After the unexpected XTi West brings us Pearl, focusing on the hypnotic killer origins of the slasher that came out earlier this year. with PearlTi West continues a future trilogy that will close next year.
It is difficult to enter a cinema and not have hype after having read Martin Scorsese talk about “masterpiece”. This is how he defined the legendary director of Goodfellas i Taxi Driver a PearlTi West’s new movie. “Fascinating” and “possessed by pure love of cinema” were other qualifiers that Scorsese gave to the prequel of X.
Pearl transports us to a Texas farm in 1918. Pearl, her overprotective mother and her invalid father live there. The relationship between the protagonist and her parents is complicated, and this situation will get worse as time goes on an underlying evil begins to emerge in Pearl’s psyche.
The expectation for Pearl has been maximum. X was a real bombshell for fans of the genre and has cemented Ti West as one of the biggest references of contemporary horror. His latest works are a tribute to 80’s slasher cinemabut passed by a stylized filter that makes them unique. Cinematographically, they are very powerful films, with a very careful photography and soundtrack that immerse us in the classic cinema of the 50s.
The projection of Pearl would certainly be one of the events of the year in Sitges. In addition, the presence of the director was a must for his parishioners, enthralled by a pure, artisanal way of making cinema. The movie starts and we watch the next two hours a well-told story, a little slow, supported by an immeasurable Mia Goth. The origins of Pearl are not unprecedented in the world of cinema, we could even say that they are quite simple, but it is the how and not the what is what shines here.
The two-hour feature that Ti West composes with painstaking precision oozes passion for classic cinema and his power to tell stories with an exaggeratedly sweetened cinematic filter. We must not forget that we are dealing with a slasher, one of the most disturbing subgenres in cinema. That’s why clash this contrast in what we see and how we see it. It is a huge merit embody such a disparity and that it does not remain a parodic pastiche.
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Finally, Pearl it took home the Best Director and Best Actress awards for Ti West and Mia Goth, respectively. Its projection has been a resounding successin addition to what he has put the second stone to a trilogy that promises to be vital to the hypermodern slasher. In a festival where originality and effectiveness do not usually go hand in hand, titles like Pearl they are always well received.