What if a flock of ballerinas had been stranded in a dive bar, the place they need to battle a vicious mob boss to get out alive? That is the premise of Fairly Deadly, the brand new motion comedy starring Lana Condor (To All of the Boys I’ve Cherished Earlier than), Millicent Simmonds (A Quiet Place), Avantika (Imply Ladies 2024), Iris Apatow (The Bubble), and Maddie Ziegler, who was the middle of such iconic Sia music movies as “Chandelier” and “Elastic Coronary heart.”
The plotline looks as if one thing out of a ’70s exploitation movie, the place ultra-femininity collides with grotesque, graphic violence. Nonetheless, the solid feels extra in line for a reboot of Sugar & Spice or Deliver It On, teen comedies that relied on charming ingenues and high-energy antics. Like exploitation motion pictures that capitalized on rising media tendencies, Fairly Deadly appears to stroll within the footsteps of current ballerina-does-violence motion pictures, just like the 2024 horror-comedy Abigail, a few pint-sized vampire lady who paired her fangs with a tutu, and 2025’s Ballerina, a John Wick spinoff starring Ana de Armas. Notably, Fairly Deadly is produced by John Wick helmer David Leitch. So, audiences may properly count on the form of modern fashion and jaw-dropping violence of that franchise.
Sadly, Fairly Deadly pales compared to all of those potential inspiration factors. It is simply not outrageous or stunning sufficient to rise above feeling like an imitator.
Fairly Deadly feels fairly primary.
Uma Thurman performs a bar proprietor with a ballet previous in “Fairly Deadly.”
Credit score: Prime Video
Written by Kate Freund and directed by Vicky Lewson, Fairly Deadly begins in a ballet studio, the place an American troupe of minor ballerinas is getting ready for an enormous competitors abroad.
Quicker than they will pirouette, their personalities are clear. Condor is the wealthy and privileged imply lady who feels entitled to the principal dancer position. Naturally, her title is Princess. And he or she completely loathes Bones, who’s poor, powerful as nails, and the perfect dancer, so she’s performed by Ziegler. Candy, good lady Grace (Avantika) is deeply Christian and needs the ladies would not battle — and would discover Jesus as their private lord and savior. In the meantime, sisters Chloe (Simmonds) and Zoe (Apatow) are low-key combating as a result of Chloe, who’s deaf, would not recognize Zoe’s overeager babying of her at each flip.
They’re struggling to return collectively as a dance troupe. However when their bus breaks down in Hungary on the way in which to the competitors, the 5 women and their teacher stumble throughout a decadent bar referred to as the Teremok Inn. Inside, they discover mementos from the proprietor’s (Uma Thurman) time as a ballet dancer. However the entire place, as soon as luxurious, is stained by years of neglect, bar fights, and resentment.
It isn’t lengthy earlier than a confrontation with a handsy patron results in their teacher being murdered earlier than their very eyes. Can these ballerinas put their private points apart and switch their artwork right into a martial artwork to outlive?
Fairly Deadly lacks a particular fashion.
There’s promise within the Teremok Inn, as its inside instantly suggests a time of splendor and chance lengthy eroded by one thing ugly. Nonetheless, Lewson falls into the tiresome coloration palette of dingy greens tinting mustards, magentas, and teals. This look has turn out to be tediously commonplace in any motion film attempting to have an effect on a classy John Wick vibe (see additionally: Resort Artemis).
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Past that, although, even the ballerina’s outfits are frustratingly anticipated. Once they arrive, soaked to the bone from strolling within the rain, a snarling bartender calls for they placed on dry garments. Clearly, which means their meticulously white uniforms, full with pointe footwear and lengthy tutus. Now, a white costume (like a white T-shirt) is an ideal canvas for the anticipated sprays of blood as they will brawl with harmful Hungarian goons. However the easy design of those clothes does nothing to differentiate the ladies from each other or so as to add panache to the movie’s manufacturing design.
These uninspired visuals do not assist the screenplay, which reads like a mediocre ’90s teen comedy. The acquainted archetypes of powerful lady, imply lady, good lady, and bickering sisters is one factor, however the lack of zinging dialogue is one other. None of Princess’ barbs are stinging sufficient to recollect. The battling between sisters is frustratingly surface-level. And midway by means of, the “good lady” act will get so tedious that Grace is pressured right into a psychedelic drug journey. There, at the very least we get some sudden visible aptitude, as towering nutcrackers come to life to warn her to run.
But within the midst of these hallucinations, I puzzled if the film can be extra visually thrilling if Lewson had rejected the cool-toned strategy and embraced the brightly coloured, high-saturated, ultra-femme coloration palettes of movies like Imply Ladies, Deliver It On, or However I am a Cheerleader. Reasonably than undercutting the grime of the Hungarian bar, such a palette may need made the flip to violence much less telegraphed. And to see blood spray in such a vivid setting would have been extra stunning and even funnier.
Fairly Deadly has stable motion.
Be warned: It takes some time to get to the ballerinas-fight-back stage of the film. Freund makes an attempt some semblance of realism by having the ladies scream, run, and panic for fairly some time earlier than they determine to weapon up and battle again. Nonetheless, after we lastly get up to now, Fairly Deadly is fairly enjoyable.
It isn’t simply {that a} razor blade on the level of a ballet slipper seems to be the right technique to slit an enemy’s throat with a correct fouetté flip. It is also that seeing certainly one of their quantity pull this off strengthens the others’ confidence. They lastly start to return collectively, and the vitality of the movie lastly musters pleasure. Nonetheless, as a result of it takes so lengthy to get going, the ultimate act feels chaotic. The turns it takes really feel like shortcuts as an alternative of earned. So, even once I loved the bonkers motion (like a bunch of ballerinas leaping away from an infinite explosion), I felt disconnected from the vicarious thrill of all of it.
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There’s potential within the set items of Fairly Deadly, together with a sequence the place the ladies carry out ballet on a stage, their as soon as pristine costumes grungy in blood and muck. However Lewson’s strategy lacks punch in coloration, perspective, and music. The correct tune might have made this sequence rousing, however a easy piano is not sufficient to promote the undercurrent of feelings which might be given a spot to blow up right here. So, it is extra a whimper than a roar of a efficiency.
Talking of performances, they’re everywhere. Maybe that is intentional, as an instance how totally different these women are from one another. To Condor’s credit score, she efficiently shakes off the rom-com heroine cheeriness of To All The Boys, recreating herself as a seething bitch. Ziegler, who shone in The Aftermath reverse Jenna Ortega, is stable because the guarded powerful lady, however is at her finest within the dance/battle scenes the place she will depend on physicality to talk for her. As was true in 2024’s Imply Ladies, Avantika’s position was skinny, however she’s solidly amusing as a clueless hanger-on. Simmonds is the perfect of the bunch, nevertheless, managing to work in teen lust and angst, even inside a flimsy subplot. Apatow struggles essentially the most with the thinly written characters, enjoying earnest to the purpose the place she’s virtually an echo. Fortunately, Thurman is darkly enjoyable as a twisted former ballerina with an ax to grind.
Ultimately, Fairly Deadly is okay for a film to throw on for an evening in. However with this solid and this premise, I positively anticipated one thing weirder and wilder and extra satisfying.
Fairly Deadly was reviewed out of the 2026 SXSW Movie Competition; it premieres on Prime Video on March 25.
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