Illustration by Michael DiMilo
Young at Heart: Film Review of X
★★★1/2
By Geoff Carter
The A24 production group has almost singlehandedly revitalized the horror film genre. With elevated horror epics like The Witch, Hereditary, or Midsommar this company has taken psychological terror to new spellbinding levels. Now, with Ti West’s The Film X Series, A24 has initiated a revitalization of gory classics like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Psycho, and Last House on the Left with a dash of Lake Placid thrown in for fun.
The first installment of Ti West’s trilogy is X, the story of a group of adult film producers who rent a shack behind a secluded Texas farmhouse as their studio location. The troupe, composed of producer Wayne (Martin Henderson), student filmmaker RJ (Owen Campbell) and his shy girlfriend and grip Lorraine (Jenna Ortega) and adult film actors Jackson (Scott Mescudi), Bobby-Lynne (Brittany Snow) and Maxine (Mia Goth)—who also plays Pearl, the murderous old lady who lives in the farmhouse with her husband Howard (Stephen Ure (and voiced by Larry Fessenden)).
When the adult film crew arrives in their white van—very much like the arrival of the group in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre—Howard voices his disapproval of them and objects to the fact that Wayne hadn’t mentioned such a large group would be staying there but ultimately leaves them alone.
During a shoot with Jackson and Bobby-Lynne, Maxine wanders away and meets Pearl at the house, who invites her in for lemonade. Pearl wistfully remarks how much Maxine looked like her when she was younger. When Howard returns from town, Pearl unexpectedly ushers Maxine out, making her promise not to mention she was there.
After a long day of shooting, Lorraine starts asking questions about doing porn and asks to participate, upsetting RJ. That night, he angrily decides to leave and meets up with Pearl, who asks to dance with him and tries to kiss him. Repulsed, he pushes her away and Pearl stabs him to death.
While what follows as Pearl cuts down the pornographers one by one is a more or less traditional plotline for a slasher film, West has managed to make Pearl the killer into a sympathetic figure. Lamenting her lost youth to Maxine, who she sees as her younger self, and RJ, who she tries to seduce, coupled with her husband’s refusal to make love to her, Pearl becomes a symbol of abandonment and sorrow.
In one of the saddest—and creepiest—scenes of the movie, Pearl strips and climbs into bed next to Maxine, caressing and kissing her in a pathetic effort to feel loved—or even noticed as something besides an embittered old lady.
X has been cited by a number of critics as an example of the psycho-biddy horror subgenre, which focuses on aged women who become unbalanced and wreak havoc on those around. Films like Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte, and Sunset Boulevard fall into this category. Pearl is one of the most extreme examples.
Besides his homage to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, West seems to enjoy rather tongue-in-cheek references to other iconic horror films. The scene where Wayne meets his demise is reminiscent of Phantasm while Theda, the alligator in the back pond tended to by the old lady, is a direct reference to Lake Placid, whose giant reptile is tended to by none other than Betty White. JR’s grisly demise is over-the-top blood-soaked drive-in theater fun while the other murders are less grisly, though no less expected.
Themes of regaining and eternalizing lost youth resonate throughout X. Is Lorraine’s desire to be in the porn film a reflection of an unconscious desire to immortalize her youthful body on film? Pearl’s desire to be noticed as someone besides an ugly old lady understandable and who is lonely for any kind of attention is sad but understandable.
The second feature in The Film X series, a prequel to this feature, is titled Pearl. In it, we are introduced to Pearl (Mia Goth) as a young, pretty, starry-eyed, ambitious, (and homicidally psychopathic} girl who will do anything to get away from the family farm—anything. Her youth and exuberance (especially during an especially creepy scene when she is dancing with and assaulting a neighbor’s scarecrow) is in stark contrast to the Pearl in X.
X is mostly shot in a dark contrasty style. The porn sequences seem steeped in a sort of sepia perhaps to convey a sense of Pearl’s nostalgia for physical love. In Pearl, the X series’ second installment, every frame is filled with ultra-saturated colors, perhaps a reflection of her naïve hopes.
X is an homage to the classic slasher film as well as a tribute to age and the shattered dreams of our youth. Moving well beyond its use of the expected tropes of the genre, the film transcends the blood and gore and shock kills, giving us a sympathetic portrait of a woman beset by age, loneliness, and the specter of her own mortality.
After watching it, the words from “Hello in There”, an old John Prine tune, popped into my head.
“You know that old trees just grow stronger
And old rivers grow wilder every day
Old people just grow lonesome
Waiting for someone to say
“Hello in there, hello”
–“Hello in There” by John Prine
But just be careful who it is you say hello to….
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