Heavenly Creatures (1994)

Heavenly Creatures (also released as Maiden's Prayer) is a true-crime drama about the intense, all-consuming friendship between two 1950s schoolgirls, Pauline Parker and Juliet Hulme. As their private fantasy world grows more elaborate, they drift away from family and reality; when worried parents try to separate them, the girls take increasingly extreme steps to stay together. Viewers can expect a tense, emotionally charged experience that blends lyrical imagination with chilling realism. The film alternates between lush, often surreal sequences that bring the girls’ invented fantasy land to life and stark, claustrophobic scenes of family life and social-conformist pressure. The result is both beguiling and unsettling: you’ll be drawn into the beauty and inventiveness of the girls’ bond while feeling the mounting dread as their fantasy turns dangerous. Themes of adolescence, obsession, identity, and the collision between creativity and repression run throughout, culminating in a dramatic, tragic climax that leaves a lasting emotional impact.

Actors: Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Sarah Peirse

Director: Peter Jackson

Runtime: 99 min

Genres: Biography, Crime, Drama

6.9 /10 86 /100 7.3 /10 7.6 /10