Watch or Not: Maxxxine is Bloody Sexy and We Tell You Why to Watch It
Maxxxine arrived to close a trilogy full of blood, deaths, and characters with complicated and traumatic pasts. This film takes us back to the 80s and follows Maxxxine Minx, an adult film actress who, after surviving a brutal attack alongside a production crew, receives her big chance to join serious cinema, auditioning to star in the sequel to a controversial cult horror film. It seems that Maxxxine‘s luck is changing, until a killer begins to attack those closest to her, bringing the police closer to her and forcing her to relive the traumatic past she lived through, which she prefers to keep secret. What follows is a story about the Satanic Panic of the 80s, serial killers (and the film features a real one), and a mystery where Maxxxine must face her demons to find the truth and, with a bit of luck, manage to survive again.
Maxxxine is one of the most anticipated horror films of the year, and not only because it is the sequel to X and Pearl, which closes Ti West’s trilogy, but because, unlike the previous ones, this one makes a reference to the real case of an infamous serial killer, who is considered one of the most brutal and violent in history. The first in the series was X, where Mia Goth and Jenna Ortega became part of a film crew that arrives in Texas in search of a location for an adult film. There they come across an elderly couple who seem harmless, until they start being attacked and killed one by one, and they discover that the woman, named Pearl, is behind the violent things that are happening to them.
Pearl was the second and here we saw Mia Goth again, but with a different character. We see her as a younger Pearl. Pearl has a boring life in a rural area of Texas, but she dreams of being a star and is willing to do anything to achieve it, even if it pushes her to kill. Maxxxine is the third and final film in the blood-soaked trilogy and picks up after the events of X, as Maxxxine attempts to build a career in serious film and move away from adult films, but just as she gets her big break, a killer begins killing people who connect to her in some way, forcing her to confront her past as she tries to survive and succeed in her first leading role. Starring Mia Goth as Maxxxine, alongside singer Halsey and actors including Kevin Bacon, Emily in Paris’ Lily Collins and The Crown’s Elizabeth Debicki, the film not only tells the story of Maxxxine, her ambition, and the lengths she’s willing to go to achieve it, but like Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, the story is set against the backdrop of a brutal event that actually happened.
Maxxxine and Why You Should Watch Ti West’s Bloody Thriller
Mia Goth Shines in this Movie?
Mia Goth is considered one of the new muses of horror and one of the women who are revolutionizing the genre. In X, we saw her as a Final Girl willing to fight to survive, in Pearl we saw her as an ambitious and brutal woman, who was willing to kill to get what she wanted, and in Maxxxine we can see the evolution of that character that appeared in X. The film works thanks in large part to the performance of Mia Goth, who gives her all to the role of Maxxxine, a character with great inner strength, great determination, and great potential for darkness and violence, especially when she has to defend herself. Goth is brilliant and managed to create a character that has an interesting strangeness to it and also pays homage to those Scream Queens that appeared in Slashers of the Past. The film also stars Elizabeth Debicki, Lily Collins, Halsey, and Kevin Bacon in key roles in the story.
There is a Lot of Blood, But Also Mystery and Suspense
Part of a horror and death trilogy, Maxxxine is a bloody film, with elements of the Slasher genre and moments that generate painful sound effects in the audience. There are bloody and very violent scenes, but there are also psychological games, mystery, and suspense. It’s not just about a killer, but about Maxxxine‘s struggle to discover who he is and how he connects to her, to save her life, but also to save her career and protect that opportunity to be part of the cinema. This film no longer has the villain we met in the previous two, it moves away from this to enter new territory, but one that remains deeply connected to the original story.
An Unexpected Villain
Maxxxine has a different villain, there was talk of a serial killer from the first trailer, but it is not what it seems, and the case is full of intrigue. Throughout the film, we get small glimpses of the killer, in a style reminiscent of 1970s cinema, where a hand, a shadow, or footsteps are shown following a victim, but Ti West keeps the truth to himself until the key moment, when the audience and Maxxxine are ready to learn the truth. The villain is bizarre and he’s an extremist, he’s extravagant and wild, and he has his own motivations that, in his mind, make perfect sense.
There are Important Details Everywhere?
The production, costumes, and music by Maxxxine are all perfect, and the film has plenty of elements of Hollywood history, such as locations where iconic films were shot and mentions of cinema legends. There are Easter Eggs, clues, and references everywhere and this helps to enrich a story that captures the essence of the 80s, with the good, the bad, the extravagant, and the disturbing.
It Is Based on Real Events?
From the first trailer, there is mention of the real serial killer who became known as The Night Stalker. Richard Ramirez was the killer behind that name, which was given to him because he attacked his victims at night and was suspected of having some connection to Satanism and rituals. One of the reasons why it was so difficult to catch him was that Ramirez selected victims who seemed to have no pattern or type, so at first, it was not possible to identify that it was the same criminal and that they were not simply many isolated cases. The killer was eventually caught after witnesses helped provide a description and create a sketch that was shared across the city, helping to identify the criminal when he was in a store.
Brutal Scenes Appear from the Beginning!
In this story, Maxxxine is not only trying to get her big break in the movies, but she is also dealing with the traumas she faced in the past, which continue to affect the way she acts and reacts, which is what leads us to one of the bloodiest and most violent moments in the film (you’ll know it when you see it, as it’s one of those scenes that makes the audience react). The scene in question stars Mia Goth and Zachary Mooren, and is a key moment in an alley, in which much of the protagonist’s personality and defense mechanisms are revealed.
Regarding this, Mooren, who appeared in Cat Person in 2023, says that:
“I’ve been a fan of Mia’s for a while. We have a very similar approach and working with her was just as I expected. Before we got into character, Mia and I chatted about our families, Disneyland, does LA or New York have better food. I think we both wanted to build trust in each other before there was no turning back. The filming was really intense, though. I prayed to the movie gods that Mia’s aim wouldn’t be half an inch off target (the prosthetic). There aren’t many directors I would agree to do that for, but I think Ti West is unique. I think the fact that I’m playing a Buster Keaton impersonator, one of the most influential filmmakers of all time, represents Maxxxine’s ambition and how she’s not going to let Hollywood take advantage of her. It also shows the audience how unhinged Maxxxine is in this film. Together with the makeup department and practical effects team, we did our best to make the sequence look as real and impactful as possible.” I’m pretty sure we did it.”
Who was Richard Ramirez, The Night Stalker?
Maxxxine‘s story is fiction, but Ti West integrated the true story of a serial killer who terrorized the inhabitants of Los Angeles and San Francisco in the 80s, to give us a little more of the context in which this story takes place and to make it more brutal. Throughout the film’s trailer, we see scenes of Maxxxine and her audition process, interspersed with scenes discussing a killer known as The Night Stalker and the danger he posed to anyone who encountered him. Richard Ramirez was a serial killer and rapist who claimed several victims in the mid-1980s. Ramirez came from a troubled Texas family, he was the son of immigrants and his family had trouble making money, so his childhood was complicated and hard.
Furthermore, it is said that his father beat him and even left him unconscious at the age of 5 after hitting him on the head and that this may have been what led him to develop violent and hypersexual behavior. Over time, Richard became close to one of his cousins, a Vietnam War veteran who was one of the first to show violent and sexual images related to his time in Vietnam and the terrible things he had seen and done there. This impressed Ramirez, who also began using drugs such as LSD and became interested in Satanism. According to The Independent, Ramirez moved to California in 1982 and attacked his first victim two years later. In 1984, Ramirez raped and murdered a 9-year-old girl named Mei Leung, but it was in 1985 that he committed the second murder in which he established his modus operandi.
“Their modus operandi often involved breaking into suburban homes in the dead of night, raping and killing victims before leaving Satanic symbols at the scene,” says The Independent.
Ramirez struck at night, but his victims varied in age and appearance – he sometimes targeted couples, but also murdered older women, young girls and mothers – making it initially difficult to identify that they were the same killer. Once the connection was made, he was given the nickname The Night Stalker. What allowed Ramirez to be identified and arrested was that he left several clues at the different crime scenes, such as fingerprints, and this led the police to find him and hold a press conference in which they revealed this information, both to the public and to the murderer himself.
Richard Ramirez was recognized in a store in Los Angeles in August 1985 and was eventually caught and arrested. He is believed to have killed around 14 people and was convicted of murder, robbery and sexual abuse, and received the death penalty for them. The Night Stalker killer was sentenced to death in the gas chamber, but died on June 7, 2013, at the age of 53, from complications related to lymphoma.
