MaXXXine (18)

Porn star Maxine Minx auditions for the religious horror film The Puritan II directed by Elizabeth Bender. Her performance impresses Bender and the director overrules concerned producers to cast the wannabe in the lead role of her "B movie with A ideas". As Maxine prepares for her big break, she becomes a potential victim of a Night Stalker copycat, despite the best efforts of Detectives Williams and Torresto apprehend the culprit.

LondonNet Film Review

MaXXXine (18) Film Review from LondonNet

X marks the g-spot in the world of adult entertainment. Film classification boards around the world used to award X certificates to works that were deemed suitable for viewers aged 18 and over. All publicity can be good publicity and enterprising movie makers added additional Xs to the rating to suggest that their XX or XXX feature was crammed to bursting with more salacious content than the competition. The concluding chapter of writer-director Ti West’s slasher horror trilogy proudly inhabits this lucrative world of sex-positive performance and gleefully draws attention to the three capitalised letters at the beating heart of its title…

MaXXXine is a disappointing conclusion to a time-hopping saga which began in 2022 with X, following the crew of an adult film as they ventured into the Texan countryside to shoot at a farm owned by elderly couple Howard and Pearl (Mia Goth). A dizzying second instalment, Pearl, charted the title character’s formative years in 1918 Texas, where dreams of becoming a dancer in Hollywood were thwarted by a domineering German immigrant mother.

The wanton bloodletting continues in MaXXXine, centred on one of the survivors of the first film – fame-seeking actress Maxine Minx (Goth) – as she aggressively pursues stardom in 1985 Los Angeles. A pungent setting allows West to exercise artistic licence with the real-life case of serial killer Richard Ramirez aka the Night Stalker, who terrorised residents of California and left satanic symbols at many crime scenes. Archive news footage plays on characters’ TV screens as a backdrop to the script’s loopier excesses, building to a lacklustre finale in the shadow of the iconic Hollywood sign.

Porn star Maxine (Goth) is determined to realise her father’s mantra (“I will not accept a life I do not deserve”) by auditioning for the religious horror film The Puritan II directed by Elizabeth Bender (Elizabeth Debicki). Maxine’s performance impresses Bender and the director overrules concerned producers to cast the wannabe in the lead role of her “B movie with A ideas”. As Maxine prepares for her big break, she becomes a potential victim of a Night Stalker copycat, despite the best efforts of Detectives Williams (Michelle Monaghan) and Torres (Bobby Cannavale) to apprehend the culprit.

Bookmarked by gratuitous explosions of gore, MaXXXine is the least satisfying dish of West’s protracted three-course meal. There is no narrative reward for guessing the identity of the copycat and supporting cast are squandered in underwritten roles that have the potential to leap kicking and screaming off the page. A nostalgic 1980s soundtrack sways enthusiastically to Kim Carnes, Eurythmics, Frankie Goes To Hollywood and New Order while West’s script trades quips about Hollywood and the history of horror movies. MaXXXine won’t be joining Psycho on that illustrious list.

– Jo Planter