Film Review - X (18)

 ...one goddamn f***ed up horror picture.

'Suitable for those aged 18 and over.' That's how X-certificate was defined by the British Board of Film Censors (later changed to Classification) back in the 1970s. What the term suggested to the public was a certain brand of grainy, sordid, sex-and-violence-steeped movie that showed exclusively in so-called grindhouse theatres. Belfast's Strand cinema became one such venue during that era; check the listings, my older brother assured me, and it won't be showing Close Encounters - well, not of the Third Kind at any rate. Ti West's X evokes the spirit of those grungy Seventies exploitation movies, but with a twist, the kind you might expect from a film bearing the A24 production company logo. The result is memorable, and likely to remain 2022's most dubiously enjoyable cinematic treat.

Rural Texas 1979, and a sheriff-who's-seen-it-all is musing with his deputies over how a remote farm might have been turned into the scene of a blood-soaked massacre. Jump back twenty-four hours to a group of game young filmmakers, venturing into the sticks in a beat-up transit van. Their intention, to shoot The Farmer's Daughters, a porn movie that will rival in success - so they hope - the infamous Debbie Does Dallas. When the elderly couple from whom they're renting the property discover the project's adult nature, however, their day takes a dark turn, with spectacularly bloody consequences.

Sex and sleaze, violence and gore, with a setting and outcome more than slightly reminiscent of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. But to describe X as such and no more undersells it in a big way. Ti West does more than pay homage to Tobe Hooper's 1974 filmic slaughterhouse. Much as the hapless young director of The Farmer's Daughters aspires (not unlike Burt Reynolds' character in Boogie Nights) to shoot cheap porn with artistic value, so West devotes cinematic craft to every aspect of his deliberately tawdry subject matter. In doing so he shapes it into something more than purely tawdry.

A24's art-horror is regularly derided by more traditional gore-lovers as pretentious, particularly when the term 'elevated horror' is used to categorise it. X might be best described, however, as the point where shlock and arthouse horror meet. It may follow the 'horny youngsters get slaughtered' template, but it does so with a striking degree of technical care. In terms of framing and lighting its cinematography frequently stuns. The details of its set design are forensic. The sound design is eerie, mixing in neatly curated rock tracks of the era. And the shot transitions mirror the quirks of Seventies B-movies, while serving the filmmaker's own very contemporary intentions. Because even West's screenplay displays a wit and thoughtful subtext that exceeds the demands of a conventional slasher flick. 

X doesn't overplay its hand in this regard, but it does dare to be about something more than unlucky youths getting butchered as a kind of punishment for being wrong place/wrong time or for expressing their sexuality. The motives behind the murders run to a deeper, more existential place than you might expect. This grimy movie, in other words, has actual themes - ones it bothers to take seriously. 

It also has characters sufficiently three-dimensional to summon your empathy, rather than the traditional rack of obnoxious fresh meat you don't much mind seeing sliced and diced. However you're disposed to regard their lifestyles and choices, they're a fun bunch to hang out with, clothes off or on, and it's a real shame to see any of their lives cut short. The girls alone are sassy, daring, and aspirational by turns, and the actors playing them are capable of way better than cheap stereotypes. Pitch Perfect's Brittany Snow owns her scenes with style, Jenna Ortega endears while showing why she's already a modern scream queen (not least due to Scream 2022), and Mia Goth, who's excelled in everything from edgy independent dramas to Jane Austen's Emma., takes a dungaree-clad stroll further down the road to stardom.  

The boys don't let the side down either. A tip of the stetson is due to Grey's Anatomy's Martin Henderson, channelling pure Matthew McConaughey as the group's older, self-appointed producer. Actor-rapper Kid Cudi is every inch the laid-back retro porn stud, and Owen Campbell goes on a particularly interesting journey as the would-be avant garde director. Neither are the group's ageing nemeses reduced to stock villain status. Their story is part of what makes this slasher unique, the wife of in particular deserving close scrutiny.

The point I'm labouring is this - X may be a film with a down-and-dirty B-movie premise, but West's able cast and dedicated crew have treated it with A-grade respect, working from a script that meets and subverts expectations in equal measures. The writer-director, who's made a career out of imaginatively reconstituting horror conventions, has a clear affection for this murkiest of sub-genres, but wants to do more than just pastiche it. The outcome... all the grindhouse vibes and guilty X-certificate thrills you'd expect, plus humour, personality, a grubbily beautiful aesthetic, and a good sprinkling of provocative ideas. Now that's a movie with more than one kind of X factor.

Gut Reaction: All the responses you'd expect to this kind of nasty fare, but a bunch of others too, all some weird kind of positive.

Memorable Moment: Unlikely bed buds...!!! 

Ed's Verdict: 8.5/10. X is a lot of what you expect, and a lot of what you don't, and the finished product is an instant genre classic. Call it elevated or post or meta - however you choose to label it, this is a damn fine horror film.