(We Love a Female Badass)
So far, the John Wick franchise has given us a really solid quartet of ‘Keanu Reeves flicks’ featuring him weaving through the assassin underworld as the dreaded Babi Yaga, making it the premier action/martial arts franchise of this generation. Given the success and fandom for the (seemingly concluded) mainline series, it was perhaps inevitable that, as with other successful franchises, the spin-offs would start flying. There has already been a rather mediocre The Continental television prequel series, plus there’s also a spin-off film based on Caine (played by Donnie Yen) from Chapter 4, in the works. But that isn’t enough to satiate this fan’s John Wickiverse fix.
Enter Ballerina, set between Chapter 3 and Chapter 4, with Ana De Armas as its leading lady: tasked with extending the legend of the Wickiverse into new territory while also crafting its own unique identity autonomous from John Wick. It succeeds in some ways, but in other ways it fails. Ballerina is largely a string of action set pieces in want of a plot even though the extravagant action is still entertaining.
What helps Ballerina establish its own identity is it doesn’t try to make Eve Maccaro (De Armas’ character) the ‘female John Wick’, or ‘Jane Wick’ if you will. Eve is her own person who just happens to exist within the world established by the prior films. Nowadays, whenever a major film has a leading lady, especially if it’s on the back of an established franchise made famous by a leading man, there will be trepidation, or worse, outright venom, that this isn’t authentic, that it really is a trojan horse to smuggle in a tendentious socio-political ‘message’, or promote ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’. The unfortunate side effect is that any film that has a female protagonist will be prejudged and stigmatised as ‘woke’ by reactionary opinion because of this fact, and nothing else.
During Eve’s initial training, her teacher encourages her to “fight like a girl” (a rather lame line in all honesty) and “cheat” because she’ll always be smaller and weaker than most of her foes. Don’t play to their strengths, play to yours. In any case, anyone worried that Eve is just another feminist ‘girl boss’ can relax. Yes, she becomes a killing machine who can take out scores of enemies like a video game set on easy mode, but her virtuosity in combat and murder feels earned, based less on brute power and strength, and more on clinical precision and finesse. She takes her own share of bumps, cuts and bruises along the way. She is stabbed a couple of times even but still pushes through. When she’s confronted by John Wick later in the film, there is no doubt as to who the apex predator is. So, she is no Mary Sue.
You’ll always have smug complaints that it’s ‘unrealistic’ that a woman, let alone a dainty one like Ana De Armas, could fight and kill scores of men with such adeptness; since men are naturally bigger and stronger. Even the strongest women would struggle in combat against a man who is merely a tad above average in strength. Of course it’s bloody unrealistic! Men like John Wick don’t exist in the real world either. It’s fiction. You momentarily suspend your disbelief to enjoy the fantasy. That’s why we watch it.
Ballerina’s story is a rather pedestrian revenge tale. Eve’s father was murdered when she was a child, by a criminal cult. She’s taken in by the Russka Roma, raised in their ‘family’ and trained to become one of the elite caste of assassins. As she progresses in her vocation, her primal need for revenge is reactivated. But doing do will upset the delicate balance of power between these criminal syndicates. She can make her choice, but there will be consequences.
Of course, one doesn’t watch a John Wick flick for an intellectually stimulating plot. One wants to see bullets fly, knives piercing flesh, heads explode into mush. You know Ballerina is in the John Wick Verse with the dark elegance, the carefully curated neon-colour palette and high-end nightclubs in a European city with techno music. There’s plenty of weapon’s porn for the gun nuts amongst us, as well as imaginative violence. Someone’s head gets sliced by an ice skate. There’s also a quite fun duel between a flamethrower and a hose.
Let me add something else: from Wonder Woman to Lara Croft to Atomic Blonde, we love the fantasy of a female badass. We really like a woman who can kill and break bones as any macho man can but remain sexy and feminine while doing it. It’s a power and erotic fantasy – that appeals to many men. Isn’t it just sexy that Ana De Armas can kick some serious ass while wearing a sequin dress with a slit? Do I like it? Without shame, I answer firmly in the affirmative!- hell yeah for short. The brunette Eve is no Atomic Blonde, but she’s made her bones as worthy of the title, badass. And it’s earned, not handed off by some ‘woke’ charity.
For a film that had to have large elements reshot after abysmal test screenings, Ballerina was salvaged from a potential disaster to just about acceptable. Don’t take the plot seriously. It is a film that is rather stitched together, with threadbare characters and a pedestrian story. But if like me, you’re a junkie for fighting, for aesthetic violence and creative on-screen killing, then it won’t be a total disappointment.
Rating 6.5/10
Ralph Leonard is a British Nigerian journalist, writer, commentator & cinema critic with works published by well-known media outlets including: ‘The Atlantic’, ‘The Telegraph’ & ‘The New Statesman’
E-mail: ralphy96@hotmail.co.uk
Twitter/X: @buffsoldier_96
Review written & edited by: Ralph Leonard
Minor edits by: Lee Fenton
