10 Recent Horror Movies That Broke All The Rules

Rule Break: It's a Technicolor slasher where you root for the murderer.

Ti West has always felt like the underdog of the mid-noughties horror wave. While early work like The House of the Devil hinted at promise, West largely flew under the radar as flashier genre directors either crashed or went corporate. But quietly and patiently, he kept refining his style, honing a gift for authentically recreating specific eras of cinema.

That gift is in full, glorious bloom with his X trilogy. While X gave us gritty ’70s grindhouse, and MaXXXine leaned into glitzy ’80s sleaze, it’s Pearl - the unexpected technicolor prequel - that stands tall as the real masterpiece.

Visually, it’s closer to The Wizard of Oz than The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, but don’t let that fool you. In the first 15 minutes, our protagonist slaughters a goose, grinds on a scarecrow, and dreams of stardom while the rot of isolation and mental illness eats her alive. It’s all anchored by Mia Goth in a performance that’s part Judy Garland, part Norman Bates... all tour de force.

And here’s the kicker, you kind of root for her. That’s the rule-breaker. Despite Pearl's increasingly unhinged behaviour, West makes us sympathise, even identify with her delusion. It’s a slasher-as-character-study, painted in rich primary colours and dripping with psychological dread - even literally, while the credits roll.