Pretty Lethal

PRETTY LETHAL 🩰 (2026)

From Nobody’s suburban-dad-turned-hitman chaos, to Brad Pitt slicing through a Japanese bullet train full of assassins, to David Harbour playing a Viking Santa who smashes skulls, to Ryan Gosling’s stuntman spectacle The Fall Guy.

87North Productions has built a reputation on slick, crowd-pleasing action.

Now they’re trading fists for footwork… or at least trying to.

PRETTY LETHAL follows a group of ballerinas stranded en route to a competition when their bus breaks down. Their only refuge? A sketchy hotel that quickly turns into a crime scene, and then a full-blown mobster massacre.

On paper, it’s perfect: ballet meets brutality. Grace meets carnage. An elegant setup for a vicious, high-concept action movie.

In reality? It barely lands a pirouette.

I’m always down for a good, bone-crunching takedown flick, but PRETTY LETHAL is all surface. It leans hard into the aesthetic and forgets to bring the impact. The result is a glossy, forgettable action movie that had me constantly checking how much time is left, never a good sign.

There’s a version of this movie that works. Action films are basically violent dances, rhythm, timing, precision. Ballet should’ve been the perfect metaphor: discipline, pain, beauty under pressure. This could’ve been a brutal ballet of bodies and broken bones.

Instead, it’s a repetitive “twirl, hit, repeat” with none of the weight or artistry to make it stick.

Which makes it even more frustrating when you look at the cast. Lana Condor (To All The Boys) leads with real charm and sharp comedic timing, and Maddie Ziegler, Avantika Vandanapu, and Iris Apatow round out a lineup that should have serious energy. Add Uma Thurman, and it feels like a slam dunk.

But the script flattens them all into uninspired stereotypes.

I was hoping for a Bodies, Bodies, Bodies (2022) vibe with ballet-infused combat choreography, especially with this fun of a cast, but no such luck.

Condor rises above it, she’s genuinely fun to watch, but Avantika, in particular, feels stuck replaying the same beats from Mean Girls. Let the girl spread her wings a little and do something different.

I always try to put myself in the shoes of a movie’s target audience, but here, I couldn’t quite find one. Maybe it works for someone who isn’t that deeply invested in the totality of a movie, someone who can enjoy it on a purely surface level, let the film tell them how to react, or just vibe to the genuinely solid soundtrack. But if you’re coming in for the ballet action angle, there’s just not enough there to make it worth your time.

Maybe Timothée Chalamet was right, maybe ballet is dead. (I’m only kidding.) I respect the art form, but unfortunately PRETTY LETHAL is all pirouette, no payoff.

It’s hard to get any kind of high off action this safe, this easy to read, and this low on creativity. Sigh. 

Enjoy!

5.3/10 🍿 🎥

Runtime: 1hr36mins

Where: World Premiere at the 2026 SXSW Film & TV Festival & Now Streaming on Prime Video

The Richmond Reviewer Pretty Lethal Review - March 25th, 2026.