Ballerina (2025)

From the world of John Wick, that's what we were all sold on here. Okay, there's also the draw of Ana de Armas kicking ass while looking damn fine doing it, but this film definitely wants to please fans of Wick. Does it succeed?

After some scenes showing a girl called Eve having her childhood interrupted by the execution of her father, and then being given a home within the Ruska Roma organization, Ballerina starts to show the training and maturation of a skilled killer (De Armas). She wants revenge though, and that isn't allowed. The Director (Anjelica Huston) explains that the man who murdered her father is the head of a large group that they just tend to leave to their own devices. That doesn't satisfy Eve, however, and she soon embarks on a journey of vengeance that will only end in the death of The Chancellor (Gabriel Byrne) or her own demise. And her own demise might be facilitated by John Wick himself.

Apparently directed by Len Wiseman, but with extensive reshoots overseen by Chad Stahelski, Ballerina is a bit of a mess, but it's a hell of an entertaining one. The visual style and onscreen world-building keeps it nicely within the "Wick-verse", but writer Shay Hatten can't do enough to make anything feel truly consequential. A number of the action sequences feel shoehorned in because they needed to make the 124-minute runtime bearable (and even then, it's disappointing that one great moment isn't shown, the film making use of the aftermath for some humour and explanation of how skilled our lead now is). 

The best thing that this film has going for it is De Armas, a star who still deserves a real blockbuster success built around her. She can handle the action, and also deals with the breadcrumbs of emotional baggage given to her character. Huston also does well, reprising her role from previous movies and being just as strict and severe as ever. Byrne is a decent villain, but really only powerful enough because of how many people he can mobilise and control to attack one enemy, and Ian McShane adds his usual suave greatness as the constant calm presence of Winston. Catalina Sandino Moreno is wasted, and don't even start me on the third act moment that is delivered without any care or impact, Norman Reedus also doesn't really register, and it's a sad truth to say that any time we get Keanu Reeves making a cameo just serves as a reminder of how much better the Wick movies are. Robert Maaser is an impressive henchman, particularly in the jaw-dropping moments that involve some powerful flamethrowers, and Ava McCarthy is convincingly vulnerable and sweet as Ella, a young girl who ends up in the clutches of the baddies, which gives an extra motivation to our deadly lead.

All of the action is staged well, and it's all enjoyable enough, but things only feel truly inspired in an extended third act that makes great use of an interesting setting and a whole swathe of enemy combatants to deliver the kind of unique and inventive fights that have been a hallmark of this franchise. It's also good to be invested in something that feels as if, either way, there will be a consequential resolution to everything.

I enjoyed Ballerina, despite how it may seem from what I have said here. While there are things I have misgivings about, there's a consistency in the gorgeous cinematography, the excellent score, and the choreography and composition all working to keep De Armas framed as the star that she is. I just wanted it to be a bit better, and maybe there will be a step up in quality if we ever get a sequel to this. I'll rewatch this in the meantime, but I'll only after I have rewatched the superior John Wick movies first.

7/10

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Netflix And Chill: The Machine (2023)

A star vehicle for Bert "The Machine" Kreischer, this comedy may be appreciated more by people who were aware of Kreischer's existence before watching it. I am not one of those people. To be fair, an opening sequence sets up both the character and the details that will set the main events in motion, but your reaction to it will still mainly depend on your reaction to Kreischer, who plays a fictional version of himself onscreen.

Having some problems with his family, largely stemming from a night when he got his daughter into some big trouble and live-streamed the whole thing, Bert is at a point when he knows that he needs to calm things down a bit. He needs to leave his past fully behind him, which makes the timing all the worse when his past, in the shape of a dangerous Russian named Irina (Iva Babic), comes to bite him on the ass. Whisked away, with his ever-critical father (Albert, played by Mark Hamill) also caught up in the mess, Bert has to delve into some hazy memories to find a way to make things up to some people he wronged twenty years ago. Are they right to feel wronged though, or has Bert just been exaggerating and lying about some of his drunken exploits for the sake of entertaining the crowds who enjoy his comedy?

I'm not sure how much faint praise I can keep laying on this before it collapses under the weight of it all, but The Machine was perfectly fine. It was better than I expected it to be, but I also know that I'll have forgotten all about it by the time the year ends. It works best when putting Bert and his father in serious trouble (there's a pretty great gag about an accidental gunshot that takes out numerous enemies), but it fails to maintain any consistent momentum, and 112 minutes is far too long for something built on so slight a conceit.

Director Peter Atencio has some great stuff tucked away in his body of work, and he's done action comedy material before with a great bias towards the comedy, but it seems as if everyone here is slightly hampered by having to keep everything on-brand for Kreischer. There's also attempts to have moments that are slightly more serious and heart-felt, which is all well-intentioned stuff, but doesn't work as it unbalances the movie even further away from the lighter tone it should have throughout. Writers Kevin Biegel and Scotty Landes pack in a lot of unnecessary extra flashbacks (at least allowing Jimmy Tatro to have fun as a younger incarnation of Bert), but these mis-steps would have been easier to forgive if there had just been more big laughs.

Kreischer is fine in the main role, shoe-horning his persona into something made to accommodate him, and Hamill has a few really good moments, although they are too few and far between, but it's Babic and Robert Maaser, as well as Martyn Ford, who end up being more memorable. They're enjoyably ridiculous villains written in a way that feels amusingly old-fashioned and over the top, as if we're being told this story, yet again, from someone who is keen to exaggerate the details and turn it from something major into something epic. Tatro is someone I like seeing appear in anything (I've been a big fan since his turn in American Vandal) and his inclusion here, despite being part of the extraneous scenes that strip away the ambiguity of just what happened on that big drunken night, is another plus point. Stephanie Kurtzuba does a good eye-roll as the long-suffering partner, LeeAnn, and Jess Gabor follows suit as the older daughter, Sasha, who has had her life negatively impacted by the antics of her father.

Fitfully amusing, helped by the fact that Kreischer is self-aware to know what people like about his persona, and what can be twisted as he moves towards some kind of redemption, The Machine will never be a top viewing choice for anyone, but I am sure there are some fans out there who will enjoy it a hell of a lot more than I did. The rest of us can forget all about it and focus on the many better comedies available to take up 90-120 minutes of our time.

4/10

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