‘Abigail’ and the Bloody Dance of Disappointment [Fatal Femmes]
Editor’s note: The following contains major spoilers for Abigail.
Few subgenres are as enjoyable or unexpected as ballet horror. From classics like Suspiria (1977, 2018) and The Red Shoes (1948) to modern psychological thrillers like Black Swan (2010) and the New French Extremity film Livid (2011), there’s something inherently chilling about the combination of icy perfection mixed with violent death. Though disparate on the surface, both art forms tell stories through movement and both are known for iconic images produced by painful contortions. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett explore the connection between these striking types of performance in Abigail, a vampire film that pits a pint-sized ballerina against a team of career criminals. With an overture of upsetting crime, the story explodes into a bloody finale in which those left standing dance a deadly duet in hopes of remaining alive until the curtain goes down.
Her Story
Abigail (Alisha Weir) is a 12-year-old ballerina and the only child of an ultra-wealthy man. After performing excerpts from Swan Lake to an empty recital hall, she’s relaxing in her bedroom when a trio of masked criminals emerge from the shadows. They inject her with a sedative and whisk her away to a safe house where they await a $50 million payday. The team’s medic, Joey (Melissa Barrera) forms a bond with the frightened tween and vows to protect her from Frank (Dan Stevens), the group’s pitiless leader.
But Joey gets spooked when Abigail hints at her father’s brutality. Realizing they may be in over their heads, the team tries to flee only to find themselves locked inside the old-fashioned house. Abigail begins to pit her captors against each other before nonchalantly removing the heavy handcuffs and preparing to mount a vicious attack. Predator becomes prey as the young ballerina reveals herself to be a powerful vampire. The entire kidnapping plot was a set-up and the dancing killer settles in for an entertaining meal.
Her Weapons
Abigail may be small compared to her adult kidnappers, but like most vampires, she possesses a powerful body capable of regeneration and teeth that can rip through flesh and bone. She may not be able to explode into a cloud of bats, but she has superhuman strength and the ability to fly. Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett take their own swing at vampire lore as the team frantically searches for Abigail’s weaknesses. She can be killed by direct sunlight, but only if it hits the majority of her body. Similarly, a wooden stake will cause her to explode in a cascade of gore, but only if driven directly through her heart. She is vulnerable to an injectable sedative, but she will wake up rested and ready to kill. Even draining her of blood requires extended time and will probably only result in slowing her down.
Another interesting addition to these vampire rules is Abigail’s ability to control victims from afar. Teen hacker Sammy (Kathryn Newton) discovers this trick the hard way after she’s bitten on the arm during a vicious attack. The panicked girl looks at the circular wound and worries she, too, will become a creature of the night. With Abigail’s vague explanation ringing in her ears, Sammy soon finds herself caught in the worst-case scenario. A creepy record begins to play and Abigail attacks from a faraway room. Sammy loses control of her body and mind as the masterful vampire transforms her into a murderous avatar. She turns on her closest friend in the house, a muscle-bound brute called Peter (Kevin Durand), before Abigail discards her and leads her to a hideous death.
Like most undead killers and tweens before her, Abigail possesses a flair for the dramatic. Rather than hunt her prey in their own environment, she concocts an elaborate scheme to trap six criminals in her sprawling murder house where she can exert ultimate control. Unwitting pawns in her deadly dance, she amuses herself by using traditional ballet choreography to chase them through corridors and grand ballrooms while picking her partners off one by one. Though she enters the house in ballet class attire, the tiny performer takes time to change into the iconic white tutu of Swan Lake fame. As one of Tchaikovsky’s little swans, she evokes the innocent beauty of a jewelry box figurine. But as the night wears on, the bodies pile up and her pristine costume becomes covered in blood. Now closer to the story’s villainous black swan, she deceives her captors and sentences them to death.
Her Victims
When Abigail reveals herself to be an undead killer, she turns a band of kidnappers into sympathetic victims. Most of the team are charming and charismatic anti-heroes despite the fact that they’re introduced while committing a horrifying crime. As their mark lies restrained in a nearby bedroom, the team gets to know each other as best they can while protecting their true identities should one of them get caught.
Sammy made her bones by stealing from her wealthy parents while Peter still carries the trauma of childhood bullying. Dean (Angus Cloud) may be dealing with mental illness while Joey is a recovering drug addict. Rickles (William Catlett) was once a marine and bonds with Joey who served as a battlefield medic. He vows to help her survive the night after learning she has an estranged son close to Abigail’s (human) age. Only Frank proves to be an outright villain. This rogue group leader was once a detective who went deep undercover in an underground organization run by crime lord Kristof Lazar (Matthew Goode). Enamored with the outlaw lifestyle, he reinvented himself as a career criminal and now facilitates these jobs with a fixer called Lambert (Giancarlo Esposito).
As the marked men and women put the trap’s pieces together, they realize they have something else in common. Each of them has wronged Lazar in some way. In addition to kidnapping his daughter, they’ve either stolen from his powerful empire, worked with a competitor, or shared information with the police and now find themselves on his long list of enemies. To make matters worse, they realize that Lazar is Abigail’s father. She serves as his bloodthirsty enforcer and plans to dispatch them one by one to prove her devotion.
Her Motive
Before revealing her true identity, Abigail warns Joey that her father will not pay for her release. He may have loved her once, but he quickly grew tired of having a daughter and doesn’t value her life over the $50 million the kidnappers demand. As the full details of Abigail’s plan unfold, this turns out to be only half true. Since the kidnapping plot is entirely fake, Abigail is not concerned about her father’s refusal to pay. But she does believe that he no longer views her with love. If she can kill off his victims in brutally painful ways, maybe he will take a new interest in the daughter on whom he once doted and shower her with affection once again.
While it’s difficult to fathom a parent losing interest in his child, Lazar’s undead status provides more context. With eternity to while away, it’s likely the vampire got lonely or bored and created a child to pass the years. Perhaps he realized too late that a vampiric tween will never grow up and he won’t be able to watch her mature over the years. Though Abigail does hone her hunting skills and dancing abilities, she will never reach full adulthood and may seem like an inferior companion in her selfish father’s eyes.
His indifference mirrors Joey’s motive for joining the dangerous scheme. In the midst of her drug abuse, she lost custody of her son and now avoids reaching out for fear of his anger. Feeling the other side of this betrayal, Abigail encourages the soldier-turned-criminal to reestablish contact, reminding her that the most valuable element of parenting is simply showing up. She encourages Joey to forgive herself and call her son for both of their sakes.
As Frank proves to be more ruthless, Abigail and Joey stop battling each other and simply try to survive. However, Lambert has plans of his own. He hopes to turn Frank into a vampire and take over Lazar’s operation, killing Abigail as part of the bargain. Frank willingly partakes in the transformative ritual but stops short of partnering with the man who once betrayed him. Frank has never been exactly nice and sets his sights on the two women who have been foiling his plans.
Filled with newfound vampiric power, he delights in draining Abigail of blood and bites Joey in hopes of turning her into a puppet. Likely thinking of how she challenged him earlier in the evening, Frank plans to amuse himself by commanding Joey to kill her son. Fortunately, Abigail sees that regardless of her criminality, the attentive medic is essentially a good person who desperately wants to make amends with her child. Perhaps hoping her father will do the same, she makes a last-minute deal and joins forces with Joey to take Frank down.
Her Legacy
This performative killer will likely emerge as one of the subgenre’s most unexpected stars. While playing with classic vampiric tropes, Abigail embodies the fascinating appeal of a majestic ballerina mixed with the intoxicating draw of a bloodthirsty killer. With classical music blaring through the house, she puts on a show not only for the audience, but the unassuming victims she plans to dismember. She enjoys the thrill of playing with her food and stages elaborate shows to destabilize her prey, constantly allowing them to believe they have the upper hand before turning the tables with murderous glee.
Though her blood-soaked capers are fun to watch, Abigail also contains surprising humanity. Likely remembering Joey’s kindness in the early hours of this kidnapping debacle, she softens toward the frightened mother and allows her to live. When her father does finally arrive we see another striking contrast. Lazar is a towering vampire who has built his reputation on a grisly history of vindictive torture. But he softens when confronted by his daughter’s disappointment. Abigail connects with this monster and shows him the pain his abandonment has caused then convinces him to let Joey leave unharmed. The wisdom of centuries packaged into this image of childlike innocence may yet inspire the wayward mother to turn her life around. Though covered in the blood of her many victims, Abigail reminds us that no matter how monstrous, deep inside we all need love and long for a parent who will always show up.
Categorized:Editorials
