Blood, Gore, Tits, and Ass: A Review of Ti West’s X
Throughout history, art has always sucked ass. People love to complain about how bad contemporary cinema is, but the truth is, it’s always been shit. The only thing that’s ever been good are exploitation films. Give us blood, give us gore, give us tits, give us ass. Give us a little glimpse of cock, even, to keep us on our toes. Want to know why Hollywood is so bad these days? It’s because there’s no seething underbelly. Where are the sleazebags creating absolutely disgusting, sordid filth for perverts? Look. Think of art like a house. The walls and the roof and the windows are all the inoffensive, boring, middle-of-the-road garbage peddled by major studios, publishing houses, record labels, and museums. Norman Rockwell. John Denver. Steven Spielberg. James Patterson. All have their place, and all are equally important.1 But without a foundation, no house can stand. Without a solid base, all the rest comes crashing down. What is this foundation made of, when it comes to movies? I’ll say it again, in case you didn’t hear: Blood, gore, tits, and ass.
This is the thesis of Ti West’s new flick, X. The movie’s other thesis is that old people are disgusting. I heartily approve of both theses. I also approve of the ways in which Ti West expounds upon them. In other words, Todd likey. X is a love letter to exploitation cinema, an ode to softcore pornos like Debbie Does Dallas and independent shockers like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It’s also a halfway decent exploitation joint in its own right. West’s earlier films (The House of the Devil, The Innkeepers) were good but not great. With X, he finally takes it to the next level.
The movie stars Mia Goth as aspiring porn star Maxine Minx. Along with her sleazy boyfriend Wayne (Martin Henderson) and a small film crew, Maxine is in the backwoods of Texas, shooting the film that’s to give Maxine her breakout role. The film-within-a-film is called The Farmer’s Daughter, and Wayne is its producer. It’s a thought-provoking, groundbreaking indie about the bonds between fathers and daughters, and the lives of rural laborers in the Deep South. Just kidding. It’s a skin flick. While Wayne and the cast and crew film the sex scenes, audiences are treated to sequence after sequence of titties, moans, and beautiful softcore fucking. Hell yeah. Hope you fellas bought popcorn! As something of a titty connoisseur myself, I’d give Goth’s knockers a 7 out of 10. They’re supple, round, and proportionate to her body. The other actress in the film, Brittany Snow, has a slightly larger pair, still natural-looking, but a bit more to my taste. 8/10. Myself, I tend to go for double D’s or above. Give me voluptuous or don’t even bother. But the movie is set in the ‘70s. Breast implants were barely even a thing back then. So, I’m grading on a curve. The movie gets props for verisimilitude, if nothing else.
Anyway, once the titties are back in their brassieres, it’s time for the bloodbath to begin, courtesy of the horniest hag since Jack Nicholson locked lips with that rotted old she-devil in Room 237. X’s villain is named Pearl, and she is, in a word, unfulfilled. You see, her husband, Howard, can’t keep her satisfied on account of his bum ticker. But, as the cast and crew of The Farmer’s Daughter will soon learn, women have needs. And if no one fulfills those needs, well. Hell hath no fury like a battleax scorned.
The ensuing carnage is a delight to the senses. Discerning sleaze hounds will find much to admire. There are crocodiles, pitchforks, and shotguns. There are homages to classic horror flicks, and exciting stylistic innovations unique to West and his disturbed vision. Though many of West’s references hearken back to the grim nihilism of Kubrick and Tobe Hoober, there’s also a strain of sick, demented comedy in the film reminiscent of Sam Raimi’s early films.
The movie’s actresses all get plum roles. Brittany Snow, whom female viewers will know from the Pitch Perfect franchise, gets laughs as the dim bulb, dick-obsessed co-star of the film-within-a-film. Jenna Ortega, plucky star of this year’s lackluster Scream “requel,” gets to show her chickenshit side as a character most frequently referred to as Church Mouse. But it’s Mia Goth who really makes the movie. With her smear of sky blue eye shadow and her luminous, otherworldly presence, Goth makes the coke-sniffing Maxine a near-demonic whirlwind of an antihero. Goth also plays Pearl, the murderous old hag. Even working beneath pounds of makeup, she manages to make the character creepy and distinctive. It may be stunt casting, but it works, helping to make X one of the better horror flicks this side of 2018’s Mandy.
If there’s an issue with the movie, it’s that there’s almost too much argument. We want to be entertained, not lectured at. Even if the subject of the lecture is interesting, it’s still a lecture, and lectures are for nerds. Sure, it’s fun to see the dueling impulses of the artist-as-savior-and-provacateur embodied in the characters, and sure, it may be true that the elderly are sick, disturbed, horny, murderous creeps. But West could show us these things without spelling them out quite so literally, without having his characters voice the arguments and questions he wants his audience to ponder. His reliance on Themes-with-a-capital-T belies a certain reticence about his own talent. He need not play so coy. His talent is prodigious. At its heart, X is a gore and titty delivery system, and an efficient one at that. Next time, West should ditch the discourse and follow his nasty little heart.
Postscript
Look, I know what people are saying. But frankly, the accusations against me are absurd. Anyone who knows me, knows that I abhor murder, and violence of all kinds. Plus, I’ve never worn a Santa Claus mask in all my life. By the way, who’s this old codger in the home theatre? Looks like he’s been asleep for days. He’s got some kind of machine hooked up to his eyes taking measurements, and there’s an IV in his arm. Every so often during the movie, he’d sort of flutter his eyes a little, let out a snore, and go, “Ahoy!” Does he have a nurse or something?
Also, there’s a place on this form that asks for endorphins? I don’t know what that means, so I’m just going to go ahead and give this thing a star rating, in honor of my hero, Roger Ebert.
★ ★ ★ ☆
