Mariinsky Ballet - Don Quixote review: Fantastic dancing plus filler

​Don Quixote is perhaps not the show to convince you that ballet is a vital, living art form. In the Mariinsky's version, opening a three-week season from the legendary St Petersburg company, the look is Spanish tourist merch come to life, fans and frills; the choreography by Alexander Gorsky from 1900 (after Marius Petipa's 1869 original). The dancers, however, are fantastic.

The presence of Don Q is a folly, he's a bit-part player in the romance of Kitri (Viktoria Tereshkina) and Basil (Kimin Kim). Theirs is a love story with zero jeopardy; a case of mostly filler, a little bit killer – primarily the final act's big variations, expertly executed by the leads.

Tereshkina is pretty much perfection as a ballerina, with sharp, crisp lines, exactly calibrated, and the most perfectly vertical axis in her pirouettes. She may be a bit too perfect for spirited Kitri, but in the dream scene her absolute serenity is breathtaking. Kim is known for his light and lofty leaps, but he brings a warm and likeable presence too, and manages the only bit of comedy that's actually funny.

You get a lot for your money – gypsies, toreadors, slapstick turns, flower fairy fantasies, villagers having a knees up to Minkus's cheery score – even if none of it is much concerned with moving forward a plot.

There's plenty of talent on stage (Ekaterina Chebykina's delicately floating Queen of the Dryads deserves a mention) but they could bring more rambunctiousness to these revels. Maybe see the company in something ethereal or something modern instead, later in the run.

Until 5 August, Royal Opera House; roh.org.uk