Ana de Armas takes center stage in a John Wick prequel about a dancing orphan's quest for vengeance. The plot flails, but the creative carnage gets an ovation.

Anjelica Huston, Gabriel Byrne and Keanu Reeves also appear in Len Wiseman’s bloodbath of grief and revenge, in which an elite assassin doffs her tutu and goes rogue.

In contrast, “Ballerina”—like the four John Wick films that it’s spun off from—is, strangely, far better at story than at action. The first John Wick film is the weakest, because the framework for the franchise was still unformed: a retired hit man (Keanu Reeves) gets back into action to respond to a mobster’s attacks.