Pearl

Ti West’s follow-up to his 70s grindhouse-inspired horror X didn’t have much time to build hype. Filmed concurrently with its predecessor, this WWI-era technicolour prequel could hardly be more different stylistically, taking cues from The Wizard of Oz while diving deep into psychological horror. The result is a wonderfully camp yet disturbing flick that cements Mia Goth’s status as a genre icon.

Pearl (Goth) is a star, but the world doesn’t know it yet – and if you’ve seen X, you know it never will. Her inevitable descent into the crushing mundanity of life is made all the more uncomfortable by the glimpses of hope she, and we, are afforded. Pearl is a true slasher villain, a Pamela Voorhees for the TikTok era, but between Goth’s sweetly unhinged performance, the cruelty of her life, and the gorgeous framing of the atrocities she commits, it’s hard not to feel a perverse affection for her.

Anyone who has experienced professional or artistic rejection may see an uncomfortable amount of themselves in Pearl, while West’s use of bizarre psychosexual scenes – a scarecrow is involved – essentially serves to remind modern audiences that humans have always been humans: selfish, sex-obsessed, and in desperate need of love. 

See Pearl on the big screen if you can – these visuals shouldn’t be wasted on a TV or laptop. An empathetic, intelligent, and wholly unapologetic film, Pearl is the manic little sister of the horror family, welcomed into the fold with open arms. 

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Released 17 Mar by Universal; certificate 15
Pearl plays at Glasgow Film Festival on 6 Mar