MaXXXine (2024)......completes a trilogy of films begun by horror writer-director Ti West and his one-of-a-kind muse, actress Mia Goth.
For us, Goth evokes memories of Mimsy Farmer, the pale, thin blonder-than blonde ingenue of the late 60's and 70's. Farmer briefly wandered through American exploitation movies before settling in for a longer stay in Euro-trash Giallos.....("Autopsy", "Four Flies On Grey Velvet"...)
Their main difference.......Farmer was no actress and her attempts at over-the-top emotions (fear, hysteria, rage) were.....uh.....at least fascinating to watch.
Mia Goth, on the other hand, is the real deal. She's Bette Davis and Joan Crawford piled into the frame of a wispy blonde pixie......she can go from achingly sweet and vulnerable to cold-hearted horror, sometimes within the same shot.
So it's no wonder Ti West put her front and center in 2022's "X" and "Pearl", his artfully bloodsoaked homages to 1970's Texas Chainsaw slashers. In the third film, West and Goth continue the saga of porn star Maxine Minx,who survived the carnage of "X" to pursue her dreams of stardom in 1980's Hollywood.
For those of us who remember this 'Be Kind Rewind' era well, 'MaXXXine' spreads out an ambitious, depraved hellscape of the seediest, most porn-drenched mean streets of L.A.
But the single-minded, relentless Maxine has managed to break out of porn films by snagging a role in 'The Puritan II', a highly anticipated sequel to a hit slasher film. With stardom almost within her grasp, her bizarre, disturbing past of 'X' comes back to torment her with a vengeance. It first arrives in the form of a sleazy P.I. (Kevin Bacon, practically oozing slime out of his pores).
Bacon's representing a black leather clad mystery creep who's taken to slaughtering Maxine's friends .....and who may or may not be the infamous, real life 'Hillside Strangler'. And before everything and everyone's all sorted out, the blood 'n gore flow freely. And Maxine proves, as if we didn't know, that's she's nobody to **** with.
The movie's overly busy attempts to replicate all the touchstones of its era tends to dilute the undeniable charisma of Goth's character. This actress commands the screen. You can't take your eyes off her, which is more we can say for the movie whenever it veers into scenes designed to categorize it as 'elevated horror'.
The hell with 'elevated. Mamma Mia....give us more Goth. (And special note to encyclopedic film buffs.....is it just us or is that final shot a loving tribute to Bert I. Gordon's 'Tormented' along with Mimsy Farmer's climactic moment in 'Four Flies'....?
3 stars (***). Horror homies, check it out beyond doubt.
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