Review: MaXXXine (2024)

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Take one part Brian De Palma voyeuristic thriller, another part Italian giallo film (not mutually exclusive, as demonstrated by Body Double and Dressed to Kill), a dose of serial killer true crime, and several pinches of Quentin Tarantino-esque Los Angeles mythmaking and you get MaXXXine. The film is the latest collaboration between horror director Ti West and budding scream queen Mia Goth.

You might think it’s reductive to begin the conversation about MaXXXine speaking entirely to other works of art, but MaXXXine is pastiche and Ti West is a pastiche artist. You won’t find originality here, nor the kind of slowburn atmosphere and character work you get in West’s best films, The House of the Devil (2009), X (2022), and Pearl (2022). The latter two of these are the predecessors of MaXXXine and feature the same star and characters, so it’s undeniable that in comparison MaXXXine is something of a step down after the highs of those two films. But what you do get with MaXXXine is style and fun. It’s a rather ridiculous romp through Los Angeles with a big-name cast (Kevin Bacon, Giancarlo Esposito, Bobby Cannavale, Michelle Monaghan, and Lily Collins round out the cast), a luscious 1980s sheen, and Mia Goth delivering the goods in her lead performance (though she’s not quite as showstopping as she was in the previous two films).

Picking up a few years after X, MaXXXine follows Mia Goth’s Maxine Minx in 1985 Hollywood, as she attempts to make the transition from porn to real motion pictures. She gets her possible big break as she lands the lead in a horror sequel by a pretentious director (Elizabeth Debicki). But when all the people closest to her start falling prey to a serial killer sporting black leather gloves—the movie is deliberately set during the Night Stalker’s reign of terror in Los Angeles—Maxine wonders who’s out to get her and whether she can kill her stalker before he kills her. The movie teases a potential showdown between Maxine and the Night Stalker, which would’ve really made the film something of a horror-soaked Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood clone, but, spoiler alert, Ti West and Mia Goth have other interests in mind.

MaXXXine is extremely violent and grisly. Throats are slashed, gallons of blood flow. In a memorable early moment, Maxine even dispatches a would-be rapist with a stiletto stomp on his genitals. West has fun crafting miniature moments of suspense and grotesque violence, whether in a video rental store or a Hollywood Hills mansion that seems right out of Body Double. The movie doesn’t sustain the tension of X or The House of the Devil because it eschews the slowburn approach, but it is entertaining and keeps you engaged with the mystery behind the killer and Maxine’s own Hollywood exploits. In spite of the dark subject matter, the film is also playful, having fun with the lead character and the gritty world she inhabits.

An opening audition scene where Maxine lands the lead role in the horror feature captures the film’s tongue-in-cheek nature. The camera holds on Maxine’s face as she (in character) launches into a tearful confession about her traumatic past. Anyone who’s seen Pearl (which is presumably most of the audience) will notice the similarity to the late scene from that film, where Goth gives a five-minute monologue about her hopes and dreams in a single, unbroken take. It’s a remarkable moment in Pearl, but here, West and Goth are less precious about their past work and poke fun at their potentially pretentious artistic aspirations. As Maxine ends her confession and the director calls “scene,” Maxine’s face goes blank, she wipes away the tears, and walks out of the audition room, telling the other girls waiting to play the scene to go home, cause they’re not as good as Maxine Minx.

All the magic on her face was just a shallow show, Maxine showing the director (and by extension, us, the viewers) how we’re puppets in her hand. She can make us feel what she wants and we’re powerless to stop her, or so she thinks, which makes her overconfident, as a performer cannot control the nature of the reaction they inspire. That’s the central thesis of X: often, the urges you inspire cannot be controlled. Perhaps MaXXXine is guilty of some of the overconfidence of its central character. Like De Palma, West luxuriates in style and pomp, but jumps over logic in scene constructions. And much like the giallo films it’s inspired by, MaXXXine leans into ludicrous, almost camp, storytelling in its revelations.

I understand why some people were so disappointed by the film when comparing it to X and Pearl, but taken as a 1980s giallo-inspired romp, MaXXXine is an appealing summer slasher entertainment. The film’s pastiche approach is not a drawback, but essential to its nature. It’s trying to embody the style and screams and, yes, silliness of the films it’s inspired by. At one point in the film, Elizabeth Debicki’s director says she wants to direct a “B movie with A ideas.” X and Pearl might qualify as such, but MaXXXine is much more a B movie with B ideas, through and through.

6 out of 10

MaXXXine (2024, USA)

Written and directed by Ti West; starring Mia Goth, Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney, Michelle Monaghan, Bobby Cannavale, Halsey, Lily Collins, Giancarlo Esposito, Kevin Bacon.

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