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Director: Peter Jackson

Release Date: 10 February 1995

Tagline: The true story of a crime that shocked a nation.

Main Cast:

Melanie Lynskey … Pauline Parker

Kate Winslet … Juliet Hulme

Sarah Peirse … Honora Parker Rieper

Heavenly Creatures is the true story of the infamous Parker-Hulme murder that took place in New Zealand in 1954. Jackson chose to focus on the intense friendship between Pauline and Juliet rather than make an historical look back at the events. This was an excellent decision, because in order to understand how they came to murder Honora you need to understand their relationship.

After the initial prologue which introduces us to 1950s Christchurch, the film starts with what should be the final scene (in much the same way as The Accused did). This scene is taken from testimony from the witness and is therefore extremely accurate.

The film takes its material not only from testimonies of those involved, but most importantly from Pauline’s diaries. Although some of it is disputed by the real life Juliet Hulme (now the author Anne Perry), it is pretty much how things happened. She claims that their relationship was not physical (although the ‘night of the saints’ is taken from the diary), and that they did not make clay figures. If the latter was indeed not the case, then I would suspect that those scenes were in the film as it was the best way of portraying the characters and events of their imaginary world of Borovnia. However, I may be totally wrong about that.

Heavenly Creatures introduced both Lynskey and Winslet and both are superb.

There is a fantastic website called ‘Fourth World – The Heavenly Creatures Website’ and it contains extensive material on both the film and the real life events. In fact, you may find it beneficial to know the background before watching the film. I have seen it twice now, and the film finds a new level when you watch it after reading all about it.

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