Overview
Trapped on her family’s isolated farm, Pearl must tend to her ailing father under the bitter and overbearing watch of her devout mother. Lusting for a glamorous life like she’s seen in the movies, Pearl’s ambitions, temptations, and repressions collide.
Directed by Ti West, and starring Mia Goth in the title role, Pearl is a prequel to the director’s previous film, X, yet functions perfectly as a standalone film without any requirements to have seen that other film.
During the influenza pandemic in 1918, Pearl lives on a Texas homestead with her German parents whilst her husband is serving in World War 1. Her mother is a domineering and controlling presence, and her father is infirm, confined to a wheelchair and requiring constant care. Pearl longs for more from her life than farming and caring for her father, and dreams of becoming a chorus girl, but also shows signs of being a disturbed individual when she tortures and kills some of the animals around the farm, and inflicts abuse on her father. As the film plays out, her actions get more sinister, with every upset in her journey pushing her that little bit further over the edge.
Shot in a technicolour fuelled manner, Pearl is a very different type of film than X was – that film adopted the grindhouse/Texas Chainsaw aesthetic of the era it was set in. Opening with vibrant credits and title music, Pearl instead adopts a Wizard of Oz inspired design, emulating that majesty of early cinema, and making the dark proceedings feel somewhat surreal as a result, but in a good way. The stark contrast to the visual and musical style to the events that transpire serve well to unsettle, making many moments both amusing and chilling at the same time. It could be seen that, with her own obsession with stardom, the film is presenting how she sees her world around her.
Mia Goth shines in the lead role, and is absolutely mesmerising from the start. With her dreams and aspirations being blocked at every opportunity, it is easy to almost empathise with the character, but then something dead inside shines through a small glance from Goth, and you are immediately reminded that this is someone who maybe we shouldn’t be rooting for. Turning on a dime, Goth switches from delight and whimsy, to sinister and disturbed with ease, adding so many complicated layers to the part to make Pearl feel so chillingly real. By the time the end credits roll, with Goth staring into camera with a smile on her face, you find yourself compelled to watch that held moment, which again manages to reflect so many different emotions buried under that smile, ensuring that you feel suitably unnerved by the end.
Blood splatter chills are, of course, at play here, but not in the over-the-top nature of the previous film. Yes, there are a few gruesome moments, but the colourful palette makes them seem tamer, yet more disturbing as a result. West clearly demonstrates his love and understanding of horror genre once more, albeit in a different manner than in X. Here the horror is played out so normally that it adopts a more psychological mind-play overall.
Pearl is a great prequel to X, and has ramped up my excitement for the third film’s release. But more than anything, this is the film that really showcases Mia Goth as a lead, after many strong turns in her career, and hopefully we will get to see a lot more of what she can offer cinema in the years to come.