After I enjoyed X (2022, my review here), I was on the lookout for its sequel, which is actually a prequel filmed simultaneously with X. I wanted to know more about Pearl and wanted to see more of Mia Goth in what many claimed should have been her Oscar nomination. As you can see, I was hyped for this film, and Pearl is as good as X; however, as with its predecessor, I wish I could write I love this movie. I like it very much, but…

Let’s get it straight, Mia Goth is fantastic in this role. I am not sure whether she is “she should have been nominated for the Oscar!” fantastic, but she made this role her own. Pearl shows you how the old, murder-happy lady from X became that way, and it turns out, as always, it’s all in the family. Whether it’s the idea of a strict mother, taking care of your paralysed dad, or the mix of both whilst your own mental health wasn’t the best to begin with, this movie shows us how much (or little) it takes for somebody to snap. And when Pearl snaps, she snaps hard.

I liked the aesthetic of this film. The movie takes place in 1918, and I had no issue believing it. Sure, for the most part, it helps that it mostly takes place on one farm, but everything around it, all the characters, just “fit”. And here, for me, is the biggest proof that you don’t need a multi-million dollar budget to make a half-decent movie; just hire someone as creative as Ti West, who has a vision and seems to understand how to get the absolute maximum out of the little they must have had to shoot both this film and X.

And as with X, I wanted more. That will be my ultimate “one thing” about this movie. Pearl is not a straightforward horror film. You could argue it’s even less of a horror movie than X was, as it mainly serves as this character study of our main protagonist, Pearl. Therefore, this movie is the ultimate definition of a slow burner; it takes its time before it gets going. And although I loved Mia Goth, I wasn’t captivated by all the movie’s length. And when I thought this is where it starts to get fascinating, this is where I will fall in love with this film, the movie ends. I know movie schools teach people: “Always leave your audience wanting more!” but Pearl took it a bit too literally.

I won’t spoil this film, but I will say this. There is a thing or an event we (and Pearl) are waiting for throughout the movie besides the “when will she snap?” And that thing happens (that also has a connection to X), so I thought that this was where we would learn more. Nope. The movie leaves us hanging on this, it is not really a cliffhanger, but I don’t know what else would I call it… Let me put it this way, where this movie stops and ends, I hoped that would be its halfway point. I hoped we would have at least 40/50 minutes left. It’s hard to say more without saying what the movie ends on, but I hope I am not the only one feeling like that.

I understand that I am doing what I hate the most, re-imagining the movie the way I want to see it; why did Ti West not make the movie I wanted? And the thing is, he kind of did because Pearl delivers on the main promise. It gives us more of Mia Goth and reveals how she became the way she did. But, whilst he did it, he kept reminding us that “this one thing is coming” throughout this movie. And once that “thing” happened, that was when I felt like I wanted another at least 30 minutes with Pearl. And I hope we might still get it after he’s done with MaXXXine (?), as I have a feeling that if he made a straight-up sequel to Pearl and picked right where this movie ends, it would have been amazing.

But it bears repeating that’s my only negative thing about Pearl. The rest of this movie is a great slow burn about one special young lady who wanted to be a star. She wanted to escape her life and misery and hoped for something better. Something greater, and when she didn’t get what she had hoped for, she took it the only way she knew how. As the famous line goes: “We all go a little mad sometimes.”

Overall, Pearl is a performance piece for Mia Goth. It’s a movie that will surprise you on multiple occasions with its choices, and it surprised me with its ending. Respectively, it ends almost abruptly just as it started to go somewhere I desperately wanted to see more of. But a few things are clear – we need more of Mia Goth, and we are in need of more people like Ti West. I will be there for MaXXXine, and I can’t wait for what he does next after he’s done with this X/Pearl world. It’s always great to have a fresh, new perspective and voice on the scene.

That’s all for this one! Did you see it? What did you think about it? Let me know!

Until next time,

Luke