MaXXXine (Ti West, 2024)
MaXXXine is the third entry in Ti West’s much acclaimed horror franchise, that started in 2022 when both X and Pearl were released.
There is talk of a fourth movie in the series, so calling MaXXXine the ‘trilogy capper’ may no longer be applicable.
Which would be fine with me. This movie has a lot of qualities, but leaves us on a rather ambiguous note, so that another entry would be welcome.
Set in 1979, the violently terrifying X introduced us to a bunch of amateur filmmakers, who hired a barn on a farm to shoot a dirty movie, unbeknownst to its good Christian owners, who didn’t take kindly to this sinful behavior, which in turn led to all kinds of mayhem.
Mia Goth did double duty in X as both budding porn star Maxine Minx and the farmer’s murderous wife Pearl. She then played Pearl again in the equally impressive prequel, set in 1918, charting Pearl’s own quest to find fame - the failure to make her dream come true leading to her ultimate confrontation with Maxine in X, as two different sides of the same coin.
In MaXXXine, set in 1985, Goth is back as Minx, who is now a big name in adult entertainment and longs to make the transition to regular movies. She gets her chance to shine when she nails an audition to star in the horror movie The Puritan 2, directed by haughty English director Liz Bender, played by the always magnificent Elizabeth Debicki, who basically reprises her role of Princess Diana in The Crown, just in a completely different setting. Liz has dreams of ‘making B-movies with A-level ideas,’ and dismisses conservative protesters - it was the time of Satanic Panic and the Night Stalker - with the already classic one-liner ‘angry people are so easy to lead.’
Maxine, meanwhile, hopes to join the likes of Jamie Lee Curtis, Demi Moore, John Travolta and Brooke Shields, who broke through in horror before crossing over to mainstream movies. But life is not going to be that easy for Maxine, as she may be through with the past but the past isn’t through with her (to quote Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia).
Soon the bodies start to pile up, beginning with a couple of Maxine’s adult colleagues (Halsey and Chloe Farnworth), which attracts the attention of two police officers (Michelle Monaghan and Bobby Cannavale) and some more shady characters, like a private dick played with a lot of relish by Kevin Bacon.
Maxine gets support from her manager Teddy Night (Giancarlo Esposito) and Leon (Moses Sumner), the video store owner who lives next door to her, but it’s clear that she will have to take the law into her own hands to survive In Hollywood.
X was heavily inspired by the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, while Pearl payed hommage to the Golden Age of Hollywood. With MaXXXine writer and director Ti West makes it crystal clear he has a lot of affection for the ‘video nasties’ of the 1980’s and the movie’s grizzly look and feel coupled with the atmospheric sound design make for an engrossing cinematic experience.
The actors are all excellent, with Mia Goth getting every opportunity to shine as a wounded character, who though haunted by demons keeps her inner fire burning to achieve her goals in a hostile environment that would chew her up and spit her out at the first sign of weakness.
MaXXXine is a full frontal attack on Puritanism, but as far as feminist movies go, I like to think that it is also an ode to all the young women who ever travelled to Hollywood in the hope of making it big, but wound up either drugged, derailed or dead, like Elizabeth Short who became known as The Black Dahlia and who is mentioned early on in the movie.
MaXXXine tries to redress the balance and could use another killer movie to tie up the whole story of Maxine Minx.
Note: MaXXXine is out now in most of the world, with Argentina, Latvia, Italy, Spain and Denmark to follow in the next month.