What does "Pretty Lethal" tell us about Modern Femininity

If you have ever wanted to see a ballerina movie that features Eastern European mob crime and dance fighting, Pretty Lethal is the movie for you. With a stacked but also relatively experimental cast featuring Uma Thurman, Maddie Zeigler, Lana Condor, and Iris Apatow, to name a few. The film was released on Amazon Prime Video on March 25, 2026, and was produced in collaboration with 87North Productions and Gulfstream Pictures. The movie was highly anticipated on social media due to the cast and ballerina-style violence. Movies of the “ballet-fu” style are rare, recently seen successfully in the John Wick world with the film, From the World of John Wick: Ballerina. 

Pretty Lethal attempts to take on many aspects of the “ballerina” film, ranging from the interpersonal female relationships in the studio to the idea of being an elite female athlete in a patriarchal society. The film follows five ballerinas and their coach, Thorna (Lydia Leonard). Similar to the Dance Moms setup, there are dancers on top of the pyramid and ones below. Bones (Maddie Ziegler) and Princess (Lana Condor) go head-to-head for a solo in their group's number at the beginning of the film. Sisters Chloe (Millicent Simmonds) and Zoe (Iris Apatow) work together as Chloe is fully deaf. Finally, Grace (Avantika Vandanapu), a zealously religious teenager, battles through reality to find what she feels is god’s plan for her.  

Bones, while talented, is seemingly the least fortunate ballerina and struggles with attitude, but in accordance with Ziegler and her career, she is the most talented one on stage. All five ballerinas and their coach are stranded after being invited to an international ballet event in Budapest. The group’s van breaks down, and they have no choice but to seek shelter at the Teremok Inn, which is owned by a woman named Devora (Uma Thurman). Devora is a retired elite ballerina and becomes obsessed with the girls as they resemble the young girl she once was. Without spoiling the entire plot of the movie, death and violence ensue, but in a very graceful way. Every fight scene happens with the ballerinas on pointe, not only dancing. The fight scenes are choreographed with aggressive tour-jetes. A box cutter breaks into Bones’s point shoe, and it becomes a staple weapon for the girl squad. 

To survive, Devora and her Hungarian Mob, the ballerinas must battle for their lives, but as Bones notes, “These guys are drunk and out of shape, and we're prima fucking ballerinas." Multiple times throughout the movie, there is an emphasis on the intense work and injuries that go into becoming a high-level ballerina. These aspects of their lives, the broken toes, and the cutthroat mentality are some of the reasons that the girls can make it out in one piece. 

In an interview with Cosmopolitan, the five young actresses joke together as they collectively interview each of the cast members. Millicent Simmonds, who lost her hearing at the age of two, signs to Apatow to ask her if there is any piece of advice she would give to younger girls. Jokingly, Apatow says, “learn how to fight… that's how I handled things.” While I doubt the child of Judd Apatow and Leslie Mann did a lot of fighting, her spunky energy is a great example of the vibrant feminine energy that is displayed in Pretty Lethal.

The movie, while at times corny, attempts to do a lot in the span of an hour and a half, but notably displays that a graceful but disciplined feminine sport such as ballet does not create princesses (literally) but instead powerful, often scary women. The aspects of the plot, while short, that focus on the incredible pain and suffering that goes into becoming good at a craft are rarely talked about. In 2026, my expectations for the film were higher, but the shortcomings of this film specifically just reinforce the idea that is already known: no one exactly knows how to portray women in action films. While I wish that more people would make more badass female-led action movies – ones that also feature complex interpersonal relationships without stripping women of the aspects that make them themselves, such as a competitive spirit – this is a step in the right direction.