Heavenly Creatures has recently been re-released on Blu-Ray, 17 years after its original theatrical release. It’s generally been seen as notable for the fact that it’s one of Peter Jackson’s earliest films, and also Kate Winslet’s first film role as she plays Juliet Hulme alongside Melanie Lynskey as Pauline Parker. Based on a true story, the film follows the two girls who meet at a girls’ school in New Zealand in the mid 1950s and form an intense relationship, culminating in the murder of Parker’s mother. Alongside this we get a visualisation of the girls’ fantasy world that they create with clay figures and intricately detailed character biographies of ‘The Saints’, a kind of royal family, that populate it. This is the world that they retreat into at regular intervals and considering the age of the film, the environment that Jackson creates with prosthetics and early digital effects is pretty remarkable. The film is worth watching just for the visuals and if you want to see an earlier stage of Jackson’s development as a director.
Unsurprisingly for a film that covers a lesbian relationship between two teenagers, and finishes with them committing murder, any depiction of their intensifying relationship could easily be construed as sensationalised and prurient. Although unmistakably sexual, the bond between the two is inextricably linked to their fantasy world- when they do have sex, it occurs when they are re-enacting how ‘The Saints’ would do it. This progression in the two’s relationship fits in neatly with the two girl’s loss of a grip on reality and comes just before the two plot to kill Parker’s mother. This is interestingly paralleled by the attitudes shown by the adults in the film including the girls’ parents, whose attitude to homosexuality is that it is a by-product of a mental illness. What does Jackson do in depicting the sexual side of their relationship and their fantasy worlds as mutually reliant? He confirms this discourse around homosexuality that was such a pervasive pattern throughout the 1950s not only in New Zealand but also Europe and America, that it was unhealthy and symptomatic of a lack of morality. It’s hard to read any critique of this discourse around sexuality into the film when it just agrees with contemporary attitudes.
As the film is based on an actual case, with the voice-over of Parker’s diary entries being taken from her actual diary, the confirmation of contemporary discourse found in the film’s depiction of sexuality could easily be pushed aside by saying that ‘oh, but this actually happened, so it doesn’t matter how Jackson’s chosen to depict it, he’s just showing it how it was’. I’d disagree. In making a film in the first place, be it fictional or non-fictional, the director has an opportunity to depict a story in any way they please. The ‘truth’, in the end, doesn’t matter all that much. So Jackson’s choice to confirm this pervasive and damaging discourse admittedly doesn’t encourage watching it.
However, the fact remains that sometimes, watching a pair of murderous teenagers can make for an entertaining few hours. Especially when one is a young Kate Winslet and the acting tends towards the histrionic. As a depiction of a particularly extreme case of the consequences teenage angst, it’s also very effective. Discounting the criticism above, the film is still enjoyable in a cathartic way and so still comes as recommended.
Recommendations
The Lovely Bones (2009): Another exploration of teenage life from Jackson, once again based on pre-existing source material in the form of Alice Sebold’s novel about a murdered 14 year old. Less effective in my opinion than Heavenly Creatures, but more visually spectacular.
Running With Scissors (2006): Again centring around a description of a turbulent adolescence and based on the memoirs of Augusten Burroughs, this is directed this time by Ryan Murphy (yes, the same one that created Glee). Far camper and lighter than Heavenly Creatures.
Jo Gilbert
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