Earlier this year, Timothée Chalamet suggested that ballet is a dying art. Director Vicky Jewson’s “Pretty Lethal” agrees — but not how you might think. The campy action movie follows five ballerinas as they fight for survival in a remote Hungarian inn after their bus breaks down en route to a performance in Budapest.
Released on March 25 on Prime Video, “Pretty Lethal” is an easy watch. It is quick, funny and sweet and doesn’t ask audiences to do much, if any, thinking. Instead, the film offers pure entertainment in the form of well-shot and well-choreographed fight scenes between badass ballerinas and male attackers who are equal parts sinister and stupid.
Opening on a tense rehearsal, “Pretty Lethal” quickly, but uninspiringly, establishes its characters and their dynamics, primarily through the rivalry between Bones (Maddie Ziegler) and Princess (Lana Condor). The duo’s names themselves set a tone of levity that persists throughout the film.
The troupe is rounded out by Grace (Avantika) and sisters Zoe (Iris Apatow) and Chloe (Millicent Simmonds). Simmonds — who is deaf herself — portrays deafness authentically in Chloe’s character.
Ziegler shines as a strong and constant lead while Condor and Apatow seem unconvinced of their own performances. Avantika is an adept comic though not much else.
Before long, the girls and their ballet teacher, Miss Thorna (Lydia Leonard), are hiding from the rain at Teremok Inn, a dilapidated establishment buried in a Hungarian forest — a long way from the ballet company’s Los Angeles studio.
With one gunshot, the movie transforms from an ensemble dramedy to a comedy-thriller. Now witnesses to a murder on the property, the girls are an inconvenience to the inn’s owner, Devora (Uma Thurman). Bones, the fiercest of the troupe, rallies the other girls to fight against several Hungarian gangsters seeking to murder them. Naturally, the fight takes shape in the form of ballet choreography — a choice as laughable as it is fun to watch. Things get bloody quickly and stay gory throughout.
Jewson offers an attempt at complexity with the subplot of Devora, who was a former ballerina herself. It is clear the film intended to posit the girls as younger versions of Devora, full of the opportunity she had stolen from her, but this comparison lands fairly ineffectually.
The movie brings little to nothing to the table in terms of prestige filmmaking and fails to concoct much suspense or a remotely gripping climax, despite the onslaught of ballerina battle. Nonetheless, there is something awfully satisfying about a pointe shoe with a blade stuck through the toe whipping through the air to slice the neck of a mobster.
If anything, “Pretty Lethal” offers an opportunity to watch a talented group of young actors play on screen alongside the legendary Thurman, who seems to be enjoying herself. “Pretty Lethal” isn’t worth making time for, but it’s pretty fun if you have time to kill.
Rebecca Goodman is a university news senior staff writer covering career and alumni. She is a junior from Cambridge, MA, studying English. Outside of writing, you can find her at the Avon or in the basement of the Rock.
