PEARL

An extremely quickly released prequel to the film X that was released in March of this year, Pearl tells the story of the old woman (also played by Mia Goth in X) set in 1918. Pearl is born and raised on a Texas farm but has big aspirations to make it on the big screen as a dancer. Her father is infirmed in a vegetative state while her overbearing German mother wants her to assist the family in their day-to-day life and give up any ambitions she has outside of that. Her sister-in-law Misty (Emma Jenkins-Purro) informs Pearl of a dance audition at a local church that will tour the state for a dance recital. Believing this could lead to her big break, Pearl will not let anything stand in her way of making that audition. While this film is rated R and does have some horror elements to it, the story is more of a character study of Pearl: what makes her tick and how she came to be in X. Another strong performance by Mia Goth but the film can drag at times (with a runtime of 102 minutes) and for those hoping to see a big body count, you'll be disappointed as the number is lower than X. I preferred X over this but we'll see how MAXXXINE does when it's released. 5/10