Heavenly Creatures (1994), directed by Peter Jackson, from an original script written by Jackson and Frances Walsh; starring Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Sarah Peirse, and Clive Merrison.
Now seemingly forgotten, Heavenly Creatures is the film that launched the careers of both Kate Winslet and Peter Jackson (amusingly, Winslet is listed in the opening credits as “Introducing Kate Winslet.”) The script, which was co-written by Jackson and which later received an Oscar nomination, is based on a famous murder case that shocked staid 1950s, New Zealand society. Two teenage girls bludgeoned one of their mothers to death with a brick, while the trio were out on a walk in a woodland area. The girls claimed she tripped and hit her head on a rock, but the story fell apart when police discovered an incriminating diary kept by one of the girls.
The movie starts with a BBC-style documentary depicting New Zealand’s capital, Christchurch, in the 1950s. It’s an idyllic, orderly town of rosy-cheeked, bicycle-riding citizens. Then it cuts to frantic footage of two teenage girls running through the woods, spattered with blood and screaming hysterically. The girls are Lynskey as Pauline Rieper (later known as Pauline Parker) and Winslet as Juliet Hulme.
The story line then loops back to a prim, private girls’ high school, where Juliet and Pauline meet. Pauline (Lynskey) is a chubby misfit from a lower-middle-class Kiwi family. Juliet (Winslet) is an upper-middle-class British girl with a taste for drama and fabrications. Both girls have suffered serious illnesses which kept them from having normal early childhoods. They become fast friends, and soon create a fantasy world, instigated by Juliet, that revolves around movie stars and a magical land called Borovnia.
They sculpt the land and people of Borovnia out of modeling clay and collaborate on writing stories, letters, and plays about them. Eventually, they start losing touch with the real world, which Jackson drives home effectively by making the clay figures come to life in several memorable fantasy sequences. As Pauline fills out her diary, she refers to herself and Juliet as "heavenly creatures" who are too smart and creative for the mundane world of reality.
The girls’ parents are alarmed at their close relationship and signs of lesbianism. When Juliet’s parents announce they are getting divorced, with the father (Clive Merrison) planning to return to Britain, they announce that they will send Juliet to live with an aunt in South Africa. The girls fall into hysteria at the prospect of being separated. Pauline believes that her mother will block her plans to escape with Juliet to Hollywood, and that’s when the girls concoct their tragic murder plot.
It’s easy to see why Winslet and Jackson became international superstars after this film. Winslet, just 19 when Heavenly Creatures debuted, is spectacular in her portrayal of flashy, drama-loving Juliet. We see the seeds of lunacy under her glittery exterior when she begs Pauline for a chance to touch a long, ugly surgical scar on her leg.
Lynskey turns in a more understated performance as the frumpy Pauline, but she’s very good at conveying her character's growing dissatisfaction with her humble parents and her concurrent attachment to the more affluent and glamorous Hulmes.
Jackson ably mixes in fantasy sequences with brutal violence; he makes viewers pay rapt attention to the slow descent of the two girls into madness. It’s an engrossing, compelling tale, expertly paced and framed. In one memorable shot, the camera catches Winslet in twilight while she sings an opera aria from the upper verandah of her family’s lavish house. In another, Jackson aims his camera down from a steep perch above the tragic trio as they make their way into the woods, with Pauline’s mother Honora (Peirse), tromping away happily, completely unaware of her impending fate. Creepy.
The film ends with Honora's murder, but it includes a postcript which explains that the girls were tried and convicted of murder. They served five years in prison before being released because of their youth at the time of the murder. Both eventually made their way to the UK, although they didn’t maintain contact. After Heavenly Creatures debuted, the media revealed that Juliet had changed her name to Anne Perry and had become a successful mystery writer. Both now at the age of 80, they are still alive as of this writing. On disc and streaming; currently, there’s a good hi-def version on YouTube, although it inexplicably has English subtitles (the film is in English.)
