X (2022): The Core of a Story

In this post, I'm going to start talking about one of my very favorite horror projects in the space today, which hasn't yet concluded as of writing, but has knocked the first two of its three films out of the park. Ti West's (and, as of Pearl, also Mia Goth's) X film trilogy. 

I don't think "X trilogy" is the official title for the series, but it certainly makes sense, as X, the first of two entries released in 2022, is the first released, a strong audience entry point, and the anchor of the series. 

The concept of the overarching series is the comparison and contrast between two identical women separated by generations and both driven by a pursuit of fame. X is the only point in the series where the two women's lives intersect and they meet. The films might be considered an anthology that unites and changes both separate stories through its center.

X alone could alternatively be called "The Sexas Chainsaw Massacre" as it explores the endeavors of an indie porn crew in 1978 trying to break into the mainstream with sexual filmmaking, and their shoot happens to be set in an old Texas farmhouse with the overall film carrying deliberate heavy similarities to Tobe Hooper's 1974 classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Among the porn crew is young actress Maxine Minx, a televangelist-preacher's daughter who abandoned her father's lifestyle pretty extremely. Maxine has a drug habit and a drive to be famous, and the lead of the project, Wayne, assures her she has the star-quality "X factor" to make it big. The farmhouse they shoot at is owned by an elderly couple, Howard and Pearl, who don't initially know the pretenses for the crew renting their space. After seeing a sex scene shoot starring Maxine, Pearl quickly fixates on the crew and Maxine, who reminds her of her younger self and her bygone opportunities. The old folks are embittered by the debilitations of aging and the way it has deprived them of a sex life, while Pearl treats her own failed dreams and long-lost youth as a reason to creep on Maxine sexually and admonish her for her pursuits. After the elders enact a slasher spree against the crew, Maxine emerges as the final girl and kills Pearl herself to shut up her bitter rhetoric and go on to pursue her dreams.

The mind-blowing key to the entire greater trilogy? Both women central to X are played by Mia Goth. 

X is a thematically rich and very fun film, stylistically evoking classic seventies horror and commenting upon the culture of the time and its echoes in our own. The film also displays great empathy to the trials of aging, with the killers being entirely understandable, if wrong, for the reasons they lash out at the young people. Even at their most earnest kindness, the young folks clearly convey the sense that they see the elders as feeble, infirm, inadequate, and old, setting off all of Howard and Pearl's resentments. It's a great discussion about the pursuit of dreams, sexual dynamics, and opportunity. But it's far richer and more precious to me because it evolved textually and thematically into the middle of a trilogy and the center of a linear timeline. Director Ti West and star Mia Goth got so interested in the character of Pearl that they wrote and shot a prequel on location during the same trip. It's fantastic and rest assured I will be tossing as many flowers to Goth as I can when I write about Pearl. The films both released during 2022, and a sequel, MaXXXine, which I expect to feature Goth portraying only Maxine after the events of X and dealing with how they shaped her, is upcoming. I'm really looking forward to MaXXXine primarily because I felt like her character wasn't focused upon enough in X as a consequence of the ensemble cast all getting their time in the sun. I think it's X's only true failing. For a self-contained mirror narrative of Pearl and Maxine, and the center of a trilogy between their solo films, X doesn't feel quite enough like Maxine's story to me because the rest of the ensemble cast has so much good writing and development. I like the story of X a lot, but it really feels like the Maxine/Pearl parallel is just one facet of the story among many, and it's not weighted as heavily in the screentime as I think it should be given the concept of the greater series.

But I'm just such a fan of this idea of the trilogy. It gives the story so much more dimension and intrigue.

I mean, just consider the title of X alone. For a single letter, it has so much packed in, with more as a consequence of the trilogy structure. It can mean:

• X as a rating--the film crew is divided between straight-up porn and "elevated" X-rated cinema as their creative vision as a meta-discussion on the boundaries of sex and accepted art.
• X as part of two other unsaid Xes--an XXX symbol is used to designate straight-up porn, and X is also one of three films in a story. 
• X as the X-factor--this is the meaning most directly alluded to in the script of both released films so far (anachronistically in Pearl, but I give it a pass), and all three films deal with one or both of the central women and their belief in their star power and their journey seeking fame.
• X as a visual symbol of a crossroads or intersection--X is the film where the two characters' stories directly cross paths, and is the point where Pearl's story ends and Maxine's begins. 
• X as a symbol binding a relationship or mixture-- the letter X put between names can imply a combination or a relationship between characters. The titles of the three films will line up this way chronologically, suggesting the entire trilogy (Pearl, X, MaXXXine) is the story of "Pearl x Maxine". 
• ...I also can't help but notice that "X" is the very middle letter of the name "Texas" which is where this film is set, meaning Texas is the center of this saga and X is the center of Texas? Maybe? Who cares, I'm calling it, it's another meaning for the title!

And because the film became the middle of a broader character study, the films about Maxine and Pearl create a unique storytelling form. It's my impression that the series might move forward entirely in time and feature only the stars of the isolated films, so I don't personally expect MaXXXine to feature flashback scenes or any scenes with Pearl in them as a hallucination. I think it makes a nice mirror if the films on either end only feature the titular character and the sense of a timeline would make it work for there to be no flashbacks. There is also an editing motif in X that suggests this might be the case. Repeatedly during the film, scene transitions feature a few cuts back and forth between the succeeding scene and the current one before finally remaining in the next scene. This, to me, suggested the characters of Maxine and Pearl and how the film juggles the themes of Pearl as the past and Maxine as the future. The film introduces both characters and looks back with Pearl, but ultimately closes the book on her and moves forward with Maxine. X features no flashback cinematography beyond these transitional cuts which evoke it, and backstory for both of Goth's characters is delivered without flashbacks, which to me says that the film stands as the meeting of two narratives that cements a forward motion in the story. We glance back with Pearl but we never literally flash there in the movie, so I would expect MaXXXine to stay entirely in its own present. Maxine didn't look back when she left the farm, and I don't expect the series to. And that's such a cool story structure! 

X  is great because it serves as an introduction to the character dynamics of the two leads of the series, and with this film being the center of stories before and after, it's a great way to analyze where things come together, and it perfectly fits the theme of the two characters as past and future of each other. When you see X first, you know where Pearl ended up before seeing her own movie, but you don't know what's in store for Maxine in her own movie...and X is about Pearl at the end of her life and Maxine just beginning hers! The middle film being the first given to the audience also invites rewatching the trilogy in different viewing orders. Watching X first gives you a glimpse into the other films and has the fun past/future gimmick when it's the first one seen, but being the center compels you to watch the films linearly as well, to start with Pearl and carry forward in time with Maxine. I do want to watch the films that way once they're all out and I've seen them once in release order. Alternatively, you could even watch the films in reverse linear order to end with Pearl as the origin point of the entire thematic sequence...and there'd probably be value in starting with MaXXXine and then going back to watch Pearl, then X for a "how we got here" viewing structure!

For those who are okay with pretty heavy sexual themes, X is highly recommendable as an insightful, fun piece of thematic storytelling paying homage to horror history...but as the middle of a greater mirrored narrative about two principal characters whose lives only touch here, it's also the hook of the most exciting and original narrative film series I've seen in a long time. I have pretty good faith they'll stick the landing via MaXXXine because what West and Goth have started here is a work of genius.