service i tangentially have access to. I love clearing the backlog when the backlog doesn’t end up costing me extra to clear! It’s also a bit of an experimental movie - one to see if a movie without the main character can still be a good movie in a franchise. Yeah, tutus to .22s, the sky’s the limit with a mountain of brass. Tonight we are going to check out Ballerina.
To be specific, the John Wick one, not one of the at least two other movies that have a title dealing with those fancy swan lake dancers. Here, our story follows a new character in the Wick universe. The little girl enjoys dancing and hanging out with her dad - and then people come for them. Dad isn’t going to let his kid go silently into the night however, fighting off those he’s apparently crossed by trying to “steal” the kid away from the leader. Dad gets the kid out safe, but doesn’t make it himself and while she’s hanging out afterwards who would approach her but one classy hotel owner? He takes her over to the group we can recognize as having helped out Wick in his movies, where she ends up staying and improving her skills - not just dance skills at that. She grows up and gets missions, but it isn’t long before an old darkness comes knocking into her, sparking a quest for vengeance.
The story feels fitting in the universe it sits - complete with differing levels of wackiness given all the events that go down in this world. The actors do a decent job - many a face you will recognize from the rest of the franchise popping in as if to say hello even - with what they have, although in all honesty I wouldn’t say that it’s any better or worse then most the rest of the Wick flicks. Nobody feels like they are phoning it in, even if it doesn’t really wrench your heart or anything like that along the way. Our lead does get to do more than just be stoic, with some tears and anger and plenty of facial expressions. There’s some kids in there doing some acting as well - which isn’t exactly the best I’ve ever seen, but far better then the worst still. In all fairness to the actors though, I also didn’t come into a Wick universe movie for the acting - none of them have been terrible, but they are at their heart and soul action flicks, so you have just as much chance of getting mileage out of the stunt crew as you do the main crew, and a lot of times it’ll be the action that does the talking.
Characters are essentially there. Our main has enough to her to drive her actions as to becoming what she becomes, but I wouldn’t say it feels multi-faceted or anything. She’s no ogre that we have to peel back the onions for, like a character we don’t meet until the very end of their story - she’s just a person with drive that may be revenge motivated. It is nice that the movie does acknowledge that she isn’t on that level, and that she should fight to her strengths - although by the end, I also don’t really feel like she really puts a lot of that advice to use. She’s crafty without a doubt, but not really in the sense of “cheating or doing whatever it takes” to win the fight as our earlier training scenes point out. Still, if there’s one thing it nails for her character is that persistence, as she keeps getting up even when continually getting the crap kicked out of her. Oh yeah, and John shows up in here for a bit, which completely confuses me as to the timeline of events to some extent, but it’s been so long since I’ve watched the first Wick I don’t remember if I even remember gaps in the times between the events in those movies.
Some folks don’t know how to chill.
Stunt crews were working overtime on this movie. Plenty of action, plenty of punches, throws, falls, and burns showing up in this movie. Every one of the Wick movies is in a constant battle to try and innovate or one up themselves and it generally leads to some pretty awesome stuff. One scene reminded me of Fist of the North Star and that guy whose martial arts style is literally just throwing TNT at stuff. Another scene is like a pyromaniac saw that scene in Mandy where they fought with chainsaws and said “Hold my beer!” Like, it’s absolutely some wild stuff in the action department here - but it also keeps a lot of it grounded in classic universe fists and tight precise gun action. If you liked the others, you’ll keep liking this one.
Effects are tight and flashy. Like I just mentioned, one scene is literally ninety percent weaponized explosions - to the point where trying to get a screenshot I ended up mistiming it and just getting a white screen. There is some stuff that isn’t as clean as others, as you could argue for a few moments in the other parts of the franchise as well, but most the time you don’t really notice them unless you are really looking for them so it’s never something that really takes you out of it. The settings get some of this treatment as well - a super cold club with ice everywhere, normal building interiors, all the way to our final set that takes place across an entire snowy village. I’m sure the village was at least in part to help capture some of the Wick against everyone charm of the earlier movies - and even if it might feel a bit extreme it somehow also feels fitting for the universe it takes place in and does lead to some cool stuff. I should also mention, it also does explain it in the movie, so it’s not like it’s just suddenly this entire town is an action scene just because.
Audio is there and largely maintains cohesion with the rest of the franchise. Line deliveries are fine, and sometimes can come off pretty funny. It’s got some humor to it, really feeling a bit Three Stooges at times if I’m being honest, but it does bring some always appreciated levity to the revenge fantasy of the movie. If I had to go on about stuff for the thinking person I’d probably be at a relative loss on this one. I mean, I guess the big one it feels like it’s pushing - past and through the revenge story - would be an emphasis on choices. I guess there’s also maybe something to say about grief in there, or the other Wick franchise staple of consequences of actions. Really wasn’t looking for a whole lot of deep thoughts out of this going in though, so if you really wanted to deep-dive it past the action scenes maybe you would find more.
These guys wish they were at the ice club.
I had fun here. Making the timeline a bit more fuzzy to me aside, the movie is still put together and retains a lot of the same charms the rest of the franchise does. I will say that at least part of Reeves sections in the movie feels a bit like it was sort of unnecessary, although you won’t catch me complaining that he was in it because he still nails the stuff he has for it. I do like that it’s a pretty functional test of showing how we could tell more stories in this universe while still retaining it’s fun, while also keeping that one-up feeling nature of always trying to find something new to do about it. Of course, new characters give us a chance to have new attitudes, and they could have perhaps played with that a bit more in this, but overall it was a fine addition that you could theoretically enjoy without the others, although some of the finer details that they explained in the other movies and not in this one would be lost to you that way. I’m going to be stuck on the mental image of de Armas face photo-shopped over that TNT throwing guy all night now though.