Review: ‘Pearl’

Ti West’s X (2022) was a horror movie set in the 1970s about sneaky pornographers in a remote Texan farmhouse owned by failed actress Pearl and her protective husband Harold. It was an enjoyable yet gruesome film, but sadly lacked the character development that one might expect from an A24 movie. Its far superior character spin-off prequel Pearl, also directed by West, stars Mia Goth as the twisted and psychotic adolescent murderess that is Pearl. Set in November 1918, it is an entirely different kind of movie – a tragicomic depiction of a woman who cannot accept the falsehood of her daydreams, ultimately leading to her descent into madness and murder. 

Pearl believes feverishly in the American Dream. Her desire for silver screen stardom is compounded by her longing to escape the panoptical gaze of her immigrant mother and the lament of caring for her paralysed father, who keeps her aspirations at bay. Whilst cycling into town to fetch a morphine prescription for her father, she is led into the arms of the local cinema’s charming projectionist, played by David Corenswet. From here, Goth’s character begins a speedy descent into the hell that is her own subconscious.  

The film’s dazzlingly colour palette, characterised by a three-strip technicolour look, pays homage to the age-old classic The Wizard of Oz (1939) – as does Pearl’s unusual attraction for a scarecrow and the film’s enchantingly romantic score, put together by Tyler Bates and Tim Williams. Pearl mirrors Dorothy Gale’s yearning for something more than her Kansas reality will allow, just with an added violent and demented bite. In a similar fashion, iris slows, as used in older cartoons such as Looney Toons and Merrie Melodies, were incorporated post-production to give Pearl an air of vintage. 

Mia Goth’s performance is sublime. No one does horror-thriller movies quite like her; as her chilling appearances in Infinity Pool (2023), X (2022), A Cure For Wellness (2016), and Nymphomaniac (2013) have demonstrated.  Since Pearl opts out of the slasher genre almost entirely, it allows her charisma to shine through as it nicely substitutes X’s sex, gore and depravity for a full-blown character dissection. Pearl’s torment, which is equal parts frightening and ludicrous, is believable because Goth single-handedly wills it to be. Her commitment to every teary cry for attention and illusory departure from reality is once again magnificent. 

West’s Pearl is, in short, a masterclass in finding sympathy for a person’s evil. It delicately unpicks Pearl’s innocence to show us a woman so open to the world and vulnerable to its incessant cruelties that she’s become corrupted beyond all hope. Given just how successful this spin-off was, it is exciting to see what West and Goth bring to the third instalment in the X universe. MaXXXine (date TBA), will be a dive into the escapades of rebellious Maxine (also played by Goth), who was part of the sexually-deviant group of pornographers in the original X. 

Rating 4.0/5 

Featured Image Credit: Empire