MaXXXine: The Sleazy Neo-Noir Finale Of The 'X' Series

Mia Goth has joined the likes of Jamie Lee Curtis & Neve Campbell as a generational "scream queen."

Ti West and A24 have hit yet another home run with MaXXXine which debuted last week. And this home run was definitely hit in the form of a line drive - smack right into the faces of its target demo.

The X series goes out with a big bang, drawing influences from all over the place - including Halloween, Psycho, and other 80s films, with a very neo-noir (or maybe even neo-neo-noir!) tone, and possibly even drawing some influence from video games like Outlast 2, L.A. Noire, and Rockstar Games' cult-classic hit Manhunt.

Unlike it's predecessor X, which leaned more toward a 1970s slasher-flick/comedy-combo feel, and served as something of a uniquely original remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, MaXXXine takes on a much darker, sleazier tone, but still delivers a nice hard punch (or should I say stomp - you'll know what I mean once you see the film) to the balls (in the best way possible). Despite the horrifically gruesome murders not being quite as over the top as in X, we still get to see lots of blood, gore, and a sweet execution-style decapitation with a shotgun at the end of the film(definitely one of the nods to Rockstar's Manhunt or maybe even Capcom's Resident Evil 7).

The film follows the morally-ambiguous character titular character Maxine (also the main protagonist of X as well as a reflection character of the titular character Pearl in X's prequel, Pearl) six years after the massacre that occurred while she filmed her first porn movie in Texas (the plot of X). Maxine, at first, seems to have recovered well from the events of X with minimal symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder. But after finding out her friends have been murdered by a perverted deviant known in the film as the "Night Stalker," and then being confronted by a P.I.-turned-criminal (Kevin Bacon) who tells her he knows what she did six years ago, Maxine, in very neo-noir fashion, becomes very paranoid, and begins to remember the gory details of the massacre in Texas, and even hallucinates being attacked by Pearl (spoiler alert: whom Maxine decapitated by running over her head with a car at the end of X). West does a good job of making some of these scenes particularly creepy, most notably when Maxine hallucinates being choked to death by Pearl while she's having a wax mold of her head made during pre-production of the Hollywood film she'll be starring in, as well as when she sees Pearl's menacing face in the window of the Bates' house at Universal Studios' Psycho set in the middle of the second act. Although very neo-noir in its story and atmosphere, this film is definitely still a horror/slasher at its core, and does a good job of creeping out its audience.

The soundtrack in this movie is incredible. The vast majority of the music in this film is original, 1980s-inspired heavily-overdriven guitar riffs, synths, and reverberated drums, and turned out to be one of the most memorable characteristics of the film. West recruited veteran film scorer Tyler Bates to compose the film's soundtrack, and he delivered, in spades. The soundtrack to this movie gets a perfect 10/10 and will almost certainly make even Hans Zimmer a bit jealous.

MaXXXine also features an all-star cast including Giancarlo Esposito, Lily Collins, and Halsey. But besides Goth's awesome performance as Maxine, it was actually Kevin Bacon that really stood out. Bacon's been in dozens of blockbuster films in his career, but his portrayal of the villainous P.I. with a very off-putting southern accent "John" in this film will probably be one of his most memorable characters of all time. Spoiler alert: And admittedly, it's quite satisfying seeing his violently gruesome and bloody demise when Maxine, along with her lawyer and agent (Giancarlo Esposito) cleverly devise a plan to trap and then murder him in the beginning of the third act. This ended up being another one of the most memorable moments in the movie, and the over-the-top violence of the scene was much more on the level of MaXXXine's predecessor, X.

It's also worth noting that Mia Goth seems to be one of the last remaining classically feminine archetypes in Hollywood. We recently wrote about Challengers and how Zendaya really fell back into her femininity for that role (and did it well), and also how Sydney Sweeney and Jenna Ortega seem to be able to actually play sexy, feminine characters without getting upset about it (OMFG, WHAT IS THIS, THE 1950s?!??! YOU MYSOGYNIST!!!), unlike many other Hollywood actresses, who will play characters in a major, large-budget productions, whine about being "sexualized" (whatever the hell that means), and then take their big six or seven-figure paychecks anyway and cash out, and still claim their virtue-signal points along with them once those big fat paychecks hit their bank accounts. But Goth has now been added to that short list of women who embrace their femininity, and don't whine about being "sexualized" (assuming that's even actually happening), as well as to our list of generational "scream queens," like Jamie Lee Curtis, Neve Campbell, and even Jenna Ortega, whom history will also almost certainly remember as an archetypal horror-movie-hott-girl.

MaXXXine is highly-entertaining and serves as a great neo-noir finale for the X series. It's also remarkably different than Pearl and X, and doesn't feel like it's recycling old ideas. The whole film feels new and unpredictable, and dare I say, actually scary at times, which is hard to come by in modern cinema, although sometimes Hollywood is still able to pull it off. It also will make for a great date night - your girlfriend is all but guaranteed to love this 3-star, two thumbs up film (as we rate it) just as much as you will.