X

Zero expectations or knowledge about this movie when I turned this one on. I knew it was a horror movie and that was it. Watching it, I could feel the love that the creators had for the old age of horror movies, the era of slashers and all the things that Scream once dissected and made light of, an age of horror movie rules where you expect sex to equal death and the final girl to surmount all odds and take on the horrible entity terrorizing them.

The idea of this movie seems like something I should have really enjoyed. The reality of it was more underwhelming. I never found myself connecting to the characters, so when things start to go awry, I had no investment in their existence. They were just red shirts in a horror movie. I expected them to die and most of them met that expectation. It was fine. It never really tipped the scales into love, never into hate, it lingered in the realm of quiet acceptance of what was going on, a positive tolerance that never reached proper enjoyment.

Didn't expect much. Paid homage to classic 70's horror movies. Unlikeable characters that were given sufficient depth to make you care enough to not want them to be the next kill which made it refreshing. A little too gorey in parts for me but a well shot movie none the less. Cannot understand for the life of me why they didn't just cast older people as the central characters though. Just pointless having younger actors in prosthetics for the sake of it. Would have been much better if they just cast older aged actors. A simple yet fun movie that was original enough but with clear nods to some of the classics from the past.

An interesting slow burn, but without enough to make it stand against the countless other slasher films, X is a fine film and another tribute to the iconic genre that made horror so popular in the first place. Granted, I do enjoy myself a slasher film from time to time- I'm quite fond of films like Nightmare on Elm Street and My Bloody Valentine, but where X faults among the others is through using a rather familiar formula without any true unique purpose. Throughout the film the characters often talk about an X factor, something that makes Mia Goth's character special and starworthy- but unlike its mentionings- this film just doesn't have that. The acting is really good, I love the underrated Mia Goth as always- as well as Brittany Snow, Martin Henderson, and even Kid Cudi did a rather impressive job. The cinematography is fantastic and perfectly fits the amitpshere and tone the film is going for. The music is enjoyable and tense, and its pacing can be a bit slow at times, but does allow for an interesting point of view. Its main problem lies solely in its script, which revolves largely around a smut film production- but takes too many elements and formulaic tendencies from other horror films like Evil Dead, Friday the 13th, The Visit and most obviously Texas Chainsaw Massacre to really stand out on its own and become its own thing. In the end, its not a bad watch, I wouldn't watch it again, but I certainly didn't mind watching it. It isn't the most memorable, but I certainly don't have any disdain for it. It just could have been more, especially given the talent involved, but ironically it settled for less.

My Rating: 5.8/10.

Pros.

It has some decent gore Mostly good acting Lots of 70s horror Easter eggs/references Martin Henderson doing what has to be the best Matthew McConaughey impression I've heard in a long time (seriously I really expected him to say "alright alright alright) The early Eaten Alive nod and final payoff are both hugely effective Really solid soundtrack

Cons.

It's very slow to get started. And not in the gradual suspenseful build up of tension sense, but that very little happens for close to an hour.

Despite wanting to be a really smart horror, the film still falls into the standard tropes of characters being morons who make dumb decisions and doesn't really bring anything original to the table besides better quality (but not perfect) cinematography When the carnage begins, the lighting gets very dark and sometimes obscures the shots and detail which may be a creative choice but does somewhat reduce the enjoyment

Overall, very decent but not a game changer Worth watching.

A decent slasher, but does not deserve a 96% rating on RT. The kills felt conveniently cheap and honestly everything was underwhelming. I was hoping to to feel paranoid or scared, but didn't feel much of anything. Spent most of the movie hoping it would get better or surprise me a little but we've seen this all before.