MaXXXine (2024)

a review by Evan Landon

The third and final entry in Ti West's X trilogy sees Mia Goth step into the executive producer seat alongside Jacob Jaffke, Harrison Kriess, West, and the late Kevin Turan (who unfortunately passed away in November 2023). It ties up the 3 films pretty well, as it takes on not only the depitction of cinema's influence on society, but it does it with tongue pressed firmly in cheek alongside organized religion undertones and it's effects on the entertainment industry.

In this one, we find Maxine (the final girl from the first film) in 1985 Hollywood, where she is moving on from the pornography industry to B-Movie sequels. This particular film is titled “Puritan II” and she has scored the lead which she believes will be her ticket out of doing peep shows and porn for money. She does not care about that, however; she wants to be a star and she will accomplish it no matter what, despite the very real “Night Stalker” (no, not Kolchak) on the loose. Her problem is not that killer, but another one who has hired a pesky private investigator to threaten her with the porno she made in X. As her new friends start dying, she must find out who is killing them and trying to blackmail her before it is too late.

What is a shame is that I did not find Mia Goth as engaging as she usually is. She is great, do not get me wrong, but she seems much more subdued in Maxxxine than in the other movies. I had to squint pretty hard to tell if it was Kevin Bacon behind that strange Cajun accent, so I guess he was fine and Giancarlo Esposito was barely in it. Michelle Monaghan and Bobby Cannavale are just fine too as the detectives sent to investigate if the murders were in connection to the Night Stalker's, but that is really the only acting worthy of note. In Pearl, it was easier to disguise the poor acting because of how over the top Goth's performance was, but in this her character is more subtle to the point I wonder if she is just phoning it in with all the other parts she has been tackling.

What sets this one apart from the other films in the series is mainly the setting, but that is apart of the trilogy's agenda and charm. What does not set it apart from a lot of other slashers released these days is that very same thing. Countless modern horror flicks, such as The Neon Demon, Climax, Enter The Void, even the remake of Susperia pay homage to the “giallo” subgenre - which is awesome! It should and it does. My point is that there are a lot of them, so it fits in more with those than it's own series.

As far as the kills and the gore, it lacked a lot and felt like they held back a lot, but I suppose they did a lot of that in Pearl. Some of it happens in a weird cut scene and when it doesn't, it is off screen, except for a good ole castration. That did make the cut.

A24 must have learned their lesson with Pearl because Maxxxine only cost $1 million, as opposed to the $8 million spent on Pearl. X also only cost $1 million (I say a million like it's nothing). Cleaning up $20.4 million at the worldwide box office, Maxxxine is the highest grossing of all three films.

With all it's glitz and glamor, Maxxxine misses the mark here and there, but when it does hit, it knocks it out of the park. There are some very good scenes that tie what seems a little incoherent at times better to the main plotline, but Goth just seems checked out most of the time, so some of it seems lost. Again, that might just be her character. Either way, it's a strange decision.

3 Out Of 5

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PEARL (2022)