Warning: The following article contains spoilers for Ballerina.
Explosive action. Intricate fight choreography. Incredible stunt work. These are phrases that describe the John Wick franchise, Hollywood’s gold standard for action movies. The Wick series now adds a spinoff to its lineup with Ballerina, which follows a female assassin (Ana de Armas) and her quest for vengeance. If you were nervous Ballerina would stray away from John Wick’s signature style, think again. One of the film’s stars, Catalina Sandino Moreno, experienced these sensational stunts firsthand.
“The stunt doubles are incredible,” Moreno tells us in an interview. “These people are incredible. They’re passionate. They love it. They have the adrenaline in their blood. It’s pretty amazing to watch.”
Directed by Len Wiseman, Ballerina stars de Armas as Eve Macarro, an orphan sent to train with the Ruska Roma and become an assassin. As an adult, Eve chooses to avenge her father and kill those responsible for his murder. Eve’s travels lead her to the Continental Prague, where she has her first encounter with another assassin, Lena. Like Eve, Lena is also an orphan, one who was raised by the Chancellor (Gabriel Byrne) in the remote Austrian mountain village of Hallstatt, a place populated entirely by assassins.
Eve and Lena share several similarities: sharpshooting, combat proficiency, and toughness. It’s almost like the two females are cut from the same cloth. As it turns out, Eve and Lena are sisters, a stunning reveal that caught Moreno off guard when she first read the script.
“When I knew the relationship between the two, I didn’t see it coming,” Moreno says. “If I go back to my character, I saw that she was an orphan. She was raised by the Chancellor. That was her father figure. She had an absent mother. And then I see Ana’s character, and she’s kind of the same. Her father was killed. Absent mother. Maybe I should have been like, ‘Hmm.'”
Ballerina includes a memorable third act, one where the violence never stops and the death toll increases by the second. Keanu Reeves’ John Wick even shows up to prove he’s still the best hitman with a gun. After starring in a John Wick movie, Moreno now has a newfound appreciation for this genre.
“Working on an action film is so much work,” Moreno explains. “When you do an action film, you don’t want to hurt each other because accidents happen. The dance has to be very specific and calculated. I see action films in a very different light now.”
Ballerina is now in theaters.
