HEAVENLY CREATURES (1994)

"Our main idea for the day was to murder Mother."

Loosely based on the real life 1954 Parker–Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand, HEAVENLY CREATURES starts out with the introduction of the two girls, Juliet Hulme and Pauline Parker, (played by Kate Winslet and Melanie Lynskey) to each other.  Pauline is an unkempt and homely girl who sticks to herself while Juliet is beautiful, cheerful and outgoing.  At first, it would seem that these two are complete opposites, but as Fate would have it, they take an immediate liking to each other and are soon inseparable.  They spend all of their time together having fun and making up elaborate adventure stories set in a fictional place called "the Fourth World".  It's all very innocent.  Eventually, the parents (on both sides) become concerned about the closeness of Pauline and Juliet and fear that they might be...gay!  Gasp!  The parents try different things to separate the two girls, but none of it works.  It only creates stress in a situation that was completely stress-free before.  Eventually, Juliet's parents decide to remove Juliet from New Zealand altogether and move her in with a relative in South Africa!  Jesus Christ, talk about an overreaction!  Things get even worse when the girls hear about this news.  Their completely insane response is to beat Pauline's mother to death with a brick!

I was lucky enough to see HEAVENLY CREATURES in the theater when it was released in 1994 and I loved it.  It was so shocking to see such a mature and professionally crafted film from the guy who brought me BAD TASTE, MEET THE FEEBLES and DEAD ALIVE!  That said, time has definitely diminished the impact of HEAVENLY CREATURES.  Watching it again now, the "Uncut" version (which is 10 minutes longer) is too long, the special effects are dated and the ending is way too abrupt.  There's no closure to the story.  It just kinda ends and tosses some words on the screen about what happened afterwards.  I didn't find that to be a satisfactory ending at all.  It only created more questions in my handsome brain.

My minor complaints aside, HEAVENLY CREATURES is still 100% worth watching.  Unique story, imaginative storytelling style, strong acting, Peter Jackson cameo, some familiar faces from other Jackson films (I smiled from ear to ear at seeing Elizabeth Moody), some funny jokes about how "hideous" Orson Welles looked, wonderful photography.

I don't know it will ever happen, but I'd love it if  Peter Jackson and company would release an extras-packed edition of HEAVENLY CREATURES.  I mean, after releasing a extras-packed version of DEAD ALIVE, of course.

DEAD ALIVE (1992)

"I kick ass for the Lord!"

1957: adult Lionel still lives with his over domineering mother in a large house on the hill. He goes on a date with a local girl, Paquita, to the zoo. While spying on her son, the mother is bitten by a rat monkey and the next day turns into a flesh eating zombie! Lionel can't stand the thought of killing his zombie mother, so he keeps her under sedation in the basement. Keeping a live zombie in the basement is hard work, so before long everything has spiraled out of control until there's an entire horde of zombies running around the house...and all of them want to kill Lionel.

That's a brilliant story, but what pushes DEAD ALIVE into the one of the greatest zombie movies of all time territory is the absolute genius of director Peter Jackson. Right from the beginning, the film blasts off in a frantic pace and it never lets up. It's just one hilarious gore-drenched scene after another all wrapped up in a clever script that somehow makes it all believable and even has a little romance thrown in for good measure.

There really hasn't been many over the top splatter films of this quality made since this movie. It's kinda sad. It's also sad that Peter Jackson has completely forgotten about the horror genre.  Maybe one day he'll return to it.