Beautiful Creatures (2001)


Rachel Weisz            Petula
Susan Lynch             Dorothy
Iain Glen               Tony
Maurice Roeves          Ronnie McMinn
Alex Norton             Detective Inspector Hepburn
Jake D'Arcy             Train Guard
Tom Mannion             Brian McMinn
Paul Doonan (II)        Man in Lift
Robin Laing             Man in Kiosk
Pauline Lynch (II)      Sheena
John Murtagh            Man on Beach
Shane Cadzow            Small Boy on Beach
Juliet Cadzow           Mother on Beach
Stewart Preston         Duty Sergeant
Don Donachie            Police Pathologist
Joel Strachan (II)      Sergeant Binnie

Directed by:            Bill Eagles
Produced by:            Simon Donald, Alan J. Wands, Duncan Kenworthy


Not so much a feminist twist on the bloody British gangster thriller as a vision of innocents in thugland, 
Beautiful Creatures offers a pair of birds at the center of this traditionally bloke-driven genre. Think 
of it as Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels by way of Bound. Susan Lynch and Rachel Weisz are Dorothy 
and Petula, gangster girlfriends desperate to escape the Scottish underworld of scumbags, violent gang 
bosses, and corrupt cops.

The familiar details are all here--a dead body that won't go away, an uneasy balance between sadistic 
violence and black humor, and a tightening web of conspiracies and revenge plots that converge in a messy 
climax. But director Bill Eagles and writer Simon Donald temper the runaway plotting and cutthroat conniving 
of alpha males with moments of female bonding and giggly girl talk. Unfortunately they never quite overcome 
the brutal misogyny inherent in the genre. Still, there's a real joy in seeing Petula's self confidence 
blossoming under Dorothy's encouragement and trust, and you can't help but want the giddy girlfriends to 
triumph over the big, bad underworld.


=================

Dorothy is having a bad day. After her deranged boyfriend, Tony, trashes her apartment, steals her money 
and dyes her white dog, Pluto, bright pink, Dorothy runs into Petula who is on the brink of being strangled 
in a dark alley by her own boyfiend, Brian. She comes to Petula's defense and knocks Brian on the back of 
his head with a piece of scaffolding. But complications arise. Somehow Brian turns up dead. If there's 
anyone Petula is more terrified of than her boyfriend, it's his even more dangerous older brother--who also 
happens to be her boss. With a scheme that seems to develop on its own, Petula tells him Brian has been 
kidnapped for a lot of ransom. They may as well get something out of the ordeal. But a corrupt, lascivious 
police detective uncovers the scheme and Dorothy's irate boyfriend shows up looking for revenge and leaving 
Petula and Dorothy at the mercy of three perilous men