Review: Maxxxine (2024)
Mia Goth emerges from a horror-film cocoon into a mainstream murder mystery where she steadfastly refuses to become a victim
Maxxxine (2024)
Written and directed by Ti West
Any review of “Maxxine” must start with the fact that this horror-action film is the third in a trilogy of movies starring Mia Goth. Goth plays the title character in “Maxxxine,” the same character in part 1 of the series, “X,” and plays the title character in “Pearl.” (The character Pearl also appears in “X,” with Goth playing both roles.) With this level of intentionality and links works, Ti West, the writer-director of the trilogy, is clearly striving for auteur status.
Whether or not he deserves it must be decided by someone who has seen all three movies. As for me, I don’t go to horror movies — or at least I didn’t, before so many indie films directed by women, such as “Lisa Frankenstein,” “Totally Killer,” and “I Saw the TV Glow” started using some of the conventions of slasher films, minus the gore. But the trailer for “Maxxxine,” in which the title character launches a revenge spree while simultaneously attempting to make the jump from famous porn actress to the mainstream of Hollywood, got me interested.
The reason I avoid horror movies is simple: unlike millions of other viewers, I just don’t enjoy the overwhelming atmosphere of menace and foreboding that typifies the genre. I know that a loud noise and a scene of unmitigated gore are about to be sprung on me and I just don’t need the tension. Millions do enjoy that; I don’t. I even walked out of “Alien” in 1979 during its first run because I couldn’t stand to see the characters cut down one after another. If that’s the main point of the movie, it just isn’t fun, not for me. (I’ve still never seen the whole movie from beginning to end.1) So I probably won’t be seeing the trilogy’s other films. No doubt this means that I missed many references and echoes from them in “Maxxxine;” so be it. I’ll attempt simply to take “Maxxxine” on its own terms.
The year is 1985. The Night Stalker — a real criminal2 — is menacing Los Angeles. Maxine Minx has escaped the repressed, religious environment in which she was raised and has become a top-flight performer in adult films in L.A. Not satisfied with this tawdry level of success and recognition, she auditions for and scores a role in a mainstream Hollywood film. Yes, it’s a horror movie, and a sequel at that, but it’s a real movie.
This is the time to talk about Mia Goth’s great performance. “Maxxxine” is all hers, and as the trauma survivor-turned-porn performer she’s excellent. She expertly casts off Maxine’s own native southern accent when it’s time to audition for the mainstream movie and speaks her monologue in standard north-midwest. At the end of the audition scene, there’s an even better, subtler moment. The casting director asks if she can take off her top. After a quick, bitter glance at the director to make sure this is really happening in a mainstream audition, Maxine mutters “Yeah — sure.” And this is said in the exact flat voice, from which every bit of emotion has been extracted by an expert, that it would be in real life. Because if there is any kind of actor who knows how to fill their voice with emotion at the right moment and remove all tonal quality in the next breath, it’s an adult performer.
Otherwise, Goth performs physically in a somewhat downplayed manner. There’s no hysteria, no extra motion when she runs from a pursuer; there’s no flailing even when she’s fighting a chokehold. Though pint-sized, she cuts a glamorous figure in sunglasses and a white pants suit suitable for the era. The movie was written for her, and she’s perfect in it.
Threatening Maxine’s tenuous mainstream foothold is a private detective named Labat, broadly overacted by Kevin Bacon. While somewhat threatening, his role in “Maxine” is merely that of a messenger for, as the kids say now, the Big Bad. Aside from his messenger duties, Labat’s role is mostly to get his ass kicked — first by Maxine, and then with extreme prejudice by her agent Teddy Night (Giancarlo Esposito). It’s as if the man’s boss asked central casting for a tough guy and instead of Bogart they sent Elisha Cook Jr.
Speaking of noir, there’s a lot of “Maxxxine” that is more mystery than horror movie. Yes, there are a few bloody moments, the last of which is more absurd than anything else, but I felt that director West was putting them in to satisfy fans of the trilogy more than making a horror movie per se. Viewers can avert their eyes during the worst scene, a determined murderous beating taken by a video store owner (Moses Sumney) who is Maxine’s friend.
If Labat is a Cajun shrimp-fried caricature, then it’s harder to describe the agent-lawyer played by Esposito, a fantastic actor who seems to enjoy popping up in ever more unlikely places. Here he manifests as a purple-suited, Brylcreme-wigged fixer who is quite able to follow through on his promise to protect Maxine so that she can pursue stardom. His office resembles a funeral home, and Night himself an undertaker — which is appropriate given how Labat ends up. I was disappointed that there was no place for Teddy Night in the third act.
Instead, as Maxine closes in on Labat’s employer, we get a pair of homicide detectives played by Michelle Monaghan and Bobby Cannavale (who would have been better cast as Labat). They’re investigating the trail of bodies popping up across Hollywood, each marked with a satanic pentacle, though Monaghan’s detective Williams says she doesn’t think the victims are the work of the Night Stalker. But they are connected to Maxine — they are her fellow strippers/porn actors, which is why the cops want to talk to her.
Maxine: I don’t talk to police.
Williams: Help me save the next victim’s life!
Maxine: Maybe she should save herself. I did.
Boom! This single line encapsulates Maxine’s entire character. Similarly, the director of the straight film Maxine has been hired for advises her that if you want something done right, do it yourself. This is the message of “Maxxxine”: Grant agency to yourself, because nobody is coming to save you. Well, the cops do, more or less — but they don’t survive the rescue. In the end, it’s Maxine alone, holding a sawed-off shotgun pointed at the villain’s head, frozen before the HOLLYWOOD sign in the ultra-bright spotlight of a police helicopter.
That’s not the end, though. The end should be the next scene where Maxine, in her trailer preparing to shoot her role in the horror sequel, cuts a line of cocaine with her Screen Actor’s Guild card. But then there’s a TV interview in which Maxine performs a saccharine interpretation of her new public persona. I could believe this as a morning show segment in 1985, maybe, though it’s not specifically presented as such. What makes it strange is that — unlike the shot of her cutting coke with her SAG card — it’s presented without irony.
Likewise, the script has a few needless repetitions and cul-de-sacs. There’s a running joke about Cannavale’s detective being a failed actor, and this could have led to an actual heartfelt moment as he dies in Maxine’s arms beneath the Hollywood sign, but the moment is fumbled. Maxine hears a lot about what a hardass the director of her film is; this led me to think that there would be substantial segments showing them working together, but Elizabeth Debicki, who plays the director, mostly just imparts advice to Maxine about surviving in Hollywood.
But despite this uneven quality, none of it detracts from Mia Goth’s performance, and I came away hoping that she, like her character, will become a star.
To be clear, I respect “Alien” tremendously. It deserves recognition just for making it clear that working in outer space will be gritty, dirty, tarnished, and dark.