Pretty Lethal - Ballerinas in Hell: The Action Comedy Where You Kill to the Rhythm of Dance

A company of young American ballerinas, led by experienced teacher Thorna, is traveling to Budapest to participate in a show. The group is diverse enough: we find the rebellious Bones and the spoiled Princess, passing through sisters Zoe and Chloe - the latter deaf-mute - to the naive Grace. Between friendship and rivalry, each of them has dreams, hoping to become famous in that discipline that costs tears and sweat.

However, the protagonists of Pretty Lethal find themselves in an unexpected situation when the bus that was supposed to take them to the Hungarian capital breaks down in the middle of an isolated road. The girls decide to continue on foot in search of shelter for the night, finding refuge in a castle nestled in the heart of the forest, a kind of inn run by former ballerina Devora Kasimer, linked to a criminal organization. Their arrival unfortunately coincides with that of the young gangster Pasha, arrogant and rebellious, who unleashes chaos. But the criminals are unaware that Zoe and her companions have unexpected aces up their sleeves.

Step by Step, to the Grave

On paper, Pretty Lethal had several arrows in its quiver to try and fit into the crowded genre of contemporary action comedies, but in the end, the result was much more timid than expected, and the suggestive initial premise was almost entirely wasted. Naturally, as the title and poster already hinted, the film placed much of its appeal on the fact that the usual villains were confronted by girls in tutus, ready to take down bad guys with dance moves.

And the formula works when exploited, with a couple of choreographically inspired sequences that find their strength precisely in the dissonance between ballet moves and the use of weapons, with a healthy instinct for genre violence peeking through. It's a shame that the essence of the operation is practically exhausted in those few minutes, with the rest of the viewing being a confused hodgepodge of lighter moments and hypothetically pulp ones, without, however, having the necessary awareness of what is actually being told.

Furthermore, a villain of the caliber of Uma Thurman is wasted, here reduced to a kind of dull caricature, and very soon the presumed heterogeneity of the cast - from the rivalry between two of the ballerinas to one with a disability, to another who ends up hallucinating after taking psychedelic substances - gets lost in a tired sequence of uninspired gags and bickering, with the already written epilogue just around the corner.

A Film Lacking Surprises

The only partial moment of originality in the plot is the brutal cold-blooded killing of the instructor, a choice that thus allows the very young protagonists to demonstrate their full worth, acting not only out of a spirit of survival but also with a desire for revenge. Not that the characters, good or bad, need particular motivations, since Pretty Lethal relies on a relatively linear narrative, which offers no noteworthy plot twists in the second half and ends up dragging once the cyclical nature of the formula is understood.

A continuous hit-and-run, a cat-and-mouse game within a manor that offers multiple hiding possibilities but also as many pitfalls. The setting, it must be said, is not used in the best way, with the result that rooms and corridors all look the same and one hopes that the showdown arrives as soon as possible to put an end to a massacre that perhaps wanted to be sui generis but turned out to be much more predictable than expected.