User:Jensmall/Ballerina (2016 film)

Reception

Box office

According to Box Office Mojo, Ballerina grossed approximately US$106 million worldwide. It opened in France on 14 December 2016 with over half a million admissions, earning €2.2 million (~US$2.4 million) over the course of the weekend. Its French gross eventually reached $14.5 million. In Canada, it earned more than Can$1.5 million during the first 13 days of its theatrical run, $1.1 million of which was made in Quebec. It ultimately grossed a total of Can$3.6 million (~US$2.8 million) in Canada. It was released on 25 August 2017 in the United States, earning $4.7 million over its opening weekend. It grossed $21.9 million in the US, the film's highest-grossing territory.

Critical response

On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the original version of the film holds an approval rating of 75% based on 32 reviews, with an average rating of 5.7/10. The critical consensus reads, "Ballerina's rich setting and beautifully animated dance sequences elevate a solidly crafted all-ages adventure with a surprising amount of colorful flair." On French entertainment information website AlloCiné, the film has an average grade of 3.5/5, based on 17 critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the US version of the film, entitled Leap!, has an approval rating of 42% based on 62 reviews, with an average rating of 4.86/10. The critical consensus for the US version reads, "From its bland story to its unremarkable animation, Leap! does little to distinguish itself from a long list of like-minded – and superior – family-friendly alternatives." On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating to reviews, the film has a weighted average score 48 out of 100, based on 18 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.

After the release of Leap! in the US, many fans and critics noticed changes between Leap! and Ballerina, including the name of the film. Animation news website Cartoon Brew theorized that the film's name was changed to appeal to a wider audience, saying "the reasons for the U.S. title change are unstated, but the trailer gives a pretty clear indication why: the Weinstein Co. did not want to sell this as entertainment strictly for girls." Amid Amidi of Cartoon Brew wrote "Leap! is set up by the Weinstein Co. as the adventure of a girl and boy in fin de siècle Paris. Compare that to the original French teaser, which clearly set up the girl who aspires to become a ballerina as the star of the film." Children's author Paul Bullock commented on the film's name change and wrote: "If a girl goes to the cinema one day and wants to see a film that will speak to her, she’d likely be more won over by Ballerina than Leap!. By skewing so much at young boys, the marketing is creating a barrier between the film and its intended audience – and that’s a real shame for a film that looks like it has the potential to inspire and empower."

Melissa Stewart of Insights magazine of Australia called the film "a heart-warming adventure. ... With the animation capturing the elegance of ballet, it is hard not to be mesmerised by the pirouettes and grand jetés. ... [Félicie's] journey will resonate with for anyone who has experienced the sting of failure and trying to figure out how to bounce back. All of this occurs while humour is trickled throughout the movie making it enjoyable for kids and parents alike. ... [T]he themes of fighting for your passion and dreams is timeless." Mike McCahill of The Guardian wrote: "It's attentively, attractively designed – with a real eye for the light hitting the buildings of a city under construction – but a shade more Black Swan in its DNA might have made the happy ending less inevitable and its pep less repetitive." Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com gave the film one and a half out of four stars, criticizing its numerous "3-D animation clichés" which he said spoil the potential of its original premise, stating that "The best thing about [Leap!] is its portrayal of the dance world, then and now, as both exhilarating and cruel. ... But [the film] doesn't seem to grasp how special these elements are ... it keeps wasting [Félicie's] time (and ours) with theoretically comic or suspenseful subplots that we've seen done many times before, with considerably more wit and feeling".