X (2022)

Directed by Ti West. Starring Mia Goth, Martin Henderson, Brittany Snow, Scott Mescudi, Owen Campbell, Jenna Ortega, Stephen Ure, James Gaylyn. [R]

A group of aspiring filmmakers and performers rent a guesthouse at a Texas farm to shoot a low-budget adult film, but something’s a little off with Howard and Pearl, the elderly couple in the main house, and all bets are off when the decrepit matriarch catches the visitors “in the act.” The brief prologue showing the remains of the bloodbath to come wasn’t necessary for writer/director West to maintain a sense of unease long before any blood is seen spilled, done through a subtly ominous tone instead of overusing tension escalation techniques. There aren’t deep characterizations at play, but by pushing all the butchery to the final forty minutes, there’s room not only to carve out a little empathy for the victims-to-be, but to also explore the psychology of the antagonists, who aren’t mindless killers—they thirst for their lost youth (Pearl most prominently), and decide it’s being wasted on these sinful outsiders…except for wannabe starlet and self-described “sex symbol” Goth, who has that “X-factor” that the old lady takes a shine to (said old lady is also played by Goth underneath pounds of makeup and prosthetics that strangely become less convincing as the film progresses). Despite all the blood and viscera on display, the most brutal demise is that of beauty itself, an angle that revitalizes the laundry list of clichés that West and company plow through on the sometimes bumpy but always arresting road to ruin (two appearances by an alligator, for instance, are each silly enough to briefly break the sinister spell). Shot in New Zealand. Co-star Mescudi is better known by his rapper stage name, Kid Cudi.

72/100