X

It is a dynamic, deadly work of filmmaking that achieves all its lofty ambitions and then some to become an absolute masterwork.

On the whole, X proves that West is a master of craft. In The House of the Devil, he ingeniously drew out suspense through his slow, careful editing, and 13 years later he still hasn’t lost his touch.

It’s a new twist on the period-piece slasher movie, smart and strange and fantastically depraved. I kinda loved it.

West delivers a crowd-pleasing return to horror that’s a love letter to the genre without becoming a parody.

X is a reminder that, while the slasher genre had some very deep valleys, some of the most effective horror emerged from it (especially in the early days before the films became little more than orgies of inventive eviscerations). With X, West seeks to recapture some of the fun, edginess, and energy of those productions while at the same time delivering a few surprises.

It would be a mistake to call X a misfire — in its artisanal, period textures and delight in old-school atmospherics, it’s too well made. But it’s better at teasing than following through.

While the latest “Texas Chainsaw” installment dropped on Netflix a few weeks ago, “X” owes so much in style and tone to the 1974 slasher classic it feels like more of a legitimate heir than the film bearing its name.

Extremely inventive and absolutely riveting horror film filled with scenes I will never forget in my life; most films are lucky to have 1 - this has around 10, some of which I half wish I could unsee...

I hate giving 7s as I feel like it's a fence-sitting score where you can't decide if it's a good or a bad movie but X straddles the line. There are many things this movie does well, for example, it flawlessly executes its psychological horror aspect (my girlfriend and I had to watch an episode of Friends afterwards to calm down). However, the movie has trouble with pacing, which I think was sluggish without actually building much tension. to give it the benefit of the doubt it could be that too much was revealed in the trailer and I was constantly waiting for the action to get going leading to me feeling as though the movie was dragging. Overall I do think it does a decent job of being a disturbing psycho-horror and I would recommend it to fans of slow-burning, dred-fueled slashers

Don't let the review scores fool you, it is an extremely ordinary movie. It cannot go beyond being a simple slasher movie.

(Mauro Lanari) 1) The umpteenth "American Gothic", social subtext against the puritanical hypocrisy of the "Deep South" and the "Rust Belt". 2) The umpteenth horror of the clash between the illusory youthful vitality and the senile regret of the dyings, shown here in alternate montage and represented by a single actress (Mia Goth: "nomen omen"). 3) Manneristic in the less explicit references to "Boogie Nights", "The Shining", "Psycho", which didn't need to resort to the slasher subgenre. 1) The umpteenth "American Gothic", social subtext against the puritanical hypocrisy of the "Deep South" and the "Rust Belt". 2) The umpteenth horror of the clash between the illusory youthful vitality and the senile regret of the dyings, shown here in alternate montage and represented by a single actress (Mia Goth: "nomen omen"). 3) Manneristic in the less explicit references to "Boogie Nights", "The Shining", "Psycho", which didn't need to resort to the slasher subgenre. Even the MGM's lion was silenced: no more is to be expected from the A24.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]