Heavenly Creatures (Peter Jackson, 1995) wr. Frances Walsh, Peter Jackson; Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Sarah Peirse, Diana Kent, Clive Merrison, Simon O'Connor, NZ, 95 min.
True story about a girl who killed her parents: anything made by Peter Jackson is at least interesting.
Based on the notorious 1954 Parker–Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand, the film focuses on the relationship between two teenage girls—Pauline Parker and Juliet Hulme—which culminates in the murder of Parker's mother. The events of the film span the period from their meeting in 1952 to the murder in 1954. Wikipedia.
What makes Jackson's film enthralling and frightening is the way it shows these two unhappy girls, creating an alternative world so safe and attractive they thought it was worth killing for. Roger Ebert.
Jackson's visionary triumph, heightened by the blazing performances of Lynskey and Winslet and by Alun Bollinger's whirling camera, is in capturing the delirium as the girls whip themselves into an erotic frenzy with Mario Lanza records, semi-naked dances in the woods and revenge fantasies. The unthinkable becomes suddenly real. Though Pauline hasn't been heard from since her release in 1959, Juliet was recently revealed to be the best-selling mystery writer Anne Perry. It's a fitting postscript to a startling and haunting film. Peter Travers, Rolling Stone.
Garry Gillard | New: 11 November, 2012 | Now: 26 June, 2020