Pretty Lethal Parent Guide

While travelling to Budapest, a group of American ballerinas are stranded in the Hungarian countryside when their bus breaks down. Luckily, there is an inn not far away where staff offer a dry place to rest while they call for a cab from the nearest city. But as the dancers settle in, they start to realize that not everything at the Teremok Inn is as it seems. After a tragic incident, the girls find themselves in a life-or-death situation - one that can only be survived through teamwork, and a bit of ballet. 

I love the idea of ballerinas using their dance skills as a weapon. It’s a fantastic premise, and one that leads to some creative, though bloody, action scenes. However, this film fails to deliver on anything beyond the basic idea, which causes the production to fall flat. On the positive side, the actors are trying their best, and there are some convincing performances. It’s obvious that Uma Thurman is having a great time as the inn’s devious owner, and she does elevate the material she’s given. 

Unfortunately, the writing surrounding these performances is abysmal. Most of the characters are one-dimensional stereotypes whose lines seem to come straight out of a corny after school special. As much as I appreciate having one of the ballerinas (Millicent Simmonds) be deaf, her character feels infantilized, which is an ableist trope that should have been left back in the 80s. Though the high level of violence is expected for this genre, some moments did feel gratuitous. I’m convinced that the writers knew they had only 20 minutes of story, so they needed to add some shock value to distract audiences from the overall lack of plot. 

The high levels of violence and profanity along with a terrible script make this a film I can’t recommend. If you are a fan of action violence there are some fight sequences that are worth watching purely for the creativity used to incorporate the ballerina’s skills into an action flick, but you can probably just find those clips on YouTube rather than sitting through the whole movie. But for most people this is a dance worth sitting out.

About author

Savannah Sillito

Savannah Sillito is a librarian with a master's in library science, a bachelor's degree in English, and a certificate in early childhood education. She enjoys nonfiction books, travel, and is a staunch proponent of the Oxford comma.