--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Thu Jun 6 02:07:10 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id CAA11670 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Thu, 6 Jun 1996 02:06:59 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (daemon@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id CAA11695; Thu, 6 Jun 1996 02:06:43 -0700
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 02:06:43 -0700
Message-Id: <199606060906.CAA11695@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n044
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n044 --------------
001 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - Jefferson's analysis! Yum!
002 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - STARZ! "HC" airing
003 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - Amusing "lesbian" photos
004 - "karen mcquillen" <kmcqui - re: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n043
005 - marth@maine.maine.edu (Na - Re: Jefferson's analysis! Yum!
006 - Erica Jamieson <beatles@w - Jefferson's Analysis
007 - Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@ - The handshake
008 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Jefferson's analysis
009 - RUMerry@aol.com - Re: Jefferson's Analysis
010 - orson@CAM.ORG (Jean Gueri - Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.1 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: Jefferson's analysis! Yum!
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 02:06:39 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 9487
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
Thanks to Jefferson! I feel compelled to add comments..
Note to Bao: I have no qualms with 'archiving' these reviews, UNLESS
it's from Starwave or some other (potentially) litigious website which
proclaims on the bottom of every pretentious webpage, "DO NOT DISTRIBUTE
OR MODIFY IN ANY FORM.. LEST WE SUE YOUR ARSES OFF AND RIP EVERY PENNY
FROM YOUR GRITTY LITTLE HANDS..."
On with the commentary! I relish the opportunity to engage in this type
of discussion.. especially since I saw "HC" again tonight on Starz! (More
comments in next email..)
I'm editing out the portions, such that only that which I am commenting
on is included, to save everyone's valuable time.. :)
> --------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n043.2 ---------------
>
> From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
> Subject: A few thoughts
> Date: Tue, 4 Jun 1996 20:34:32 -0400 (EDT)
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>
>[..schnipp!..]
> Paul's stocking: On the surface, Paul doing her stocking as she goes
> outside is simply a sign that she's in a hurry. But there's a sexual
> element to it as well. A mild foreshadowing of the appetite which will
> come to drive Paul in the second half of the film. Of course this also
> ties in with all the walking/feet imagery (Which I still have yet to
> figure out).
Yes, there is a focus on walking/feet. Not sure why. (Or maybe the
question we should be asking is, "Why not?")
> Visual contrast: Jackson sets Pauline apart from the rest of the group
> beautifully. We immediately know, without anything being said, that
> she's something of an outsider. In the shot of her half-heartedly
> mumbling the hymn, she stands out immediately--a frizzy-haired brunette
> in a sea of carefully beretted blondes. She's also looking in a
> different direction than everyone else, obviously uninterested in the
> proceedings. This apparent lack of interest in conventional religious
> ritual will also find its outlet in her relationship with Juliet, when
> they create a self-deifying religious faith of their own.
That is so precisely accurate and correct! The first time I saw this
scene, I was laughing very hard. Jackson -- such a master. And Melanie
Lynskey, she has a gift for making me laugh. I am easily set off! I see
her arched brow, pursed lips, or scrunched nose and I titter endlessly.
>
> Juliet's eyebrows: During her theatrical entrance--waiting for Ms.
> Stewart to actually say her name before sweeping into the room--her
> eyebrows are almost contemptuously arched, as if these lowly Kiwi
> students (and teachers) are barely worthy of her gaze. And the Kiwis
> fall right in line--Elizabeth Moody's orgasmic response upon hearing of
> Juliet's background still makes me chuckle. And when Ms. Stewart
> momentarily forgets to mention Juliet's noble homeland ("I am actually
> from England, Ms. Stewart"), we get another haughty little eye lift. All
> this class posturing may be silly, but it will prove tragically important
> to Paul as the film goes on.
>
Did you notice as well, when Juliet first walks in (and everyone stands)
something else? Ms. Stewart asks the class to "Sit!" -- and yet, Pauline
remains standing, only her, for at least a second, before sitting down in
perfunctory fashion. Always such a rebel!
This is indicated in the FAQ. Also indicated in the FAQ (erroneously)
is that when Pauline hops over the fence, right after having fixed her
stocking, on the way to school, a schoolmate rushes up to her "excitedly"
and they both go off and converse on some topic. Wrong! That is not
Pauline that the schoolmate talks with, but someone else.
> Be My Love: Melanie Lynsky's reaction to the opening strains is
> absolutely priceless. It's as if she's never heard music before. But
> then Dad has to screw it all up, first with his Irish joke, and then,
> more seriously, with the fish. Paul's spirit is soaring on waves of
> romantic passion...and then Herb feels compelled to waltz in waving a
> smelly reminder of the family's exceedingly modest means of livelihood.
> Is there anything less romantic than a dead fish?
>
One of my favorite scenes. Melanie is so adorable in that scene. Some
have deemed it overacting, but I felt it was quite normal and credible. I
wonder how my face looked in my youth, when I heard a new Led Zeppelin
album? Or something of that nature? Surely not much different than
Melanie's reaction.
Herbert and the fish.. what a sense of humor he has! I guess he knew
Pauline was a serious girl, and wished to try to annoy her.
> Ilam: The Princess on the bridge (Peter Dasent's musical cue is literally
> called, `The Princess of Ilam.' BTW, if you don't have the soundtrack,
> turn off you computer right now, go to a store and buy/order it). With
> that magnificent track-in on Paul's face when she sees Juliet, we now
> realize the object of Paul's romantic dreams. The film's love story is
> told using the cinematic conventions usually applied to heterosexual
> romances. Romeo has seen the light breaking. Paul is officially smitten.
Another favorite scene. When I listen to the soundtrack on the way to
work, I vividly recall this scene when I hear the soundtrack. I see
quite vividly, in my mind's eye, the camera zooming in on Pauline's
enraptured face, upon seeing Juliet on the bridge.
Is the CD soundtrack still easily acquired? One person told me in email
that CD Europe no longer can find the disc! I can't believe this. Can
anyone confirm?
>[..schnipp!..]
> The Shrine: The atmosphere of this scene, in which Juliet introduces Paul
> to the basic tenets of their alternate religion, is marvelous. Dasent
> takes scraps of melody from the Ilam theme, particularly one three-note
> motif, and alters it, making it odd, haunting, magical, and foreboding
> all at once.
Did you notice how Pauline looked at Juliet during that scene? Pay
particular attention: I believe it is on the third saint, when Juliet
says "This." The camera shows Pauline looking at Juliet in what could
only be described as a *very* admiring manner -- almost fanatical! Very
fascinating.
> It: Now I'm sure we all know what `It' is. As Juliet runs through the
> other pronouns/saints, Pauline gazes at her in a way that can only be
> described as rather...amorous. And then she makes her first individual
> contribution to their personal mythology--The saint of sex and violence,
> `It.' Juliet isn't ready for `it' yet, but we know that Mr. Welles can't
> be escaped forever.
Ahh! I see that you did notice. Good.
>
> Meet the Riepers: Despite her best efforts, Paul can't hide her family's
> lower class background from Juliet. Melanie Lynsky looks as if she's
> trying to curl herself into a ball throughout the scene, especially when
> John the idiot boarder starts his tour of the house. And of course
> there's her pitiful attempt to save face after her father reveals his
> job--"He's the manager." More priceless facial expressions.
...and of course you did notice "John the Boarder" give Pauline a parting
glance as he left the dining area? Sort of like, "Wow, she's enchanting,
I have to get to know her.." Of course, Pauline is oblivious to his
gaze.
>
> The Handshake: when Juliet and Honora meet, Dasent clues us in to the
> coming discord with a little note of dissonance in the midst of his
> otherwise jaunty and playful music for this scene. We realize that
> Juliet and Honora represent forces in Paul's life which can't exist
> harmoniously for too long.
>
I am a bit confused by the handshake, not knowing much about "class"
issues. Is this to be interpreted as an insult to Honora -- to shake the
hand of Juliet? Perhaps someone could clear this up for me.
> Jumping In: As they run down the dock in their bathing suits, Juliet is
> still the leader, but she isn't willing to take the plunge. Paul,
> however, feels no qualms. Her position as leader in the second half of
> the film is foreshadowed here, along with her willingness to `dive in'
> and experiment with sensual pleasures. Remember where the picture of
> Orson ended up after Juliet discarded it? I don't know, maybe I'm taking
> this Freudian stuff too far.
>
Don't you adore Jackson! It is because of his style that we are able to
mention all these issues..
> Birth: Note the apparent grimace of strain and effort on Juliet's face
> just before she opens her eyes and sees the Fourth World. It's as if
> she's giving birth to it in her mind. And then it appears. I don't
> think the girls are actually experiencing any kind of mutual
> hallucination, but rather that Jackson is taking us directly into their
> minds to see the world they're jointly imagining. And (New Yorker
> reviews notwithstanding), I think the tactic works. Brilliantly.
> Gloriously. Magnificently.
Pauline's performance in this scene is exquisite! From the way she
handles Juliet's legs, as if something really *is* about to emerge, to the
way she squeals, "It's a boy!" and gasps breathlessly -- "Oh!" -- fantastic!
>[..schnipp!..]
> ---(That's enough for now. I'll post more later.)---
Looking forward to it!
see ya,
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.2 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: STARZ! "HC" airing
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 02:18:10 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 2388
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
I just watched STARZ!'s broadcast of "Heavenly Creatures." Finally,
they have shown it again. It was first shown in late December, of 1995.
It was where I first saw "HC."
The version was prefaced with the comments, "This version has been
modified from the theatrical release: It has been resized to fit your
screen." Or something like that..
This version was fantastic! Comments:
o The "old man coughing up blood into the bowl" in the hospital
is *in* this version! NOT in the pan/scan or laserdisc releases.
In the pan/scan & laserdisc releases, the scene is cut *right before*
the old man coughs up blood into his bowl. WE SEE THE BLOOD
in this version! BTW, I wish to gross Adam out, so I am going to
go into a bit of detail -- some of the blood actually sloshes out
of the bowl, onto the floor!
o More of Melanie's bosom can be seen in the scene with "John
the Boarder" (right after he says, "I didn't hurt you, did I?")
o More of Juliet's bosom can be seen in one of the bath sequences
(quite surprising, actually!) I believe it's when they are in
the bathroom and Mr. Hulme overhears them talking about "more
cleavage."
o Whomever "resized the film to fit your screen" for this version
did a FANTASTIC job. Much of the 'letterbox feel' is there --
you see most of every scene, just like in the laserdisc version!
Melanie isn't cut out of any scene. She's always onscreen when
she should be, just like in the laserdisc (letterbox) format.
o Expansion on previous comment: It's like they combined the
nice, zoomed in quality of pan/scan with the detail in the
letterbox versions. A great effort.
I felt this version was better than the pan/scan because:
o Melanie wasn't chopped off in some scenes
o We actually see *more* of the action! More of the "bottom frame"
or "top frame" is there, it seems they moved the camera back a bit,
so we see more of the peripheral action.
I felt this version was better than the letterbox version because:
o We see *more* of the action (see above..)
I may be able to find out more details later. This is the best version
of "HC" I have seen so far.
see ya,
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.3 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: Amusing "lesbian" photos
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 02:28:56 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 691
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
An associate of mine on the Internet brought this to my attention --
Apparently someone else out there has been making "HC" framegrabs!
Some 'lesbian' photos from "HC" were posted to the newsgroup
alt.binaries.pictures.lesbians
I found this fairly entertaining, so I thought I'd make you all aware of
it.
I have posted a contact sheet of these postings to an ftp site.
Access details:
ftp to ftp.best.com, cd to /pub/bryanw/misc, get file abplhc.jpg.
see ya,
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.4 ---------------
From: "karen mcquillen" <kmcquillen@ets.org>
Subject: re: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n043
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 96 11:11:08 EDT
Thanks to Jefferson for posting impressions of many HC scenes. Nice to relive
them again.
Two of my own thoughts (for now):
1) I saw the adjusting of the stocking as Pauline leaves for school as a
foreshadowing of what a stocking is used for later in the film. (20 demerits
to anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about!!!)
2) Is Bert singing to and waltzing with the mackerel forshadowing of the Red
Herrings that are to come? ;-)
(Hi Jane!)
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.5 ---------------
From: marth@maine.maine.edu (Nancy)
Subject: Re: Jefferson's analysis! Yum!
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 10:02:38 -0700
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>> The Handshake: when Juliet and Honora meet, Dasent clues us in to the
>> coming discord with a little note of dissonance in the midst of his
>> otherwise jaunty and playful music for this scene. We realize that
>> Juliet and Honora represent forces in Paul's life which can't exist
>> harmoniously for too long.
>>
>
>I am a bit confused by the handshake, not knowing much about "class"
>issues. Is this to be interpreted as an insult to Honora -- to shake the
>hand of Juliet? Perhaps someone could clear this up for me.
This scene intrigues me as well. It's really the only scene in the movie
that I can't quite figure out the meaning.
I get the impression that Honora is surprised at the extension of Juliet's
hand, a confident action for someone of Juliet's age . I think it also
indicates a distinction between class. Honora can tell by that action that
Juliet comes from a well-bred, upper-class type of family (she seems to
already know this from what Paul has told her about Juliet before the
meeting). Maybe Honora has never met someone so young with such forthright
manners before. Another thing--since Juliet is a guest in Honora's house,
it would have been more appropriate if Honora had extended her hand first.
Maybe she knows this and was caught off-guard by Juliet beating her to it.
Actually, to get technical, is would have been more appropriate for Paul to
introduce Juliet to her mother.
Nancy
========================================
Nancy Marth
Spatial Odyssey
Raymond H. Fogler Library/NCGIA
University of Maine
Tel: 207-581-1634
Fax: 207-581-1653
http://www.odyssey.maine.edu/gisweb
========================================
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.6 ---------------
From: Erica Jamieson <beatles@wchat.on.ca>
Subject: Jefferson's Analysis
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 12:35:27 -0700
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Very Perceptive Jefferson!!! :)
I'm wondering why during the "Be My Love" and disgusting fish scene, why
does the camera close in on Steve? He looks terrified!
Erica
?????????????????????????????
I believe, this is heaven
To no one else but me
And I'll defend it as long as
I can be left here to linger
In silence if I choose to
Would you try to understand
- Sarah
McLachlan
?????????????????????????????
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.7 ---------------
From: Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: The handshake
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 09:12:25 +0800 (WST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Hello Creatures,
I think the handshake does two things. Firstly, it indicates the class
difference between Honora (and her family, background etc) and Juliet
(ditto), as has been pointed out. Secondly, it foreshadows the scene of
Honora's death - after the first blows knock her to her knees, she
stretches out a hand to Juliet, who at first appears to be responding, but
in fact reaches past her to take the brick from Pauline, and thus take
part in the murder. I find this one of the most terrifying and gripping
moments in the film.
(I wondered whether to put a SPOILERS alert at the top of this, but
decided everyone reading this must have seen the film. Correct me if I'm
wrong!).
Sandra Bowdler
sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.8 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Jefferson's analysis
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 19:59:16 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
I feel like I've just turned the movie off.
Handshake - I agree with Sandra that it's foreshadowing, and I think
that Honora also just doesn't like Juliet even before she walks in
the door. She resents Pauline's sudden fascination with an upper-
class girl and her desire to spend so much time at Ilam, because it
makes her feel that the life she's given Pauline isn't enough.
Herbert and the Fish - This is the first example of Pauline's
family getting in the way of her dreams of Juliet. If they won't even
let her listen to a record in peace, then, later on, obviously.....
The Feet Thing - I don't think this has any traditional symbolism.
(at least I've never heard of feet symbolizing anything), but I think
Jackson, in his infinite genius, is using this to "ground" the story
and the viewer. By showing us literally and intuitively "where these
characters are", it prepares us for the flights into ecstasy and
madness that they will take. I think a story filled with so much
hysteria really needs to be grounded or else it won't seem believeable.
And what more cinematic way to do this then by showing feet? That's
my meditation on the genius of Jackson for the day.
Looking forward to Part II, Jefferson!
_ kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.9 ---------------
From: RUMerry@aol.com
Subject: Re: Jefferson's Analysis
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 02:43:10 -0400
Hi all!
>I'm wondering why during the "Be My Love" and disgusting fish scene, why
does the camera close in on Steve? He looks terrified!
Erica,
I too wondered why Steve looked so very anxious in the "Be My Love" scene.
I came up with this:
When I first saw it I thought maybe it was just to sustain the dizzying
rollercoaster-like feeling of the movie.
Just recently I wondered if Steve might represent the outsider(for example
some people in the audience) who looks at Pauline's extreme intensity and
passion while listening to Mario (and during the episode with her father that
follows) and is shocked and horrified by it. Maybe he further represents the
attitude of any respectable person in a respectable town, repulsion at such a
display of heightened emotion.
And maybe he foreshadows our horror as we watch the passions and emotions of
both Pauline and Juliet go spinning out of control.
--April Ellis
(closing account
6/6 14:00 EDT, no email after this time)
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n044.10 ---------------
From: orson@CAM.ORG (Jean Guerin)
Subject: Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 05:09:04 -0400
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Sounds like full frame version shot! You may have the holy grail!
E. Jean Guerin
Director of Programming
FANT-ASIA Film Festival
Montreal, Canada
also: Film Critic (HOUR magazine) & Journalist (Cinefantastique)
Cult/Trash Cinema specialist (CBC-Radio's Brave New Waves)
Actor (_Heavenly Creatures_,_Frankenstein & Me_,_La Vengeance de la
Femme en Noir_)
The critics rave!
"The Most Hideous Man Alive"
-Kate Winslet, Academy Award Nominee
"Sexy Demon"
-TIME Magazine.
orson@cam.org
http://www.cam.org/~orson/index.html
==============================================================================
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n044 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Fri Jun 7 03:17:20 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id DAA08884 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Fri, 7 Jun 1996 03:17:12 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id DAA23902; Fri, 7 Jun 1996 03:00:24 -0700
Date: Fri, 7 Jun 1996 03:00:24 -0700
Message-Id: <199606071000.DAA23902@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n045
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n045 --------------
001 - adamabr@asterix.helix.net - Re: A Few Thoughts/STARZ! "HC" airing
002 - Clscflm@aol.com - Greetings
003 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Re: Greetings
004 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
005 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - the fish!
006 - adamabr@mail.helix.net (a - Heavenly Creatures - The Montage
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n045.1 ---------------
From: adamabr@asterix.helix.net (adam abrams)
Subject: Re: A Few Thoughts/STARZ! "HC" airing
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 02:23:52 -0800
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
"Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org> wrote:
>This long, rambling message
>BTW, I'm issuing myself a license to be a bit pretentious
Long? Yes...
Rambling, pretentious? _mais non_!
Your comments and observations are a delight. I think you have expressed
elegantly a lot of the underlying themes in, and reactions many of us have
had to, the film. I look forward to part 2!
>Paul's stocking: On the surface, Paul doing her stocking as she goes
>outside is simply a sign that she's in a hurry. But there's a sexual
>element to it as well. A mild foreshadowing of the appetite which will
>come to drive Paul in the second half of the film. Of course this also
>ties in with all the walking/feet imagery (Which I still have yet to
>figure out).
And (perhaps you are going to mention this!) during the sequence where Paul
is doing housework (and glaring at Mother) as we hear her plans for the
"moider", the sequence ends with her doing the laundry, and what is she
taking off the clothesline? Yep... stockings.
>Juliet's eyebrows: During her theatrical entrance--waiting for Ms.
>Stewart to actually say her name before sweeping into the room--her
>eyebrows are almost contemptuously arched, as if these lowly Kiwi
>students (and teachers) are barely worthy of her gaze.
>From US magazine (Jan. 96):
"People said that Juliet would always arch her eyebrows and look down her
nose at people," says the British actress. "So, they plucked out all mine
from underneath and painted them in on top".
>Domestic bliss: More wonderful faces from Ms. Lynsky. We see by her
>expression as Hilda brushes her hair that this is exactly where Paul
>wants to be, and how she wants to live--with the Hulmes, as their
>daughter.
And the car ride home always struck me as the most tranquil image of Paul
in the entire film. Not one furrow on her brow; as she leans against Juliet
and stares peacefully into space, she, and Juliet, seem completely at
peace. Probably how I'd look if I'd just been to the 4th world...
More please!
Oh, and Bryan wrote:
>BTW, I wish to gross Adam out, so I am going to
> go into a bit of detail -- some of the blood actually sloshes out
>of the bowl, onto the floor!
Er, thanks a lot, Bryan... 8^)
Adam "Grossed Out But Glad to Know Anyway" Abrams
==========================================================================
Only the best people fight against Adam Abrams
all obstacles... in pursuit of happiness! Vancouver, BC, Canada
--Juliet Hulme, "Heavenly Creatures"
Visit the "Fourth World" at http://www.helix.net/~adamabr/creatures.html
==========================================================================
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n045.2 ---------------
From: Clscflm@aol.com
Subject: Greetings
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 14:20:14 -0400
Hi! Finally getting around to subscribing and wondered how to get digests of
all chat. Thanks in advance.
To plunge in - re dead mackeral - always thought wicked sense of Jackson's
humour to introdunce Honora with a shot panning up from the dead fish - talk
about foreshadowing... Can feet and walking and legs have some connection
with seeking a way out, a course, a destiny?
"Its all frightfully romantic." ClscFlm
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n045.3 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Re: Greetings
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 22:11:05 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
> Hi! Finally got around to subscribing...
Welcome!
> To plunge in - re dead mackeral- always thought wicked sense of
> Jackson's humour to introduce Honora with a shot panning up from the
> dead fish - talk about foreshadowing....
Did you ever notice also how the opening shot of Henry Hulme also involves
fish? He is shown opening forgotten egg and salmon sandwiches, and doesn't
even know what they are at first. So what a contrast between the two
families already! The Reipers are extremely interested in what they'll eat
in a few hours, and the Hulmes don't even notice food when it's there.
> Can feet and walking and legs have some connection
> with seeking a way out, a course, a destiny?
That makes a lot of sense, and could explain why they use it so
often in the murder scene especially.
> "It's all frightfully romantic."
Like heaven, only better because they're aren't any Christians.
-- kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n045.4 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 22:46:01 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 547
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
> From: orson@CAM.ORG (Jean Guerin)
> Subject: Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
> Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 05:09:04 -0400
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> Sounds like full frame version shot! You may have the holy grail!
>
>
> E. Jean Guerin
>
>[....]
Perhaps I've had a taste? I'd love to see the NZ version!
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n045.5 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: the fish!
Date: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 22:50:53 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 1097
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
> From: Erica Jamieson <beatles@wchat.on.ca>
> Subject: Jefferson's Analysis
> Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 12:35:27 -0700
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> Very Perceptive Jefferson!!! :)
>
> I'm wondering why during the "Be My Love" and disgusting fish scene, why
> does the camera close in on Steve? He looks terrified!
>
> Erica
>[....]
Remember when Herbert first says to Steve, "You're partial to a nice pair
of mackerel, aren't you Steve?"
He replies: "Oh, I'm not much of a fish man, Mistah Reeepuhhh."
So, he is grossed out, because Herbert is singing to this dead fish!
Perhaps he is also shocked to see that Pauline "cut in line" and used the
phonograph before he had a chance to play his Doris Day album.
Two emotionally jarring experiences in less than 2 minutes -- enough to
make anyone come undone!
Just my warped conception.
see ya,
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n045.6 ---------------
From: adamabr@mail.helix.net (adam abrams)
Subject: Heavenly Creatures - The Montage
Date: Fri, 7 Jun 1996 00:32:44 -0800
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Greetings all!
I'm proud to announce that the Heavenly Creatures Montage is now complete!
This artistic creation is culled from twenty-nine separate images from the
film (thanks to Bryan Woodworth's media page!), seamlessly woven together
into a unique neo-psychedelic tapestry of unforgettable imagery. And like
the film, it's chock-full of small details that reward a closer look!
And at 640x480 pixels, it also makes a dandy startup screen. For Macs anyway...
You'll find it in the Picture Gallery in either wing of my website.
Enjoy... "It's for You!"
Adam
I've also added an interesting observation about Anne Perry's "Inspector
Pitt" novels to HeavenlyNews!
==========================================================================
Only the best people fight against Adam Abrams
all obstacles... in pursuit of happiness! Vancouver, BC, Canada
--Juliet Hulme, "Heavenly Creatures"
Visit the "Fourth World" at http://www.helix.net/~adamabr/creatures.html
==========================================================================
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n045 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Sat Jun 8 07:00:57 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id HAA24073 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sat, 8 Jun 1996 07:00:47 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id HAA17217; Sat, 8 Jun 1996 07:00:34 -0700
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 07:00:34 -0700
Message-Id: <199606081400.HAA17217@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n046
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n046 --------------
001 - Erica Jamieson <beatles@w - Re: the fish!
002 - Clscflm@aol.com - Henry and Herbert
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n046.1 ---------------
From: Erica Jamieson <beatles@wchat.on.ca>
Subject: Re: the fish!
Date: Fri, 7 Jun 1996 06:36:15 -0700
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Bryan wrote:
>So, he is grossed out, because Herbert is singing to this dead fish!
>
>Perhaps he is also shocked to see that Pauline "cut in line" and used the
>phonograph before he had a chance to play his Doris Day album.
>
>Two emotionally jarring experiences in less than 2 minutes -- enough to
>make anyone come undone!
Duh! <Bangs head>.
Thanx!
Erica
?????????????????????????????
I believe, this is heaven
To no one else but me
And I'll defend it as long as
I can be left here to linger
In silence if I choose to
Would you try to understand
- Sarah
McLachlan
?????????????????????????????
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n046.2 ---------------
From: Clscflm@aol.com
Subject: Henry and Herbert
Date: Fri, 7 Jun 1996 15:29:35 -0400
Kate writes:
>Did you ever notice also how the opening shot of Henry Hulme also involves
>fish? He is shown opening forgotten egg and salmon sandwiches, and doesn't
>even know what they are at first. So what a contrast between the two
>families already! The Reipers are extremely interested in what they'll eat
>in a few hours, and the Hulmes don't even notice food when it's there.
True, but also note the look on Henry's face - screwed up - something smells
bad. And isn't he the suspicious one throughout ("She hasn't done anything...
its the intensity that disturbs me..." "I will not stand for any -
hanky-panky.") - who "smells something bad" in the relationship.
In the script, btw, Herbert sings to a banana while teasing Paul - and only
uses the dead fish to serenade Honora in the kitchen. Henry's sandwich scene
is also missing and the first reference to him is Hilda pointing out he's
doing his research when Pauline and Juliet rush in after Jon breaks Paul's
Lanza disk. Quite another feel all the way round.
ClscFlm
"Its all frightfully romantic."
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n046 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Sat Jun 8 18:23:40 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id SAA18329 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sat, 8 Jun 1996 18:23:20 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (daemon@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id SAA02696; Sat, 8 Jun 1996 18:23:03 -0700
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 18:23:03 -0700
Message-Id: <199606090123.SAA02696@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n047
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n047 --------------
001 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Responses to responses
002 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
003 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Jackson's foot fetish
004 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: Jefferson's Analysis
005 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Fish supply
006 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - A few thoughts, part 2
007 - opensesame@earthlink.net - Re: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n046
008 - 9506148v@Magpie.Magill.Un - Peter Jackson Interview
009 - Nancy <marth@maine.maine. - Re: A few thoughts, part 2
010 - Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@ - Re: A few thoughts, part 2
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.1 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Responses to responses
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 11:24:09 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Wed, 5 Jun 1996, Bryan Woodworth wrote of the 'Be My Love' scene:
> One of my favorite scenes. Melanie is so adorable in that scene. Some
> have deemed it overacting, but I felt it was quite normal and credible. I
How did the FAQ describe the acting style? "Pitched to the cheap seats"?
Everything about the film's style is a little bit heightened, and I for
one think the acting blends in beautifully. It ain't mimimalist, that's
for sure. The dialogue is also mixed in nice and loud ("I'VE GOT
SCAAAARRSS. THEY'RE ON MY LAWNGS.") Magnificent.
> Is the CD soundtrack still easily acquired? One person told me in email
> that CD Europe no longer can find the disc! I can't believe this. Can
> anyone confirm?
I don't know about CD Europe, but I didn't have too much trouble getting
it myself. A friend of mine who's a realy soundtrack fanatic ordered it
for me by mail. But then a few days before the disc arrived he informed
me that he'd actually seen the disc on the shelves of a Tower Records.
> I am a bit confused by the handshake, not knowing much about "class"
> issues. Is this to be interpreted as an insult to Honora -- to shake the
> hand of Juliet? Perhaps someone could clear this up for me.
It might have been considered unusual for a 15 year old girl to shake the
hand of her best friend's mother. I suppose a handshake implies a
certain amount of equality, which would be rather presumptuous of Juliet
in this case. Presumptuous, but certainly not out of character.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.2 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 11:25:55 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Wed, 5 Jun 1996, Bryan Woodworth wrote:
> This version was fantastic!
The important question is...Did you tape it? Just curious.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.3 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Jackson's foot fetish
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 11:35:59 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Wed, 5 Jun 1996, kate ann jacobson wrote:
> Jackson, in his infinite genius, is using this to "ground" the story
> and the viewer. By showing us literally and intuitively "where these
> characters are", it prepares us for the flights into ecstasy and
> madness that they will take.
Good point. In simplest terms, what is being depicted? Locomotion.
Ambulation. Characters going from one place to another. Leading, following.
It could be representing flight, or escape. An effort to get away from
where one has been (or where one has come from), which Paul is certainly
trying to do throughout the film.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.4 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: Jefferson's Analysis
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 11:40:25 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Thu, 6 Jun 1996 RUMerry@aol.com wrote:
> Just recently I wondered if Steve might represent the outsider(for example
> some people in the audience) who looks at Pauline's extreme intensity and
> passion while listening to Mario (and during the episode with her father that
> follows) and is shocked and horrified by it. Maybe he further represents the
> attitude of any respectable person in a respectable town, repulsion at such a
> display of heightened emotion.
I agree with this. Steve may like Doris Day, but Paul LOVES Mario. Once
again the "intensity" of the girls' feelings are disturbing the rest of
the general populace. Paul's faces can best be described as orgasmic,
and they simply aren't the kind of faces a proper schoolgirl is supposed
to make. That amount of passion, of burgeoning sexuality, can come to no
good.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.5 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Fish supply
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 11:56:31 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Thu, 6 Jun 1996, kate ann jacobson wrote:
> Did you ever notice also how the opening shot of Henry Hulme also involves
> fish? He is shown opening forgotten egg and salmon sandwiches, and doesn't
> even know what they are at first. So what a contrast between the two
> families already! The Reipers are extremely interested in what they'll eat
> in a few hours, and the Hulmes don't even notice food when it's there.
Excellent point. Perhaps heightening the class distinction a bit more.
For the Riepers, give them a couple of fish to fry and it's like
Christmas. The Hulmes are affluent enough to actually lose food and
never give it a second thought.
I suppose it also contrasts the two fathers in particular. One's job is
fish supply, and the other is too wrapped up exalted professorial
contemplation to even notice them.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.6 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: A few thoughts, part 2
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 12:03:52 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Okay, here's the rest.
____________________________
The Royal Family: Just as they've created their own heaven and their own
religion, they've also created their own royal family. We see now how
the relationship is beginning to overtly clash with the conventions of
Christchurch. And we see how Paul is changing. Whereas she presumably
rarely spoke in class before, she's now willing to stand up and yell at
the teacher ("It's not rubbish!").
TB: When Paul learns of the diagnosis on the phone, her devastation is
presented visually--she's locked in a criss-cross of dark shadows, with a
patch of light illuminating her anguished face. A great shot. This is
their first period of separation, and it will prove rather momentous.
Sickness: At the dinner table, Paul shares Juliet's sickly pallor, as if
her wish that she could contract TB as well has somehow been granted. (We
should keep in mind that consumption is the most utterly romantic of all
diseases). Their psychological connection is so intense and powerful at
this point that nothing can ease the pain of being apart.
Diello: Significantly, now that society has temporarily pulled them
apart, Paul and Juliet's fantasies take on a decidedly violent and
antisocial bent. Whereas Juliet was content to dismiss Christianity as
`bunkum' before, now she's annoyed by it to the point of aggressive
fantasy. (I love Kate's glare) Diello makes his first corporeal
appearance here, in the first of many instances in which he will murder
anyone who stands between the girls. He's firmly established as a
representative of anarchy, chaos, bloodlust (and just plain lust, for
anyone sharp-eyed enough to recognize his resemblance to `It.' I wasn't,
at first.)
John/Nicholas: The loss of Paul's virginity is perhaps my favorite scene
in the film. There's a hell of a lot going on. When we finally see
Borovnia in all its glory, take a close look at the clay the characters
are made of. The upper class glitterati of Borovnia--Mario, Charles,
Diello, Deborah--appear to be made of a brownish, slightly darker clay
than the others. Could this darker clay signify that they're made of
sterner, more valuable stuff than the commoners? And note the level of
detail in the sculpting--Charles et al are finely detailed, but most of
the commoners are rather grotesquely unformed. During the sequence in
which Paul goes after Deborah, John's grunting visage is interspersed
with these hideous faces, linking them together as obstacles separating
Pauline from the true object of her adoration--Deborah/Juliet. The
commoners (and their commonplace, grunting sex) prove not only to be
"dreadfully dull" to Pauline, but an outright irritation. Pauline's
tears and the toilet flushing at the end say it all. She'll never find
happiness this way.
The New Juliet: When they are finally reunited, Juliet appears softened,
more feminized, with longer, more voluptuous hair (and less arched
eyebrows). At the risk of sounding sexist, this seems to go hand in hand
with the girls' switched positions in the second half of the film.
Juliet is now officially "the girl" in the relationship, as Paul takes on
a more aggressive leadership position.
Do You LIKE your Mother?: The transparent Freudianism of the Doctor
Bennet's question still makes me laugh. If Pauline has somehow failed to
bond with her mother, then that must inevitably lead to...
H...H...Homo...: As I mentioned in an earlier post on this mailing list,
this was the first time in my initial viewing of the film that the
thought of the girls' being lesbians actually crossed my mind. I had so
willingly entered into the girls' world that their intimacy never struck
my as odd. But then DeNiro's question to Joe Pesci in `Raging Bull' came
to mind: "What's with all this kissin' on the mouth? Ain't a cheek good
enough for you?" Honora and Henry Hulme had no doubt been asking
themselves the same thing.
Portraits of Juliet: Upon reflection, there's something odd about Paul's
drawings of her beloved. Their style seems somewhat simplistic and
cartoonish, as if a younger child had drawn them. They seem especially
strange in light of Paul's deft sketching of horses in Ms. Waller's
class. Did her skill backslide somehow?
The Balloon has Gone Up: What does this mean? Somebody please tell me.
Paul gets an Idea: The rather grotesque down angle on Paul's face when
she first has the idea of killing mother hearkens back to a similar angle
on Juliet when she imagined the priest's death. Only this time, we know
it's not just a harmless (if somewhat twisted) fantasy. Perhaps
Jackson's decision to remove Paul's visual fantasy of her parent's death
for the American release version has something to do with this. Killing
Honora isn't just a pipe dream. And Paul's mind is turning to the
consideration of concrete plans rather than cathartic fantasies. She's
got to plan an actual murder now.
The Loveliest Night: The doors at Ilam seem to open by themselves for
Paul, as if some unseen force is urging her onward. Then Juliet sweeps
down the stairs in evening gown, just like a good paramour should. She's
absolutely stunning_by idealizing and glamorizing Juliet, the filmmakers
cause us to identify even more strongly with Paul's adoration. I mean,
who could blame anybody for falling in love with her, be they man, woman,
or hermaphrodite? I wonder at this point if Juliet is even there at
all. Is this another joint fantasy, like their glimpse of the Fourth
World, or is it simply Paul's vision? Fantasy and reality, now of equal
importance, merge together.
Booah!: Nice line reading, Mr. Guerin. This is the moment of reckoning,
when the girls can finally no longer escape `It.' At the end of their
breathless chase, we find that their screams of terror are actually
screams of laughter. Their trepidation eased, they're finally ready to
consummate the relationship. Impulses toward both sex and violence
intermingle freely here, as Diello's dismemberment of some unfortunate
Borovnian is intercut with Pauline's ecstasy. And as the shadow of
Orson's hat resolves itself into Pauline, we finally realize who `It'
really is.
Going way, way down: Keep on the lookout for the incredibly boisterous
fellatio one pair of Borovnians is engaged in during the mini-orgy.
They're in the background, and Juliet's face covers them up as she moves
into shot. I'm not going to try to tie this into any of my theories. I
just think it's funny.
(It was at this point that my notes became more sparse.)
Juliet: Throughout these last scenes, Juliet's attitude toward the coming
murder is elusive. She's obviously more aware of the import of Paul's
plan than Paul is, and seems to know on some instinctive level that this
will signal not only Honora's death, but the death of their relationship
as well. Juliet's farewell to her own mother is especially poignant in
this light--she realizes that her life, her most intimate friendship, and
her family will never be the same again. And yet she seems powerless to
stop the coming events. She hesitates and rationalizes ("She doesn't
appear to bear us any grudge"), but never once does she attempt to steer
Paul onto a different course. Is this loyalty a misguided expression of
love, or a symptom of shared madness?
The Aria: Are we expected to believe that Juliet suddenly felt the urge
to go out on her balcony and sing in the middle of a crying jag?
Probably not. So what's happening then? I think it's most likely
another fantasy on Paul's part_when the balcony is revealed on the right
side of the screen, with Paul's brooding face on the left, it's almost as
if the scene is springing from her mind. But if this is Paul's vision,
then why is Juliet crying? The tears make the already poignant love song
come across even more strongly as a lament or a farewell. Could it be
that some part of Paul realizes that the coming events will destroy their
relationship forever? Or perhaps it's not Paul's dream. Perhaps it's
pure aesthetics_a scene with no grounding in the reality of the
narrative, or the characters minds whatsoever. A kind of commentary by
the filmmakers, if you will.
Mud: All throughout the film we've seen women walking and running. Now
the film slows down as the girls tramp downhill on a muddy path which
seems to mirror the inescapable track of fate they've put themselves on.
But the girls can't stay out of the mire any more. You almost expect
them to sink right in, as if it were quicksand.
The Tree Branch: The very deliberate and enigmatic shot of Juliet
catching herself on the tree branch reminds me of a similar shot earlier
on: When she discovers Hilda and Bill in bed, the camera zooms in to
focus on her hand gripping a banister. On the off chance that this is a
deliberate reference to the earlier scene, both shots would seem to
indicate a loss of balance as Juliet dangles on the precipice of
life-changing events.
Death: The murder is another kind of consummation for the girls. It's
the end product of the untenable psychological position Paul found
herself in. In the confrontation between her own dull, dead-end
background (associated with Mother) and the globetrotting, romantic
possibilities of upward mobility (associated with Juliet and her family),
one of them had to give. As Honora dies we see the shipboard dream
transformed into the ultimate nightmare: Separation. Pauline is left on
the dock as an unwilling part of the madding crowd, abandoned forever
among the `dreadfully dull.' To slightly paraphrase Edith Wharton: "You
gave me my first taste of a real life, and now I have to carry on with a
false one." Juliet is gone. Her dreams are gone. In the face of this
kind of desolation, there's only one possible response: screaming. There
is no point in the film continuing. The story (as Jackson and Walsh
chose to tell it) is told.
_________________________________________________________________
And that's that. Whew. If you read this far, I hope you got something
out of it. I know I did. I sort of had to write this, sooner or later,
and I'm glad I have a forum in which to post it.
I think I'll go back and review the FAQ now (At which point I can
determine what actual percentage of this has already been said.) Adios.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.7 ---------------
From: opensesame@earthlink.net (dg acosta)
Subject: Re: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n046
Date: Sat, 08 Jun 1996 19:10:53 GMT
cancel please
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.8 ---------------
From: 9506148v@Magpie.Magill.UniSA.edu.au
Subject: Peter Jackson Interview
Date: Sun, 09 Jun 1996 05:12:49 +0930
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT
Hello people. This is an interview with Peter Jackson that was done in
February 1995 after the release of HC in Australia. I copied it off JJJ
radio when it was on, and now I transcribe it in the hope of causing
unlimited happiness in all of you. :-) Dissolve it in a spoon and inject.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
PJ: I mean, I didn't approach Heavenly Creatures with the idea of doing it
in a different style... than my previous films. It was a different subject
matter, sure, which... in a way the subject matter demands a different kind
of approach, but as a film-making style I think it's the same.
[Excerpt from the film]
[JH: Your mother is rather a miserable woman, isn't she?]
PJ: I think what intrigued me about it is the complexity of the story. It's
actually not a Hollywood story. It's not a case of saying, 'Well, these two
people did this... to this woman... and they were evil, and she was innocent,
and therefore, you know, it's all nice and clean,' or that the mother was
evil and she deserved to get killed by these two girls. I mean it's not kind
of simple. It's a case of trying to humanise a story which has never really
been humanised before, and to explain it in a way that you can see it from
their perspective, but at the same time not condoning it.
[Excerpt from the film]
[HH: Your daughter's... an imaginative, and... spirited girl.
HP: Look, if she's spending too much time at your house, you only need to
say.]
PJ: You know, I felt a very strong commitment, if you like, a responsibility
to telling this story as accurately as I could. There was no way ever that
I was going to make stuff up, or that, you know, we were going to sort of
change the facts because they'd make a better movie.
[Excerpt from the film]
[HH: The thing is...
HP: Yvonne hasn't been herself either, locking herself away in her room,
endlessly writing.
HH: My wife and I feel that the relationship is... unhealthy.]
INT: Down to the point where one of the fantasy characters bears a striking
resemblance to Orson Welles?
PJ: Well, yeah, I mean, he was Orson Welles. They had a series of matinee
idols that they had named the Saints, and they were usually squeaky clean,
like James Mason and Mario Lanza, they were their heroes, but they had Orson
Welles as an antihero, and they gave him a code name called 'It', and they
never referred to him by his name. They always talked about It, and how
grotesque It was, and how It is the most hideous man who ever lived. There
was a strange ritualistic thing that happened, that a week before they
committed this murder they went to see an Orson Welles film for the very
first time, and they came back to Juliet's house, and they were incredibly
excited and wound up about it, and they were in this kind of exhalted state,
and they did these sort of crazy things until dawn. They didn't get to sleep
until dawn that day. And so it was strange, and that was obviously another
great scene to put in the film.
[Excerpt from the film]
[HP: I'm not sure what you mean, Dr Hulme.
HH: Your daughter... appears to have formed... a rather... unwholesome
attachment to Juliet.
JH: Come with me!]
PJ: Pauline in her diary wrote fairly explicit chapters about... what was
written as a shared hallucination, and the psychiatrist who interviewed the
two girls afterwards was fascinated by this too, in that they appeared to be
able to fantasise, and to transport themselves into this Paradise, which
they called the Fourth World, more or less at will, and there's certainly an
extract from Pauline's diary which is at Easter, and they're on top of a hill
above a bay where the Fourth World apparently opens up before them, and they
go into it. So I thought, 'This is a great scene to show in the film,' and
it was written as though it actually happened, to both girls at the same
time. One of the things about the relationship in the end that's a slightly
trite, but I think accurate conclusion is that they almost belonged in the
nineties more than the fifties. They had this active imagination, this
disrespect for their teachers. I mean we spoke to fifteen or sixteen of
their classmates, who are now obviously sort of fifty-five year old women,
and they all said that Pauline and Juliet were kind of scary to them, and
that they would never talk back to their teachers, But Pauline and Juliet
would, and they seemed to have no fear of authority. This imagination too,
this love of fantasy and writing about fantasy characters almost seems more
sort of modern. I mean it's something that seems to come more out of
Dungeons and Dragons, I guess, than something you'd imagine from the fifties.
INT: How did you direct your two lead actors, because you're asking two quite
young women to go into some very dark places.
PJ: It was difficult. Kate Winslet, who plays Juliet, was a trained actress
from London. She had had some experience, and she'd been to drama school. It
was much more difficult for Melanie Lynskey, who we cast out of New Plymouth
in New Zealand, who had never acted in her life before. Melanie bears a lot
of similarities to Pauline, on a sort of surface level. I mean she's
intelligent, she's interested in poetry like Pauline was, she has a sort of
enigma which Pauline had, a very mysterious quality. But what Melanie doesn't
have is Pauline's obsessive sort of darkness, and so we had to ask Melanie
to go into places that she'd never been before, thinking thoughts that she'd
never thought before, and we were lucky because Sarah Pierse who plays her
mother in the film, you know, the central character in the film, Sarah also
agreed to act as Melanie's acting coach. It was very useful in the sense
that they were mother/daughter in the film and they also had this
relationship offscreen.
[Excerpt from the film]
[PP: I know what to do about Mother.
JH: Yes.
PP: Some sort of... accident.]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
That's it. Hope you enjoyed it!
Bye.
Shannon <9506148v@magpie.magill.unisa.edu.au>
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.9 ---------------
From: Nancy <marth@maine.maine.edu>
Subject: Re: A few thoughts, part 2
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 17:02:23 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Bravo!! That was fantastic!
One more thing: so why do you think Juliet says she's sorry aboard the ship
as the ship departs at the very end: "I'm sorry...I'm so..sorry"
Nancy
=========================================================
Nancy Marth
Dept. of Spatial Information Science and Engineering
National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis
University of Maine
250 Boardman Hall
Orono, Maine 04469
Ph: 207-581-2135
http://www.spatial.maine.edu/studentbios/marth/marth.html
=========================================================
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.10 ---------------
From: Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: Re: A few thoughts, part 2
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 09:22:57 +0800 (WST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Just a minor point Jefferson, and other Creatures,
The balloon has gone up: means action/trouble is about to start. It
derives I believe from Napoleon's use of observation balloons in war in
the 1790s.
cheers
sb
sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n047 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Sun Jun 9 20:03:25 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id UAA05475 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sun, 9 Jun 1996 20:03:11 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (daemon@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id UAA11873; Sun, 9 Jun 1996 20:02:54 -0700
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 20:02:54 -0700
Message-Id: <199606100302.UAA11873@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n048
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n048 --------------
001 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Sorrow
002 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - "STARZ!" airing / Jefferson comments
003 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: A few thoughts, part 2
004 - Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@ - Re: "STARZ!" airing / Jefferson comments
005 - Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@ - Re: A few thoughts, part 2
006 - Erica Jamieson <beatles@w - Telepathy
007 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: "STARZ!" airing / Jefferson comments
008 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - the balloon has gone up
009 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Jefferson's thoughts
010 - Nancy Marth <marth@maine. - Shoot...
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.1 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Sorrow
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 02:24:34 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sat, 8 Jun 1996, Nancy wrote:
> Bravo!! That was fantastic!
Aw, shucks. Thank you.
> One more thing: so why do you think Juliet says she's sorry aboard the ship
> as the ship departs at the very end: "I'm sorry...I'm so..sorry"
Well...One a 'literal' level, she could just be sorry that Paul can't
come with her on the ship. But since the whole scene is metaphorical
rather than literal, I suppose it could be more of an apology for having
given Paul a glimpse of a lifestyle which she could never truly share.
For inadvertently tantalizing her to the point of madness.
In other words, "Sorry I complicated your life with romantic visions that
were so much more vivid and interesting than your dull reality that you
basically went crazy and killed your mom." Or something like that.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.2 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: "STARZ!" airing / Jefferson comments
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 23:23:47 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 13494
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
> --------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.2 ---------------
>
> From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
> Subject: Re: STARZ! "HC" airing
> Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 11:25:55 -0400 (EDT)
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>
> On Wed, 5 Jun 1996, Bryan Woodworth wrote:
>
> > This version was fantastic!
>
> The important question is...Did you tape it? Just curious.
>
YES. But, I munged it -- I recorded about 1/2 the intro (you know, the
archival tape with that 'tour of Christchurch') when I realized it was in
SLP mode (my VCR). So I stopped it and put it in SP. Duh!
Ok though, it was on again *TONIGHT*! I recorded it in SP mode
throughout. I hope to place more juicy infos online from this version..
And now, commentary regarding part two.
Thank you very much, Jefferson.
:-)
> --------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n047.6 ---------------
>
> From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
> Subject: A few thoughts, part 2
> Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 12:03:52 -0400 (EDT)
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>
>
> Okay, here's the rest.
> ____________________________
>
> The Royal Family: Just as they've created their own heaven and their own
> religion, they've also created their own royal family. We see now how
> the relationship is beginning to overtly clash with the conventions of
> Christchurch. And we see how Paul is changing. Whereas she presumably
> rarely spoke in class before, she's now willing to stand up and yell at
> the teacher ("It's not rubbish!").
>
I agree regarding the creation of their own religion. However, I don't
find it very surprising for Pauline to suddenly begin to show some spunk.
I'm sure all of us have experienced moments where we wouldn't do
something alone, but if we are in a group, we do that very thing --
especially in certain circumstances.
By this point, Pauline had invested lots in the relationship, including
her thoughts and feelings in the form of a story. For the teacher to
call it rubbish is surely something to spark the ire of any budding
novelist..
> TB: When Paul learns of the diagnosis on the phone, her devastation is
> presented visually--she's locked in a criss-cross of dark shadows, with a
> patch of light illuminating her anguished face. A great shot. This is
> their first period of separation, and it will prove rather momentous.
It is also the first time we see the colour GREEN. Pay particular
attention to the background lighting -- it's green!!
The color green seems to be popular in this movie. cf.: (not in order)
o Pauline in the bath ("Yes, Yes!")
o in bed with John the Boarder
o When lying back on her bed, shown overhead, while we hear
voiceover of "Mother has made the most terrible threat now.."
Right after the visit to the "doctor."
o In the scenes around the house, when trying to elude Orson!
o .. and also when they "make love to the saints"
o During the night, when they are stealing things ("They'll
blame the housekeeper!")
o During the night, when Juliet catches Hilda and Bill Perry in
bed
o During the scene in the bath, when Pauline says to Juliet,
"I'm going with you." To which Juliet replies, "Yes."
o When Pauline has her "brainwave," and we see her first begin
to write to Juliet
.. probably a few other scenes as well.
>
> Sickness: At the dinner table, Paul shares Juliet's sickly pallor, as if
> her wish that she could contract TB as well has somehow been granted. (We
> should keep in mind that consumption is the most utterly romantic of all
> diseases). Their psychological connection is so intense and powerful at
> this point that nothing can ease the pain of being apart.
>
Quite correct. Indeed, Pauline wishes so dearly to be with her companion
that she even goes to the point of scribbling in her diary, right before
Honora comes to her room to trouble her to eat something, "It would be
wonderful if I could get tuberculosis too," (words to that effect).
>{...schnipp!!!...}
> John/Nicholas: The loss of Paul's virginity is perhaps my favorite scene
> in the film. There's a hell of a lot going on. When we finally see
> Borovnia in all its glory, take a close look at the clay the characters
> are made of. The upper class glitterati of Borovnia--Mario, Charles,
> Diello, Deborah--appear to be made of a brownish, slightly darker clay
> than the others. Could this darker clay signify that they're made of
> sterner, more valuable stuff than the commoners? And note the level of
> detail in the sculpting--Charles et al are finely detailed, but most of
> the commoners are rather grotesquely unformed. During the sequence in
> which Paul goes after Deborah, John's grunting visage is interspersed
> with these hideous faces, linking them together as obstacles separating
> Pauline from the true object of her adoration--Deborah/Juliet. The
> commoners (and their commonplace, grunting sex) prove not only to be
> "dreadfully dull" to Pauline, but an outright irritation. Pauline's
> tears and the toilet flushing at the end say it all. She'll never find
> happiness this way.
And did you notice, first Juliet appears as clay -- a few Borovnian
commoners mask our glimpse of Juliet ("Deborah") - then she appears
as her true self, and turns her head with beaming gaze towards Pauline.
>
> The New Juliet: When they are finally reunited, Juliet appears softened,
> more feminized, with longer, more voluptuous hair (and less arched
> eyebrows). At the risk of sounding sexist, this seems to go hand in hand
> with the girls' switched positions in the second half of the film.
> Juliet is now officially "the girl" in the relationship, as Paul takes on
> a more aggressive leadership position.
I have to take exception to the description here.. Juliet is the "girl"?
Ewwww. :-) Hmm, well.. please forgive me..
>
> Do You LIKE your Mother?: The transparent Freudianism of the Doctor
> Bennet's question still makes me laugh. If Pauline has somehow failed to
> bond with her mother, then that must inevitably lead to...
>
You can tell the "doctor" is fishing.. When his initial questions fail to
bear fruit ("Do you enjoy your studies? Are you happy at home?") he goes
for the ones which are most blatant and obvious.
> H...H...Homo...: As I mentioned in an earlier post on this mailing list,
> this was the first time in my initial viewing of the film that the
> thought of the girls' being lesbians actually crossed my mind. I had so
> willingly entered into the girls' world that their intimacy never struck
> my as odd. But then DeNiro's question to Joe Pesci in `Raging Bull' came
> to mind: "What's with all this kissin' on the mouth? Ain't a cheek good
> enough for you?" Honora and Henry Hulme had no doubt been asking
> themselves the same thing.
>
For me, I caught onto the potential lesbian (or at the very least, *VERY*
intense) relationship after the kiss between Juliet and Pauline on the
grass, after they had danced in the woods and fallen down, fatigued.
After that scene, my sensibilities were hopelessly manipulated by
Jackson's masterful direction (and the glorious script). I think I was
fooled by nearly every red herring!
>{...schnipp!...}
> Paul gets an Idea: The rather grotesque down angle on Paul's face when
> she first has the idea of killing mother hearkens back to a similar angle
> on Juliet when she imagined the priest's death. Only this time, we know
> it's not just a harmless (if somewhat twisted) fantasy. Perhaps
> Jackson's decision to remove Paul's visual fantasy of her parent's death
> for the American release version has something to do with this. Killing
> Honora isn't just a pipe dream. And Paul's mind is turning to the
> consideration of concrete plans rather than cathartic fantasies. She's
> got to plan an actual murder now.
The way Pauline's head jerks and twitches, as if she is consumed with rage
and fury at her mother, is deftly conveyed by Melanie Lynskey. Very
powerful scene. I was mesmerized by that scene. It is amazing what can
be conveyed with a mere glance..
> Juliet: Throughout these last scenes, Juliet's attitude toward the coming
> murder is elusive. She's obviously more aware of the import of Paul's
> plan than Paul is, and seems to know on some instinctive level that this
> will signal not only Honora's death, but the death of their relationship
> as well. Juliet's farewell to her own mother is especially poignant in
> this light--she realizes that her life, her most intimate friendship, and
> her family will never be the same again. And yet she seems powerless to
> stop the coming events. She hesitates and rationalizes ("She doesn't
> appear to bear us any grudge"), but never once does she attempt to steer
> Paul onto a different course. Is this loyalty a misguided expression of
> love, or a symptom of shared madness?
I really don't see how Juliet could know at this point that "...her life,
her most intimate friendship, and her family will never be the same
again." We have the benefit of 20/20 hindsight. I'm sure
she had no idea, but perhaps she did possess an inkling?
This part of the film is most unconvincing.. I have doubts as to how much
is based on fact, and how much is very masterful scripting (fiction) on
the part of Jackson and Walsh. (In fact, I wonder that about the whole
movie, of course.)
When I say "unconvincing," (poor choice of word) I mean that I am not
completely sure I believe this actually occurred.. could it be fiction?
Is it based on fact? Perhaps from a diary entry? Hmm..
>
> The Aria: Are we expected to believe that Juliet suddenly felt the urge
> to go out on her balcony and sing in the middle of a crying jag?
> Probably not. So what's happening then? I think it's most likely
> another fantasy on Paul's part_when the balcony is revealed on the right
> side of the screen, with Paul's brooding face on the left, it's almost as
> if the scene is springing from her mind. But if this is Paul's vision,
> then why is Juliet crying? The tears make the already poignant love song
> come across even more strongly as a lament or a farewell. Could it be
> that some part of Paul realizes that the coming events will destroy their
> relationship forever? Or perhaps it's not Paul's dream. Perhaps it's
> pure aesthetics_a scene with no grounding in the reality of the
> narrative, or the characters minds whatsoever. A kind of commentary by
> the filmmakers, if you will.
Agreed, pure commentary by the filmmakers. A poignant scene, but who
knows what the relevance is. Yet, it is very powerful! We are
manipulated again by Jackson and Walsh. (And, I do enjoy it..) :-)
>{...schnipp!...}
> The Tree Branch: The very deliberate and enigmatic shot of Juliet
> catching herself on the tree branch reminds me of a similar shot earlier
> on: When she discovers Hilda and Bill in bed, the camera zooms in to
> focus on her hand gripping a banister. On the off chance that this is a
> deliberate reference to the earlier scene, both shots would seem to
> indicate a loss of balance as Juliet dangles on the precipice of
> life-changing events.
Great point.
> Death: The murder is another kind of consummation for the girls. It's
> the end product of the untenable psychological position Paul found
> herself in. In the confrontation between her own dull, dead-end
> background (associated with Mother) and the globetrotting, romantic
> possibilities of upward mobility (associated with Juliet and her family),
> one of them had to give. As Honora dies we see the shipboard dream
> transformed into the ultimate nightmare: Separation. Pauline is left on
> the dock as an unwilling part of the madding crowd, abandoned forever
> among the `dreadfully dull.' To slightly paraphrase Edith Wharton: "You
> gave me my first taste of a real life, and now I have to carry on with a
> false one." Juliet is gone. Her dreams are gone. In the face of this
> kind of desolation, there's only one possible response: screaming. There
> is no point in the film continuing. The story (as Jackson and Walsh
> chose to tell it) is told.
> _________________________________________________________________
When I first saw this movie (yea, verily, quite a while ago now.. I'm
amazed there is still stuff to discuss!) I was shocked that the
movie ended at this point. I guess I was expecting Jackson to show us
some 10 minute court trial or something.. I was just stunned. It was a
very rude way to end this movie .. it just STOPS! Quite shocking.. And,
in retrospect, masterfully compelling and effective.
>
> And that's that. Whew. If you read this far, I hope you got something
> out of it. I know I did. I sort of had to write this, sooner or later,
> and I'm glad I have a forum in which to post it.
>
I am very pleased to have been able to read this! Thanks very much.
> I think I'll go back and review the FAQ now (At which point I can
> determine what actual percentage of this has already been said.) Adios.
>
I still haven't finished the FAQ.. (version 2.0, anyway!).
I think that's enough for this message!
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.3 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: A few thoughts, part 2
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 02:28:38 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sun, 9 Jun 1996, Sandra Bowdler wrote:
> The balloon has gone up: means action/trouble is about to start. It
> derives I believe from Napoleon's use of observation balloons in war in
> the 1790s.
Cool. I was actually using it correctly then. I've been using the
phrase as a kind-of substitute for "The shit's hitting the fan."
Does anyone know if this was a common expression in New Zealand or
England at the time? Did Jackson and Walsh put it in of their own
volition, or did the phrase perhaps appear in one of the court transcripts?
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.4 ---------------
From: Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: Re: "STARZ!" airing / Jefferson comments
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 14:44:58 +0800 (WST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Hello all,
Another small point: after the real life murder, Juliet Hulme was
reported as saying "The day we killed her I think she knew beforehand what
was going to happen and she didn't seem to bear any grudge". This is
clearly the basis for Juliet's movie dialogue in Pauline's bedroom.
cheers
sb
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.5 ---------------
From: Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: Re: A few thoughts, part 2
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 14:54:47 +0800 (WST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sun, 9 Jun 1996, Jefferson F. Morris wrote:
>
> Does anyone know if this was a common expression in New Zealand or
> England at the time? Did Jackson and Walsh put it in of their own
> volition, or did the phrase perhaps appear in one of the court transcripts?
>
Well, it's not uncommon in Australia, although it has rather an old
fashioned ring about it. The phrase does not appear in Pauline's diary in
her account of this incident, although otherwise the movie version seems
pretty much an accurate rendition.
cheers
sb
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.6 ---------------
From: Erica Jamieson <beatles@wchat.on.ca>
Subject: Telepathy
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 09:42:06 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
I was watching HC this morning again, and I noticed something: In the shrine
scene when they're naming the saints, after every name Juliet gives them,
Pauline repeats it with rapture. But after Juliet throws away "It" and grabs
Paul's hands she says, "We give praise, to the Saints". She pauses and
Pauline looks at her in awe and instead of repeating "Saints", Juliet
whispers it, as if reading Pauline's mind. Is this possible or am I just
reaching?
Bye!
Erica
?????????????????????????????
I believe, this is heaven
To no one else but me
And I'll defend it as long as
I can be left here to linger
In silence if I choose to
Would you try to understand
- Sarah
McLachlan
?????????????????????????????
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.7 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: "STARZ!" airing / Jefferson comments
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 21:41:23 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sat, 8 Jun 1996, Bryan Woodworth wrote:
> And did you notice, first Juliet appears as clay -- a few Borovnian
> commoners mask our glimpse of Juliet ("Deborah") - then she appears
> as her true self, and turns her head with beaming gaze towards Pauline.
How could I miss it? It's one of my favorite things in the film.
"You're crying. Don't be sad, Gina." I get goosebumps. There's
something heartbreaking about it.
> > The New Juliet: When they are finally reunited, Juliet appears softened,
> > more feminized, with longer, more voluptuous hair (and less arched
> > eyebrows). At the risk of sounding sexist, this seems to go hand in hand
> > with the girls' switched positions in the second half of the film.
> > Juliet is now officially "the girl" in the relationship, as Paul takes on
> > a more aggressive leadership position.
>
> I have to take exception to the description here.. Juliet is the "girl"?
> Ewwww. :-) Hmm, well.. please forgive me..
Uh oh. I'm certainly not questioning anyone's masculinity, or Ms. Lynsky's
adorableness. I'm speaking purely in terms of the respective positions
they seem to be taking in the relationship.
> For me, I caught onto the potential lesbian (or at the very least, *VERY*
> intense) relationship after the kiss between Juliet and Pauline on the
> grass, after they had danced in the woods and fallen down, fatigued.
Yeah. Maybe I had an inkling at that point, but I was too caught up in
everything to worry about it.
> The way Pauline's head jerks and twitches, as if she is consumed with rage
> and fury at her mother, is deftly conveyed by Melanie Lynskey. Very
> powerful scene. I was mesmerized by that scene. It is amazing what can
> be conveyed with a mere glance..
And a fish-eyed lens, which they appear to be using for that close-up.
> I really don't see how Juliet could know at this point that "...her life,
> her most intimate friendship, and her family will never be the same
> again." We have the benefit of 20/20 hindsight. I'm sure
> she had no idea, but perhaps she did possess an inkling?
Well, she knew that Paul was planning to kill her mother, and that if she
succeeded and they were caught, that she'd be an accessory at least.
That has to be a bit of a weight on your mind. Ms. Winslet conveys Juliet's
dread marvelously.
> When I say "unconvincing," (poor choice of word) I mean that I am not
> completely sure I believe this actually occurred.. could it be fiction?
> Is it based on fact? Perhaps from a diary entry? Hmm..
Who knows? In my analyses I really don't worry about the real life case,
and I'm not even really that interested in it, except insofar as it can
throw new light on the film. What can I say? I love the movie.
> When I first saw this movie (yea, verily, quite a while ago now.. I'm
> amazed there is still stuff to discuss!) I was shocked that the
> movie ended at this point. I guess I was expecting Jackson to show us
> some 10 minute court trial or something.. I was just stunned. It was a
> very rude way to end this movie .. it just STOPS! Quite shocking.. And,
> in retrospect, masterfully compelling and effective.
For me, when I first saw it, the ending had that powerful feeling of
completeness and inevitability that you get with great tragedy. The
feeling that it couldn't have ended any other way.
One of the many cool things about HC is the fact that Jackson and Walsh
could have chosen to tell this story in a much more conventional way.
The first half could have detailed the relationship, then the second half
would have taken place in the courtroom, and detailed the scandal that
surrounded the case. Most filmmakers would have considered this material
to be a more likely source for drama. And in fact I'm sure you could
make a very compelling film out of it, with the case's celebrity status
echoing films like 'Badlands' or 'Natural Born Killers.' But of course,
that's not what J&W chose to do.
They chose to immerse you in the girls' world, to make you see the case
from the inside out. I'm reminded of Faulkner's 'Light in August,' in
which we find out in the beginning that a murder has occurred, and
everyone in town has their own fairly simple take on it. But then the
rest of the book presents us with the full story, and we realize that the
reality of it is much more complicated than anyone realizes. The crime is
not excused (just as it's not excused in HC), but it is explained.
Of course, J&W were able to very economically reduce the rest of the
story to just a few simple lines of text. "It was a condition of their
release that they never meet again." That one line does all the work,
and it's like an emotional punch in the stomach.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.8 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: the balloon has gone up
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 20:18:53 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Sandra wrote:
> The phrase does not appear in Pauline's diary in
> her account of this incident, although otherwise the movie
> version seems pretty much an accurate rendition
Actually, the movie version is very accurate! Though Pauline wrote
in her diary that Juliet said something else on that fateful night,
Hilda Hulme testified in court that her daughter did, in fact, barge
in on her and Bill Perry and utter my favorite HC phrase, "The balloon
has gone up!"
--- kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.9 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Jefferson's thoughts
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 20:03:46 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Thanks again for that adrenaline rush of HC !!!!
Juliet:
> Throughout the last scenes, Juliet's attitude toward the coming
> murder is elusive. She's obviously more aware of the import of
> Paul's plan than Paul is, and seems to know on some instinctive
> level that this will signal not only Honora's death, but the death
> of their relationship as well. Juliet's farewell to her own mother
> is especially poignant in this light -- she realizes that her life,
> her most intimate friendship, and her family will never be the
> same again. And yet she seems powerless to stop the coming events.
> She hesitates and rationalizes ( "She doesn't appear to bear us
> any grudge"), but never once ddoes she attempt to steer Paul onto
> another course. Is this loyalty to a misguided expression of love,
> or a symptom of shared madness?
I don't think this is shared madness, because at this point in the movie
the girls have never seemed more " seperate". In Paul's bedroom on the
day of the murder, the girls talk *at* each other and not *to* each
other. They're on completely different strains. ( "Your mother is rather
a miserable woman, isn't she?"...."I thought for hours about whether
Carmelita should accept Bernard's marriage proposal..." ) In the tearoom,
Paul stares almost exclusively at her mother and ignores Juliet's anxiety,
which she used to be so sensitive to. When Juliet hesitates to drop the
gemstone, Paul looks at her hostilly for the first time in the movie.
Paul, in other words, has gone "past the point of no return", and Juliet
knows it, but still loves her friend. As for Miss Hulme's motives
for going along with it and not stopping Paul, Anne Perry said that "it
was a matter of honor. I knew one of them had to die. I wanted to help
Pauline." ( I guess she meant Pauline was thinking of suicide ) I think
this loyal reluctance fits well with Kate Winslet's performance in the
last scenes.
Tree Branch: Juliet's last desperate cling to reality?
The Aria:
> But if this is Paul's vision,
> then why is Juliet crying? The tears make the already poignant
> love song come across even more strongly as a lament or a farewell.
> Could it be that some part of Paul realizes that the coming
> events will desrtroy their relationship forever? Or perhaps
> it's not Paul's dream. Perhaps it's pure aesthetics - a scene
> with nogrounding in the reality of the narrative, or the
> characters' minds whatsoever. A kind of commentary by the
> filmmakers if you will.
If I have a favorite scene in HC, this is it. I think it's one of those
scenes that can mean a different thing to every person who sees it.
For me, it's the heart's desire, and Juliet is crying not with sadness,
but with perfect love ("deep and infinite as the sea") Running onto a
boat with the Hulme's is a continuation of this - perfect belonging.
I always try to talk myself out of this, but I think this is what Paul
killed for. ( Maybe that's why they showed it so late in the movie? )
-- kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n048.10 ---------------
From: Nancy Marth <marth@maine.maine.edu>
Subject: Shoot...
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 20:02:51 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
...Why don't we all get together somewhere in the US (or elsewhere..NZ,
maybe??) and watch numerous screenings of HC?! That would be a heck of a lot
of fun. We could do an HC convention!
(Pardon my burst of excitement)
Nancy
PS--Hey, if anyone on this list lives in Maine, let's meet somewhere and do
a state-wide screening! I think I'm up to about 25 for the number of times
I've watched this movie. I love reading the analysis from different
perspectives on this list--makes me go back and re-evaluate certain scenes.
=========================================================
Nancy Marth
Dept. of Spatial Information Science and Engineering
National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis
University of Maine
250 Boardman Hall
Orono, Maine 04469
Ph: 207-581-2135
http://www.spatial.maine.edu/studentbios/marth/marth.html
=========================================================
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n048 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Tue Jun 11 03:46:47 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id DAA09031 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Tue, 11 Jun 1996 03:46:36 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (daemon@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id DAA01557; Tue, 11 Jun 1996 03:46:19 -0700
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 1996 03:46:19 -0700
Message-Id: <199606111046.DAA01557@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n049
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n049 --------------
001 - adamabr@mail.helix.net (a - Another Brick in the FAQ
002 - danny g acosta <opensesam - Re: Digest heavenly-CANCEL
003 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Re:Telepathy
004 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - HeavenlyWeb updates!
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n049.1 ---------------
From: adamabr@mail.helix.net (adam abrams)
Subject: Another Brick in the FAQ
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 1996 03:31:09 -0800
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Hi all,
Just a quick note to announce that the "Frame-o-Rama", 2.0 section of my
website is near completion... I have added sections 5 and 6. One to go and
it'll all be there!
==========================================================================
Only the best people fight against Adam Abrams
all obstacles... in pursuit of happiness! Vancouver, BC, Canada
--Juliet Hulme, "Heavenly Creatures"
Visit the "Fourth World" at http://www.helix.net/~adamabr/creatures.html
==========================================================================
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n049.2 ---------------
From: danny g acosta <opensesame@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: Digest heavenly-CANCEL
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 1996 12:08:13 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
please take me off the list...thank you
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n049.3 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Re:Telepathy
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 1996 16:53:41 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On June 9, Erica wrote:
> But after Juliet throws away "It" and grabs Paul's hand she
> says, "We give praise, to the Saints". She pauses and Pauline
> looks at her in awe and instead of repeating "Saints", Juliet
> whispers it, as if reading Pauline's mind. Is this possible or
> am I just reaching?
I always just thought Juliet was saying it twice, to emphasize it. But
now I'm thinking of the line later in the movie, remember, when they're
dancing on The Loveliest Night, and Paul says,"We have realized why Deborah
and I have such extraordinary telepathy, and why people treat us and look
at us the way they do." The Saints thing could be the first example of
this in the movie. Eerie.........
-- kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n049.4 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: HeavenlyWeb updates!
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 1996 03:45:47 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 330
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
Lots of juicy stuff coming up in the next week or two to HeavenlyWeb!
New drawings and more media.. :-)
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n049 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Wed Jun 12 20:22:31 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id UAA02189 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Wed, 12 Jun 1996 20:01:30 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id TAA24553; Wed, 12 Jun 1996 19:00:27 -0700
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 19:00:27 -0700
Message-Id: <199606130200.TAA24553@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n050
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n050 --------------
001 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - Updates!
002 - "karen mcquillen" <kmcqui - A Herring by Any Other Name...
003 - GorillaBlu@aol.com - Might be of some interest...
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n050.1 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: Updates!
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 1996 17:16:12 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 296
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
Exciting things added to HeavenlyWeb; come have a look!
URL below :-)
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n050.2 ---------------
From: "karen mcquillen" <kmcquillen@ets.org>
Subject: A Herring by Any Other Name...
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 96 9:56:15 EDT
Not to open a kettle of fish ;-), but is anyone out there bothered/annoyed
that Peter Jackson made a movie about two young women that most everyone will
admit *looks* like a lesbian relationship on the surface, only to have Peter
say, "It's a Red Herring". Or are most people OK with this and think it's
part of Peter's genius?
Does anyone think it might be homophobic to deny there is an underlying
sexual tension between Pauline and Juliet. And if you say you admit there is
sexual tension/attraction, but it's not lesbian, I'd ask you to consult your
dictionary under "L".
Sure, this brings up the issue of what is a lesbian, but then what's not a
lesbian?
Do people feel better that Peter says it's *not* about lesbians? Breathe a
sigh of relief, as it were?
Did anyone consider that Peter's Red Herring comment might be a Red Herring
itself?
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n050.3 ---------------
From: GorillaBlu@aol.com
Subject: Might be of some interest...
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 20:11:27 -0400
Hi all! As I have posted before, I have gotten the
autographs of a few people from the movie and I
also collect autographs for fun. I helped a club
create a "Heavenly Creatures" address list, and I
thought you might find this little ad interesting:
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Hello from The Dotted Line! We are a pen pal club
dedicated to the hobby of collecting entertainment
autographs through the mail. We have a bi-monthly
newsletter which goes out to our members and a
feature in our July/August edition may be of some
interest to your group.
Included in the upcoming newsletter is a Heavenly
Creatures Address List, featuring addresses for
several of the key-players in the film, including
Kate Winslet, Melanie Lynskey, Peter Jackson,
Fran Walsh and real-life Heavenly Creature, Anne
Perry.
As a fan of the film, I am also including a special
address list available ONLY upon request - a
compilation of addresses important ONLY to
a true HC fan. This list will be included if you
clearly mark your request: "HC Address List".
Get both the July/August Dotted Line newsletter
AND special HC Address List for ONLY $3 (US
funds only) OR ten (10) un-used US $.32 stamps!
Orders may be sent to:
HC Address List
c/o The Dotted Line
PO Box 753515
Memphis, TN 38175-3515
For more information, please email us at:
DottedLyne@aol.com
Thanks!
Your friends at The Dotted Line
PS - We are interested in trading our list for un-used
foreign stamps also, (especially from England). Please
email if interested.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
I am a member of The Dotted Line and they are very nice
people. The woman who runs it is a BIG HC fan!
I hope the list is helpful for you as well!
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n050 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Thu Jun 13 20:08:02 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id UAA11367 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Thu, 13 Jun 1996 20:07:54 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id UAA03664; Thu, 13 Jun 1996 20:02:28 -0700
Date: Thu, 13 Jun 1996 20:02:28 -0700
Message-Id: <199606140302.UAA03664@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n051
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n051 --------------
001 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: Jefferson's thoughts
002 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - A Mackerel by any other name
003 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - lesbians
004 - michaela drapes <oleanna@ - Re: A Herring by Any Other Name...
005 - Clscflm@aol.com - herrings by any other name...
006 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - The Red Herring ( Mackeral, whatever)
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n051.1 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: Jefferson's thoughts
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 22:05:14 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sun, 9 Jun 1996, kate ann jacobson wrote:
> I don't think this is shared madness, because at this point in the movie
> the girls have never seemed more " seperate". In Paul's bedroom on the
> day of the murder, the girls talk *at* each other and not *to* each
> other. They're on completely different strains.
Excellent point. The girls are quite distanced from each other, with
Juliet sweating and worrying about the murder, and Paul more or less lost
in her own world.
> When Juliet hesitates to drop the
> gemstone, Paul looks at her hostilly for the first time in the movie.
I'd say it's maybe more frustration than hostility. To me, her look
says, "Come on, dammit. It's too late to back out now." Juliet's
expression, on the other hand, is one of sadness. She's already
regretting what's about to happen.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n051.2 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: A Mackerel by any other name
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 22:17:50 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Wed, 12 Jun 1996, karen mcquillen wrote:
> Not to open a kettle of fish ;-), but is anyone out there bothered/annoyed
> that Peter Jackson made a movie about two young women that most everyone will
> admit *looks* like a lesbian relationship on the surface, only to have Peter
> say, "It's a Red Herring". Or are most people OK with this and think it's
> part of Peter's genius?
Well, you've got to ask yourself, in regards to what is it a red
herring? I think he meant that if you're trying to find a single
explanation for Honora's murder (in the context of this film),
homosexuality isn't it. I think he's trying to prevent viewers from
drawing the conclusion that the girls committed murder simple because they
were insane lesbians and that's what insane lesbians do.
> Does anyone think it might be homophobic to deny there is an underlying
> sexual tension between Pauline and Juliet.
Not homophobic. Just somewhat blind. I don't think anyone on this list
has denied that the girls were sexually interested in one another. They
did sleep together, after all.
> Sure, this brings up the issue of what is a lesbian, but then what's not a
> lesbian?
Well, people have asked Ann Perry if she is/was a lesbian, and she has
always replied negatively. I wouldn't classify a woman who had one
homosexual flirtation/involvement in her youth as a lesbian. One of my
best friends had a lesbian experience recently, but ended up hating it,
and certainly wouldn't classify herself as a lesbian, seeing as how all
the rest of her relationships have been with males.
True, the girls claimed lesbianism as part of their insanity defense, but
that was, as far as I know, just a legal tactic.
> Do people feel better that Peter says it's *not* about lesbians? Breathe a
> sigh of relief, as it were?
I can't speak for 'people,' but I really don't care one way or the other.
--Jefferson
P.S. On an unrelated note (except insofar as it still relates to HC), I'd
like to congratulate Adam on his very fine HC collage. Quite a piece of
work. Check it out on his Fourth World homepage if you haven't already.
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n051.3 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: lesbians
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 23:49:36 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 2549
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
> --------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n050.2 ---------------
>
> From: "karen mcquillen" <kmcquillen@ets.org>
> Subject: A Herring by Any Other Name...
> Date: Wed, 12 Jun 96 9:56:15 EDT
>
> Not to open a kettle of fish ;-), but is anyone out there bothered/annoyed
> that Peter Jackson made a movie about two young women that most everyone will
> admit *looks* like a lesbian relationship on the surface, only to have Peter
> say, "It's a Red Herring". Or are most people OK with this and think it's
> part of Peter's genius?
I think it's part of Peter's genius.
When you have had access to all the information he and Fran had access
to, it would be difficult to determine how to portray the relationship.
For all we know, Pauline could have had a slightly skewed interpretation
of her reality. Yet, the fact that Honora and Henry Hulme (et al.)
wished to "sever" the relationship tends to add weight to the argument
that, at the very least, outsiders perceived the relationship to be
somewhat outside the norm.
>
> Does anyone think it might be homophobic to deny there is an underlying
> sexual tension between Pauline and Juliet. And if you say you admit there is
> sexual tension/attraction, but it's not lesbian, I'd ask you to consult your
> dictionary under "L".
>
> Sure, this brings up the issue of what is a lesbian, but then what's not a
> lesbian?
>
> Do people feel better that Peter says it's *not* about lesbians? Breathe a
> sigh of relief, as it were?
>
> Did anyone consider that Peter's Red Herring comment might be a Red Herring
> itself?
>
I'm going to bypass those interesting questions (which are difficult to
answer) and take the easy way out: I am going to provide my
interpretation of the relationship.
I feel that while some of the elements of the relationship between Pauline
and Juliet (as depicted in the movie) seem patently lesbian, there is
really no easy way to define their relationship. I doubt that even
Pauline and Juliet *knew* of the term 'lesbian' or what it meant to 'be
lesbian.' I just accept their relationship as intense, meaningful, and
very spirited. :-)
I'm not very satisfied by that paragraph. But, I really don't wish to
open the can of worms on this issue. I'll let someone else take the
initiative.
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel,
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryan woodworth
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 bryanw@borovnia.666.org
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n051.4 ---------------
From: michaela drapes <oleanna@mail.utexas.edu>
Subject: Re: A Herring by Any Other Name...
Date: Thu, 13 Jun 1996 02:16:23 -0600
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Must reply to this one...
Personal theory time... (:
Ok, I always thought that Jackson called the girls' lesbianism a red herring
so it wouldn't overpower the rest of the story. When it really comes down
to it, that's really not the main focus of the film. If you want a
'lesbian' flick, go watch Go Fish, or Salmonberries, or Claire of the Moon
or something. HC is so much more than just a 'lesbian' film...I don't think
I need to explain in too much depth, as I'm sure everyone here has seen it
*multiple* times. But just to clarify, I do admit that, as a bisexual
woman, before my first viewing HC did appeal to me on a superficial level as
a sympathetic and non-judgemental portayal of an exceptionally close female
relationship. But I was thrilled to find when I saw the film to find that
it did deal with so much more--all consuming imagination, family crisis,
adolescent turmoil, intense friendship that turns into a love
unequalled--see what I mean? I really think that Jackson de-emphasized the
use of generalizing labels (ie, saying, "Now, this here is a movie about
lesbians") because the girls' relationship was so incredibly unique. I
believe he didn't want us, the viewers, to be constrained by thinking of the
relationship in terms of this or that, gay or straight, but just as first
and foremost, one of love.
>Not to open a kettle of fish ;-), but is anyone out there bothered/annoyed
>that Peter Jackson made a movie about two young women that most everyone will
>admit *looks* like a lesbian relationship on the surface, only to have Peter
>say, "It's a Red Herring". Or are most people OK with this and think it's
>part of Peter's genius?
see above... (:
>Does anyone think it might be homophobic to deny there is an underlying
>sexual tension between Pauline and Juliet. And if you say you admit there is
>sexual tension/attraction, but it's not lesbian, I'd ask you to consult your
>dictionary under "L".
Homophobia? Come on! If Jackson was homophobic, he wouldn't have made the
film, or he wouldn't have put the 'Night with the Saints' sequence in. If
anything, Jackson's done the gay community a great service by not being
judgemental towards the girls.
>Sure, this brings up the issue of what is a lesbian, but then what's not a
>lesbian?
In my case, that's a little too personal to discuss in this venue.
>Do people feel better that Peter says it's *not* about lesbians? Breathe a
>sigh of relief, as it were?
Why...? Because now it fits in the 'mainstream'? Because it makes it more
'comfortable'? Need I point out that the film as a whole is about
matricide, a *crime*--one that is socially unacceptable on all
fronts--despite how much we sympathize with the perpetrators? That's
definately not a mainstream or comfortable topic. Is Jackson streamlining
that for general public consumption too? I should think not... Something
tells me that Jackson isn't into watering down controversial issues. (:
>Did anyone consider that Peter's Red Herring comment might be a Red Herring
>itself?
Good point...that could very well be... (:
regards,
michaela
--
Michaela R. Drapes
oleanna@mail.utexas.edu
NEW URL! http://www2.cibola.net/~michaela
"You've got to measure your life with love" -Rent
--
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n051.5 ---------------
From: Clscflm@aol.com
Subject: herrings by any other name...
Date: Thu, 13 Jun 1996 19:05:43 -0400
Karen brings up significant questions about reading the relationship between
Pauline and Juliet. Reading some of the last few digests (as I'm new!), I'm
taken aback by people who've screened the film saying they never thought
"anything" about the girls' relationship until some overt event (the kiss in
the forest, rolling about in bed etc.). People will only see what they want
to see and then will still usually interpret it in a way that satisfies their
life view. Sure it means how you define the "L" word, most people don't even
want to consider it, much less grapple with any specific definition. They
overlook, ignore or call it something else (a phase, something - anything -
else). Question: if this was two boys, what would people have thought of the
kissing, hugging and rolling around? Why is it different with girls?
It doesn't seem anyone on the list cares to discuss real events, but I shall
proceed at any rate for the one or two who might. People are incredibly
inculturated to respond to certain things in certain ways, so much so that
even the participants of anything remotely homosexual may themselves refuse
to identify with that definition (moreso in the repressive 50s, double that
in 50s Christchurch). Hulme flat out seemed amazed they could be thought of
as having any kind of sexual relations as "we're both girls" (and modern day
Perry is infuriated most over HC's implication of lesbianism). You can go
back a few hundred years or look out the window and ask someone on the street
and get that one. According to that line, sex cannot exist without a man
around (so then why do people worry when two women _are_ rolling about
together?). Parker was only quoted as saying "Juliet is not a friend, she is
much more closer." (Dr.:) "Isn't that love?" "I don't know. I care for her
more than anyone else in the world." A goodly number of people would say
that right there was "lesbian." Then you get "phases" and all the rest.
Why does it really matter if they did or didn't have any detailed physical
relationship? How many people would you kill for? I think that says it all.
Jackson's comment is a bit of a herring - as his construction of Paul and
Juliet's relationship is so heavily romanticized. But I also think he and
Fran Walsh realize people's realtionships are never cut and dry, never easy
to pigeonhole, much less really understand.
Just my 2, well, maybe 10 cents.
ClscFlm
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n051.6 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: The Red Herring ( Mackeral, whatever)
Date: Thu, 13 Jun 1996 18:06:21 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
> Jackson's comment is a bit of a herring - as his construction of
> Paul and Juliet's relationship is so heavily romanticized. But
> I also think he and Fran Walsh realize people's relationships
> are never cut and dry, never easy to pigeonhole, much less really
> understood?
Yes!!!!
With that in mind, may I add something else ? I think the better a movie
is, the more it stands completelely on it's own as a work of art, and
the less it needs remarks by anyone, even the director, to qualify it,
or help the audience understand what to think of it. Peter and Fran's
true beliefs and feelings are in the film itself, the film they worked
so hard on for all those months, and not in things they say or don't say
in interviews. Films speak so much more loudly than words. I decided
on my own what to think of Paul and Julie's romantic relationship in HC,
and I thank Peter and Fran for giving me that gift of choice. Even if Peter
went on David Letterman and said "you know, those girls were really stark-
raving lunatics", nothing about HC would ever change for me.
( pardon me while I burst into song now )
-- kate
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n051 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Sat Jun 15 22:04:44 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id WAA05713 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sat, 15 Jun 1996 22:04:41 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id WAA04219; Sat, 15 Jun 1996 22:04:17 -0700
Date: Sat, 15 Jun 1996 22:04:17 -0700
Message-Id: <199606160504.WAA04219@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n052
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n052 --------------
001 - GorillaBlu@aol.com - Anne Perry sample
002 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Boys vs. Girls
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n052.1 ---------------
From: GorillaBlu@aol.com
Subject: Anne Perry sample
Date: Sat, 15 Jun 1996 00:22:04 -0400
If you've not read an Anne Perry novel but are curious, there is a
sample chapter on-line @:
http://www.randomhouse.com/BB/mystery/cainhisbrother.html
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n052.2 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Boys vs. Girls
Date: Sat, 15 Jun 1996 01:29:23 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Thu, 13 Jun 1996 Clscflm@aol.com wrote:
> Question: if this was two boys, what would people have thought of the
> kissing, hugging and rolling around? Why is it different with girls?
Speaking personally, I must admit I probably would have been somewhat
repelled if it had been two guys. Chalk this up to my sexual
preference. I certainly wouldn't have turned the movie
off (I know many who would), but it would have taken a lot more getting
used to. But I wouldn't have been able to enter into the thing
emotionally in the way that I did. Why? Simple. Paul is in love with
a beautiful girl. I can relate to that, therefore I can empathize with
the main character, and that's critical in the enjoyment of any story.
Of course, girls are allowed more physical intimacy with each
other before people start whispering about lesbianism. They're not as
strictured as boys in that regard. Indeed, if HC had been about two
boys, there's no doubt that the parents (and Christchurch society in
general) would have taken notice much more quickly, and taken more drastic
action to terminate the relationship.
And (to get very blunt), male society doesn't frown too much on a bit of
lesbianism here or there, in terms of its voyeuristic erotic appeal. It's a
regular feature in pornography targeted towards heterosexual males.
> Why does it really matter if they did or didn't have any detailed physical
> relationship? How many people would you kill for? I think that says it all.
Good point, although I don't think Paul is really killing for Juliet, or
even killing to stay with her. I think she's killing for a variety of
reasons, and this probably ties back into Jackson's 'red herring' remark.
Then again...Juliet is killing for Paul, in a way. Or seems to be. Dunno.
--Jefferson
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n052 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id OAA10816 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Tue, 18 Jun 1996 14:05:37 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (daemon@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id NAA17724; Tue, 18 Jun 1996 13:48:52 -0700
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 13:48:52 -0700
Message-Id: <199606182048.NAA17724@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n053
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n053 --------------
001 - Jane <misc1341@cantva.can - Red Herrings
002 - Jane <misc1341@cantva.can - Girls vs Boys
003 - adamabr@mail.helix.net (a - The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n053.1 ---------------
From: Jane <misc1341@cantva.canterbury.ac.nz>
Subject: Red Herrings
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 08:26:11 +1300
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT
Karen's recent posting, which speculated whether or not Juliet and
Pauline - as they are constructed in Heavenly Creatures - had a
lesbian relationship, has generated some interesting and revealing
(intended or not) comments. My turn now - read on if you dare :-)
I think that often, when discussing sexual identity people impose
boundaries and definitions which tend to be not nearly as fixed as
we might prefer. For myself, there is little doubt that the energy
which flowed between the two was, in part, sexual. I am also of the
opinion that the film depicted some behaviours which may be
interpreted as lesbian. (Nothing like stating the obvious) Whether
this means they 'were lesbians' or not, may be a different matter
entirely.
The construction of lesbian identity is a social thing - it is not
some pre-ordained given and I think, the ambiguity of what/who 'a
lesbian' is well caught within the film. Peter Jackson's comments
about Red Herrings (which are actually blue down here at the moment
as its winter and rather cold) would seem to me, to be a move against
the stereotypical categorisation and ownership of Pauline and
Juliet's sexual expressions. It might be useful to digress into
'reality' for a bit. For example, in her paper Heavenly
Lesbians: A Murder Revisited Alison Laurie writes,
My interest is in the public portrayal of lesbians in a discourse
which connects lesbians and murder, sex and death, and portrayals of
the two girls involved in this particular killing as either "mad" or
"bad".
Laurie's analysis is problematic because she works from the
assumption that Juliet and Pauline *were* lesbians. This assumption
is repeated throughout the article. Laurie imposes a fixed
definition on the behaviour of the girls, that does not appear to
rest easily on the construction of Pauline and Juliet in Heavenly
Creatures.
My point in referring to Laurie's paper is connected to what I said
previously about sexuality not necessarily being a fixed and convient
commodity. I think that it is equally problematic to categorically
claim that Pauline and Juliet, as they are represented in the film,
cannot be partially understood through their sexual expressions of
love for each other. I suspect, that red herring or not, that is why
Peter and Fran included the sex scenes in the film.
That's my contribution! Any thoughts on the fact that herrings are
only made red by virtue of tomatoe sauce?
Jane
_...._
/ \
/ o __ o \
( \/ )
) (
( - - - )
( )
( )
------------------/l\ /l\-------------------
------------------------------------------
( )
( __ _)
'Jackson's unique craft, combined with his acceptance of
the unaltered, unglossed Kiwi environment, makes him
literally unique in the world, possibly the galaxy. I
wonder what he tastes like?' (Chris Hegan, The Listener)
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n053.2 ---------------
From: Jane <misc1341@cantva.canterbury.ac.nz>
Subject: Girls vs Boys
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 08:26:10 +1300
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT
Hi folks,
Just wanted to respond to Jefferson's latest posting. It raised some
interesting issues which are worth considering.
> Of course, girls are allowed more physical intimacy with each
> other before people start whispering about lesbianism.
I'm not sure of your point here - people (in my opinion) seldom
whisper about lesbianism. It is - in conservative New Zealand at any rate -
talked about loudly. Often with fear, hostility and stereotype. As
the internation press creature evidenced in the 1950's.
That is, again in my opinion, why HC makes such an important
statement about romance between two young women. I think that there
are *many* facets to the relationship between Juliet and Pauline, as
it is constructed in the film. Certainly, most of their interactions
are not explicitly sexual, but I would argue that their interactions
are throughout, shrouded in romance. In 'reality' this was enough to
rouse more than a few *shouts* of lesbianism in the 1950's.
Indeed, if HC had been about two
> boys, there's no doubt that the parents (and Christchurch society in
> general) would have taken notice much more quickly, and taken more drastic
> action to terminate the relationship.
I can't quite see where this observation comes from Jefferson. It's
certainly not the case in present day Christchurch.
> And (to get very blunt), male society doesn't frown too much on a bit of
> lesbianism here or there, in terms of its voyeuristic erotic appeal. It's a
> regular feature in pornography targeted towards heterosexual males.
Which is exactly what Alison Laurie, in her article Heavenly
Lesbians: A Murder Re-Visited argues. Laurie heavily critiques the
film for this. She states,
In the next scene "Pauline" and "Juliet" are shown riding their
bicycles into the country where a car runs them off the road.
"Pauline" is portrayed as pretending to be hurt, after which the
girls are exhibited as inexplicably running and screaming and tossing
off their clothes. They are shown as frenetically dancing and singing
through the bush until they emerge at a field where they encounter
the male gaze of a conveniently placed fencer. They are depicted as
retreating back to the bush where they lie down in a glade and kiss,
ending a sequence of scenes disturbingly reminiscent of
"lesbian" plots in a pornographic genre produced for male consumers.
Personally I find this reading of the film extremely problematic.
It negates the position of the female viewer and prioritises the
lesbian sexuality of the girls which it claims to critique. It gives
a lot of power to the apparently non-existent Red Herrings :-)
Either there *is* a component of lesbian behaviour in the film or
there isn't. To acknowledge that there is, is not necessarily to
impose a fixed judgement of 'lesbian' on Juliet and Pauline, it is I
think, merely acknowledging the complexity and totality of their
commitment to each other. But to imply that it is present for the
'male consumer' seems to me, to be a superficial reading of the film.
Anyway - that's it, a few thoughts for just now
Jane
_...._
/ \
/ o __ o \
( \/ )
) (
( - - - )
( )
( )
------------------/l\ /l\-------------------
------------------------------------------
( )
( __ _)
'Jackson's unique craft, combined with his acceptance of
the unaltered, unglossed Kiwi environment, makes him
literally unique in the world, possibly the galaxy. I
wonder what he tastes like?' (Chris Hegan, The Listener)
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n053.3 ---------------
From: adamabr@mail.helix.net (adam abrams)
Subject: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 13:49:25 -0800
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Well, the good news is: a magazine called "Internet Underground" gave my HC
Website 5 stars and a mention in their magazine!
I raced to my local newsstand and confirmed that it does indeed exist.
There was a glowing review. Then I discovered...
The bad news! They gave the wrong URL for my site - it links to some guy's
gallery of B&W photos. The first image is an arty shot of a female nude
poised on one of those balance-beams that dancers practice on. Hmmm. Talk
about giving people the wrong idea. It and the rest are all nice photos,
but it sure ain't the _Heavenly Creatures Webpage_!
Ah, well, at least they got my email address right.
--Adam
==========================================================================
Only the best people fight against Adam Abrams
all obstacles... in pursuit of happiness! Vancouver, BC, Canada
--Juliet Hulme, "Heavenly Creatures"
Visit the "Fourth World" at http://www.helix.net/~adamabr/creatures.html
==========================================================================
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n053 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id SAA04033 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Wed, 19 Jun 1996 18:38:09 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id PAA04915; Wed, 19 Jun 1996 15:43:24 -0700
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 1996 15:43:24 -0700
Message-Id: <199606192243.PAA04915@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n054
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n054 --------------
001 - "Chris Black" <qleap@inte - Re: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
002 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Re: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
003 - Kaiser Wilhelm <delirium@ - Re: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n054.1 ---------------
From: "Chris Black" <qleap@interl.net>
Subject: Re: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 16:34:04 +0000
Adam,
I already alerted Internet Underground to the error, and they said
they would print a retraction in the next issue. :-)
--Chris
NP: "Pieces of You" --Jewel
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n054.2 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Re: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 1996 19:23:40 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Hi Adam/ All,
> The first image is an arty shot of a female nude
> poised on one of those balance-beams that dancers practice on.
So that was Hilda Hulme's "deep therapy". I always wondered.
( By the way, congratulations, Adam! )
-- kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n054.3 ---------------
From: Kaiser Wilhelm <delirium@ariel.ucs.unimelb.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: The Two-Edged Sword of Publicity
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 1996 14:43:45 +1000 (AEST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
> ( By the way, congratulations, Adam! )
Indeed. It's a damn fine page. All congratulations.
>
>
And in the mist there she rides,
And castles are burning in my heart.
http://ariel.ucs.unimelb.edu.au/~delirium
"I've developed a taste for geeks"
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n054 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id XAA22975 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Thu, 20 Jun 1996 23:01:14 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id XAA19688; Thu, 20 Jun 1996 23:00:28 -0700
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 23:00:28 -0700
Message-Id: <199606210600.XAA19688@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n055
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n055 --------------
001 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: Girls vs Boys
002 - michaela drapes <oleanna@ - The Frighteners tidbit
003 - edinman@felix.TECLink.Net - HC prints
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n055.1 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: Girls vs Boys
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 01:35:40 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Tue, 18 Jun 1996, Jane wrote:
> > Of course, girls are allowed more physical intimacy with each
> > other before people start whispering about lesbianism.
>
> I'm not sure of your point here - people (in my opinion) seldom
> whisper about lesbianism. It is - in conservative New Zealand at any rate -
> talked about loudly. Often with fear, hostility and stereotype.
Well, I don't know what the social climate of New Zealand is like. My
point was that, for example, if two girls kiss each other on the lips, as
long as they don't linger too long, people won't really think anything of
it. If two males engage in this behavior...eyebrows go up real fast. At
least in America. The standards are different.
> Indeed, if HC had been about two
> > boys, there's no doubt that the parents (and Christchurch society in
> > general) would have taken notice much more quickly, and taken more drastic
> > action to terminate the relationship.
>
> I can't quite see where this observation comes from Jefferson. It's
> certainly not the case in present day Christchurch.
Perhaps not. But in America, it is my opinion that male homosexuality is
considered a more offensive and egregious aberration than
lesbianism, basically because heterosexual males find it more repugnant
than lesbian activity. Sounds like we're peering at each other from across
a cultural divide.
> > And (to get very blunt), male society doesn't frown too much on a bit of
> > lesbianism here or there, in terms of its voyeuristic erotic appeal. It's a
> > regular feature in pornography targeted towards heterosexual males.
>
> Which is exactly what Alison Laurie, in her article Heavenly
> Lesbians: A Murder Re-Visited argues. Laurie heavily critiques the
> film for this.
Well, although I certainly disagree with Laurie's overall assessment of
the film (A perfect example of how someone can miss the point of a work
of art if they apply a socio-political litmus test to it), I think she
may be onto something there. As a male viewer, I found some of
interaction between Paul and Juliet titillating. I won't deny that. But
that's probably just an inevitable by-product of the films' narrative
tactic--to bring us completely inside the world of the girls. To them,
their encounters were exciting and erotic, and therefore Jackson works to
convey that excitement, that giddiness, to the audience. Just as he
works to contrarily show how disappointing Paul's encounter with John is.
(The crying, the sounds of urination and flushing toilets).
I imagine Laurie doesn't believe that any heterosexual male could present
a lesbian story without it being in some way 'exploitative.' And her
definition of exploitation is most likely, "Any depiction of a female which
straight males might derive enjoyment from." When this
logic is carried out to its fullest extent, one has to conclude that Kate
Winslet is exploited in the film by virtue of the fact that she's
depicted as an object of sexual/romantic adoration, with Paul filling in
as the traditional male paramour. Indeed, any girl who puts on make-up
and stands in front of a camera is being 'exploited.' A rather limiting
view, I think.
> Personally I find this reading of the film extremely problematic.
> It negates the position of the female viewer and prioritises the
> lesbian sexuality of the girls which it claims to critique. It gives
> a lot of power to the apparently non-existent Red Herrings :-)
I agree. Laurie chose to classify the film as a 'movie about lesbians
directed by a heterosexual male.' Her entire critique flows from
this classification, an authorical situation she obviously considers to be
inherently problematic. Imagine how different her assessment
of the film might be if she had been told that a woman had directed it.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n055.2 ---------------
From: michaela drapes <oleanna@mail.utexas.edu>
Subject: The Frighteners tidbit
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 12:12:03 -0600
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
The Frighteners
US Release date July 19
Michael J. Fox, Trini Alvorado, Jeffery Combs, Dee Wallace-Stone
Written By Walsh and Jackson, Directed by Jackson (Universal)
Peter Jackson's much anticipated follow-up to his sublime adolescent freak
show "Heavenly Creatures" inhabits neat-o alternative realities. Here
Michael J Fox plays a small-town ghost buster who enlists his phantasmal
friends--a judge, a geek, and a disco king--to help him rid a house of some
ectoplasm with attitude. Jacksons spins a whimsical baroque style into a
visual-effects field day to conjure up his creepy poltergeists. He ain't
afraid of no ghost.
Premiere, July 1996, pp 14-15
--
Michaela R. Drapes
oleanna@mail.utexas.edu
NEW URL! http://www2.cibola.net/~michaela
"You've got to measure your life with love" -Rent
--
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n055.3 ---------------
From: edinman@felix.TECLink.Net (edinman)
Subject: HC prints
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 13:31:36 -0500
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
If anyone is interested in renting 16mm or 35mm prints of Heavenly
Creatures they're available from Swank (starting at about $175 I think,
depending on the use) and can be used as part of a film series, midnight
movies, or whatever.
Their phone number is 314-289-2192 or toll free in most U.S. areas at
800-876-5577.
If you need a projector, 16mm models can be rented in most areas for $30 or
less or if you want to buy one they often trade for $80 or less. I'd be
willing to help anyone find one who is interested--just e-mail me.
I have collected lots of old cult films in 16mm and also shoot and process
my own short films with an antique camera. Always glad to hear from anyone
interested in this sort of thing.
I'm sort of new to this list. Most of my opinions about Heavenly Creatures
are probably not as well thought out as some of the authors I've read here,
but it's nice to know others enjoyed the film as much as I did and feel so
passionately ablut it.--Ed
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n055 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Sat Jun 22 02:00:43 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id CAA19813 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sat, 22 Jun 1996 02:00:37 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id BAA26508; Sat, 22 Jun 1996 01:00:30 -0700
Date: Sat, 22 Jun 1996 01:00:30 -0700
Message-Id: <199606220800.BAA26508@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n056
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n056 --------------
001 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - late night HC thoughts
002 - Donald Chin <donaldc@nets - Australian HC...
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n056.1 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: late night HC thoughts
Date: Fri, 21 Jun 1996 01:10:14 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
This evening I had a brainwave ( after watching HC ) - to write down
some thoughts I had, like Jefferson did. I'm just an amateur, though, a
Jefferson wannabe if you will, so don't expect anything quite so
insightful. But anyway, I'll take a whack at it ( er, pardon the
expression ).
Jonsy's Disappearing Act : Does anyone else think it's kind of creepy
that Jonathan is never seen or mentioned again after Port Levy, even
peripherally? For all the movie implies, Hilda could have drown him when
they went to the shops. The obvious explanation for this is that the movie
told from the girls' point of view, and he's not a part of their world,
so why show him? This is true. But why then do Hilda and Henry never
mention him? I think this could work on two levels. Realistically, they
are neglective parents. But intuitively, Jonsy's disappearance shows
something else. He is the only literal child in a movie about matricide.
His sudden vanishing, around the time of the birth of Diello, could
represent the innocence that has been lost in Paul and Juliet's fantasy
games. Also, the almost denial of his existence sets the mood at Ilam for
the seriousness of what's to come.
The Two Christmases : Do you get the feeling that Mr. Jackson is not a
"tidings of comfort and joy" kind of guy ? He seems to be really making
fun of the Christmas holiday, saying that less complicated people can be
thrilled with dumb golden trinkets and socks, but people with Pauline's
depth don't enjoy it at all, either smirking ( the first year ), or
being downright miserable ( the second ). I think it's ironic and
fitting that Pauline gets diaries both years, for they separate her, at
least in writing, from the dull life of her family. One of my favorite
"Pauline Reiper Moments" in this movie is when she gives her sister a
Mario Lanza record.....Gee, I wonder why ?
Pauline's Hair : Frizzy at the beginning, straight at the end. Hmmm.
I assume the Reiper's couldn't afford to give her a perm, so I guess this
is naturally curly hair gone straight. Since this is a little unlikely,
I thought maybe the filmmakers were trying to show her hair growing longer
over time, without her having to wear a wig. This could be, but now I
think the straitness symbolizes her inner life, too, because after she
drops out of school, it gets straighter and wilder with her darkening
nature. On the morning of the murder, it is still a _little_ curly, but
once they get to Victoria Park, straight as a board, for the first time
in the movie.
Ax : Paul walks up the stairs thinking, "I am trying to think of some
way." Next shot - an ax cutting wood in half. Could this, uh, be the way?
Shipboard Fantasy : I think this is commonly thought of as Paul's
fantasy, of running on board with the Hulmes, and longing to be one of
them. It is, of course, but I also think it's Juliet's. What little family
life this girl ever had was completely falling apart, first with Bill
Perry moving in, and then with her parents announcing their divorce. She
as much as Paul wanted a family to belong to.
Well, that's all. Sorry if I said anything too obvious.
"It all began so well, but what an end...."
-Cole Porter
============================================================================
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n056.2 ---------------
From: Donald Chin <donaldc@netspace.net.au>
Subject: Australian HC...
Date: Sat, 22 Jun 1996 00:19:14 +1000
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Hi all,
Listmembers living in Australia may be interested to know that Heavenly
Creatures will be showing on Optus Vision next month! It should be
interesting to see what version they give us.
Regards, Donald
--
Donald Chin <donaldc@netspace.net.au>
"Lost somewhere in Australia...
and fanatical about Heavenly Creatures and Jane Austen!"
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n056 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com Sun Jun 23 18:02:15 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id SAA09471 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sun, 23 Jun 1996 18:02:07 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id RAA29501; Sun, 23 Jun 1996 17:00:27 -0700
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 17:00:27 -0700
Message-Id: <199606240000.RAA29501@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n057
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n057 --------------
001 - Clscflm@aol.com - music
002 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - E non ho amato mai tanto la vita!
003 - Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@ - Re: E non ho amato mai tanto la vita!
004 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: late night HC thoughts
005 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: The Frighteners tidbit
006 - mailcall <mailcall@kiva.n - Re: late night hc thoughts
007 - "Chris Black" <qleap@inte - Re: late night HC thoughts
008 - michaela drapes <oleanna@ - Re: The Frighteners tidbit
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.1 ---------------
From: Clscflm@aol.com
Subject: music
Date: Sat, 22 Jun 1996 19:41:03 -0400
I still haven't figured out how to get past digests - any kind soul out there
care to offer some assistance?
Sorry if this has been brought up in the past, but my radio tells me it's the
100th anniversary of the debut of Giacomo Puccini's La Boheme, which of
course brings HC very much to mind (Sono andati?... Sei il amor - e tutta la
mia vita). I've always thought Jackson's application of prerecorded music
one of the most brilliant aspects of the film. The selections so well
parallel not only mood, but narrative and are built in to the actual script.
Pauline's diary mentions Tosca (and Lanza's Donkey Serenade) specifically,
but I wonder what guided the other inspired operatic choices. Pauline listens
to a segment of Puccini's Tosca, which is a story that, in part, features a
murder that will supposedly free an imprisoned lover - but that backfires and
ends in the demise of the couple... Juliet's aria from La Boheme is a love
song sung by a young woman with TB to her lover who doesn't fully realize she
is dying and really saying goodbye (ah opera!)... And that mesmerizing
Humming Chorus, from Puccini's Madame Butterfly, as Butterfly looks hopefully
to the day to bring romantic fullfillment, not bitterness and death. Nice
stuff... and so wonderfully melodramatic while sincerely romantic and tragic.
The rationale for the particular Lanza material is pretty self evident, but
I've always especially liked The Loveliest Night of the Year as its also the
tune circus high wire acts often use... another deliciously striking
metaphor for Pauline and Juliet about to take a leap into space (dare I
finish the thought? -without a net).
Do others out there get as bowled over (every time) by the music - or is it
just me?
Reflecting and humming along,
ClscFlm
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.2 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: E non ho amato mai tanto la vita!
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 12:35:10 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sat, 22 Jun 1996 Clscflm@aol.com wrote:
> I've always thought Jackson's application of prerecorded music
> one of the most brilliant aspects of the film.
Absolutely. In my book, he put himself up there with Kubrick and
Scorsese in terms of musical choices when he did this film.
> The selections so well
> parallel not only mood, but narrative and are built in to the actual script.
I especially like the parallel (pointed out in the FAQ) between the
first piece of music ('Just a Closer Walk with Thee') and the last
('You'll never walk alone.') Apart from tying into all that walking
imagery, it also puts a heartbreakingly tragic/ironic spin on the end.
The hymn is addressed to Jesus (another 'Heavenly Creature', I suppose),
but it can also be interpreted as a mutual plea between the girls.
Although I suppose it fits Paul's perspective a bit better, especially in
the beginning of the film. She does tend to see Juliet in a rather
angelic light.
When I first saw the film, 'You'll never walk' was already a favorite
song of mine, and I was immediately struck by what a perfect choice it
was. The song would seem to contradict the literal events of the story,
in that Paul and Juliet will have to 'walk alone' for the rest of their
lives (with respect to each other), but the song itself is more an
exhortation for self-reliance ('Walk on with hope in your heart and
you'll never walk alone...'). I suppose it's a self-reliance that the
girls will now have to learn, whether they want to or not. The irony is
still there however, in that it's a somewhat bittersweet but still
hopeful song to play over the credits of a film that ends so desolately.
> Do others out there get as bowled over (every time) by the music - or is it
> just me?
It ain't just you. I hope you've bought the soundtrack.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.3 ---------------
From: Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: Re: E non ho amato mai tanto la vita!
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 1996 00:45:20 +0800 (WST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
rz
**
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.4 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: late night HC thoughts
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 12:52:28 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Fri, 21 Jun 1996, kate ann jacobson wrote:
> Jonsy's Disappearing Act : Does anyone else think it's kind of creepy
> that Jonathan is never seen or mentioned again after Port Levy, even
> peripherally? For all the movie implies, Hilda could have drown him when
> they went to the shops.
I hadn't thought of this. Jonsy is the only boy the girls ever interract
with (unless you count John/Nicholas), and they seem to be able to
tolerate him well enough. I suppose he could be seen as a stand-in for
young male society--a society the girls aren't really all that interested
in. In fact, like the rest of the world, Jonsy has a tendency to try to
screw up their dreams, whether he's jumping out of the bushes and
breaking the Mario record, or destroying their sand castle.
(Incidentally, it's always puzzled me why the girls laugh when Jonsy
destroys their castle. I would've beaten the crap out of him. I guess
they were just to happy to care.)
If Jonsy is meant to be a figurative example of how society will intrude
on the girls' world, his disappearance starts to make a little more
sense. He's the first to intrude (admittedly in a fairly harmless way),
then he's replaced by John (who comes between them a bit more directly),
and then John disappears, to be replaced by the most powerful of the male
figures--Henry Hulme. Notice how almost immediately after Nicholas is
dispatched, Henry is finally introduced as the main antagonist. The
bliss of the girls' reunion is short-lived.
> The Two Christmases : Do you get the feeling that Mr. Jackson is not a
> "tidings of comfort and joy" kind of guy ? He seems to be really making
> fun of the Christmas holiday, saying that less complicated people can be
> thrilled with dumb golden trinkets and socks, but people with Pauline's
> depth don't enjoy it at all, either smirking ( the first year ), or
> being downright miserable ( the second ).
I didn't interpret her reaction at the first Christmas as a smirk. I
thought she was genuinely happy with the present (or at least happy
enough with her life at the time not to find it too disappointing). But
I don't know. We should ask Bryan or one of the other Lynskey
physiognomists to weigh in. Is it a smirk or a smile?
> Shipboard Fantasy : I think this is commonly thought of as Paul's
> fantasy, of running on board with the Hulmes, and longing to be one of
> them. It is, of course, but I also think it's Juliet's. What little family
> life this girl ever had was completely falling apart, first with Bill
> Perry moving in, and then with her parents announcing their divorce. She
> as much as Paul wanted a family to belong to.
Good point. It certainly could be a joint fantasy. Or perhaps simply
one of those 'filmmaker commentaries'--putting the characters' emotional
states in symbolic cinematic form.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.5 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: The Frighteners tidbit
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 12:56:21 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Thu, 20 Jun 1996, michaela drapes wrote:
> The Frighteners
> US Release date July 19
> Michael J. Fox, Trini Alvorado, Jeffery Combs, Dee Wallace-Stone
> Written By Walsh and Jackson, Directed by Jackson (Universal)
Anyone interested in reading a little more about this film might do well
to check out the latest editions of Cinescape and Fangoria. There are
articles in both. I haven't read all of them, so I'm not sure about
spoilers. I'm sure there are a few.
--Jefferson
P.S. Sweet bodements--Jackson has said that 'Frighteners' bears a slight
resemblance to HC in that it starts off 'fun', then gets progressively
darker. I can't wait.
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.6 ---------------
From: mailcall <mailcall@kiva.net>
Subject: Re: late night hc thoughts
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 13:03:37 -0500 (EST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
i think we should all write down our insights, because we're all
outstanding geniuses or we wouldn't be able to appreciate their
genius, right? i wrote tons of observations and insights when i first
saw the film and i emailed them all off to dr porter and he wrote
enthusiastically back again. when he gets back from borovnia, some of
the stuff i said will be in the next version of the faq. wait till he
sees heavenly web and all the archives of the list!
about what kate said:
jonsy's disappearing act. yeah it's clear he is just not a part of
their world, and it also represents how he kind of vanished out of
sight after the moider. dr hulme just took him away and no one ever
saw or heard from him again. we know he is alright today and has kids
of his own because anne perry mentions him in an interview that is
quoted in "heavenly lesbians". so she's in touch with him or at least
knows where he is.
yeah, i did notice that he vanished and then diello showed up. i
mentioned once that i thought jonsy kind of inspired them to create
diello (in the film i mean, i don't know how it was in real life).
: I think it's ironic and fitting that Pauline gets diaries both
: years, for they separate her, at least in writing, from the dull
: life of her family.
the diaries were what pauline really got from her dad, of course. he
may simply have not known what else to get her but that a diary was
appropriate for an introspective young person. maybe he remembered
someone in his family starting a diary at that age or maybe he'd kept
one himself. when he says "i hope it's alright" that could be "i hope
it's okay to give you a diary" but i heard it as "i hope this kind of
diary is alright," as in he couldn't afford to give her a fancy one,
especially since he follows it up with "it's from whitcombe and
coombes," i.e., it's not from letts' but it's good quality.
the fact that only her father gives her something really appropriate
and useful to her can be read on all sorts of levels, including the
fact that was not fully brought out in the film, that pauline and her
dad had been very close at one time and their relationship was based
on creativity. they just kind of drop the line in there, "you used to
love making things with dad, yvonne".
paul's hair: i saw her hair going straight as well. at digby's she
might have been told "smoothe down those curls." the fastest, easiest,
and cheapest way to do this was (and is) a hot oil conditioner.
combine this with the fact that like you said, they could be showing
her hair growing longer to show the passage of time, and even very
curly hair straightens out some as it gets longer, and the effect
shown in the film becomes very realistic. i didn't think of this
previously, but she could also have been straightening her hair some
to match juliet's.
: Ax : Paul walks up the stairs thinking, "I am trying to think
: of some way." Next shot - an ax cutting wood in half. Could this,
: uh, be the way?
first thing i thought of. the ax whacking down made it into the
trailer for the film, so one does wonder.
and that dreadful moment in the kitchen on the day of the moider, when
honora bends over to work on whatever she's got baking in the oven,
and paul & julie just ***look*** at each other... "hansel and gretel"
goes through every mind in the audience. ack. more later.
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.7 ---------------
From: "Chris Black" <qleap@interl.net>
Subject: Re: late night HC thoughts
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 13:30:35 +0000
>
> I didn't interpret her reaction at the first Christmas as a smirk. I
> thought she was genuinely happy with the present (or at least happy
> enough with her life at the time not to find it too disappointing). But
> I don't know. We should ask Bryan or one of the other Lynskey
> physiognomists to weigh in. Is it a smirk or a smile?
Oh, it's most defenitly a smile. :-)
--Chris "who hasn't been heard from much on here lately because he's
been on vacation!"
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n057.8 ---------------
From: michaela drapes <oleanna@mail.utexas.edu>
Subject: Re: The Frighteners tidbit
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 12:44:09 -0600
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>P.S. Sweet bodements--Jackson has said that 'Frighteners' bears a slight
>resemblance to HC in that it starts off 'fun', then gets progressively
>darker. I can't wait.
And another thing..two of the characters' last name is Lynskey... (:
-michaela
--
Michaela R. Drapes
oleanna@mail.utexas.edu
NEW URL! http://www2.cibola.net/~michaela
"You've got to measure your life with love" -Rent
--
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n057 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id TAA11299 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Mon, 24 Jun 1996 19:00:54 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id TAA24565; Mon, 24 Jun 1996 19:00:31 -0700
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 1996 19:00:31 -0700
Message-Id: <199606250200.TAA24565@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n058
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n058 --------------
001 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - Old digests -- acquisition
002 - Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@ - Anniversary/visit to NZ
003 - plath3@his.com (Peter Lat - Re: Port Levy & Victoria Park
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n058.1 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: Old digests -- acquisition
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 1996 18:57:49 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 578
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi,
Old digests are archived here --
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/hcdigests.html
It is kept relatively current. I try to update it at least twice
a month.
Indeed, time for another HC update, eh my fellow 4th World people!
I should have HC web updated again within a few days.
thanks,
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel, bryan woodworth
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryanw@borovnia.666.org
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 PGP Public Key obtainable
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/ via finger: bryanw@best.com
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n058.2 ---------------
From: Sandra Bowdler <sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: Anniversary/visit to NZ
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 1996 13:23:30 +0800 (WST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Hello fellow creatures,
I hope you all remembered that Saturday was the 42nd anniversary of the
Day of the Happy Event. I celebrated (?) by attending a performance of
La Traviata. I wrote a review for OPERA-L which contained a subtle
reference to that date. If anyone wants to play Spot the Reference (and I
don't believe there's a big crossover between OPERA-L and here), e-mail me
privately and I'll send it to you.
I will be in Auckland from July 2-15 - any fellow creatures want to meet
for a cup of coffee? I'm hoping to spend a day in Christchurch too,
although that rather depends on how my work goes in Auckland (boring,
boring).
cheers
Sandra Bowdler
sbowdler@cyllene.uwa.edu.au
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n058.3 ---------------
From: plath3@his.com (Peter Latham)
Subject: Re: Port Levy & Victoria Park
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 1996 11:09:42 -0500
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Were any of you struck by the pier scene at Port Levy? In that scene,
Juliet and Pauline run out on a pier, with Juliet in a commanding lead. At
the last minute she grasps a piling while Pauline hurtles over the edge of
the pier and into the water.In Victoria Park, Juliet grasps a tree in the
same manner, while Pauline initiates their plan. Both scenes suggest that
the girl's actions were driven by Juliet's ideas and Pauline's execution of
them.
Does this seem correct?
"Live each day as though it were your last, and one day you're sure to be
right." BREAKER MORANT (1979)
Sincerely,
Peter Latham
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n058 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id UAA05055 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Tue, 25 Jun 1996 20:03:12 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id UAA04926; Tue, 25 Jun 1996 20:02:14 -0700
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1996 20:02:14 -0700
Message-Id: <199606260302.UAA04926@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n059
BestServHost: lists1.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists1.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists1.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n059 --------------
001 - Clscflm@aol.com - more music...
002 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: Port Levy & Victoria Park
003 - "Jefferson F. Morris" <jf - Re: more music...
004 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Melanie
005 - michaela drapes <oleanna@ - Re: more music...
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n059.1 ---------------
From: Clscflm@aol.com
Subject: more music...
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 1996 22:24:29 -0400
Jefferson writes:
<< When I first saw the film, 'You'll never walk' was already a favorite
song of mine, and I was immediately struck by what a perfect choice it
was. The song would seem to contradict the literal events of the story,
in that Paul and Juliet will have to 'walk alone' for the rest of their
lives (with respect to each other), but the song itself is more an
exhortation for self-reliance ('Walk on with hope in your heart and
you'll never walk alone...'). I suppose it's a self-reliance that the
girls will now have to learn, whether they want to or not. >>
Yes, which intensifies the poignancy of the closing explanatory notes on the
girls' fate. All the music can be applied to both, but as always, it does
seem to be more closely linked with Pauline. Throughout, Pauline has always
seen herself as the one who would "die" without Juliet and the darker
operatic score emphasizes that. In Rogers and Hammerstein's _Carousel_
"You'll Never Walk Alone" closes the story, sung by the ghost of Billy
Bigelow as he finally accepts that his wife, Julie, loves him but is better
off without him. This realization frees him to finally go on to heaven. The
religious connection here (like the similarity of "Julie" with "Juliet"),
however slight, can't be overlooked.
ClscFlm
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n059.2 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: Port Levy & Victoria Park
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1996 01:35:54 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Mon, 24 Jun 1996, Peter Latham wrote:
> Were any of you struck by the pier scene at Port Levy? In that scene,
> Juliet and Pauline run out on a pier, with Juliet in a commanding lead. At
> the last minute she grasps a piling while Pauline hurtles over the edge of
> the pier and into the water.In Victoria Park, Juliet grasps a tree in the
> same manner, while Pauline initiates their plan. Both scenes suggest that
> the girl's actions were driven by Juliet's ideas and Pauline's execution of
> them.
>
> Does this seem correct?
Absolutely. Juliet is the clear leader at first, but Paul turns out to
be the one who's more willing to actually "take the plunge" and carry
things out. More willing to immerse herself in sensations. Juliet is
definitely more 'proper' and aloof in this regard. A result of her
upbringing, no doubt.
I think it's no accident that even though Juliet is the more
conventionally attractive of the two, it's Paul who actually experiments
sexually with others. And of course, she's the one who first introduces
the specter of sex and violence into their world, in the persona of "It."
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n059.3 ---------------
From: "Jefferson F. Morris" <jfmorris@CapAccess.org>
Subject: Re: more music...
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1996 01:43:31 -0400 (EDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Mon, 24 Jun 1996 Clscflm@aol.com wrote:
> In Rogers and Hammerstein's _Carousel_
> "You'll Never Walk Alone" closes the story, sung by the ghost of Billy
> Bigelow as he finally accepts that his wife, Julie, loves him but is better
> off without him. This realization frees him to finally go on to heaven. The
> religious connection here (like the similarity of "Julie" with "Juliet"),
> however slight, can't be overlooked.
...Except that Paul is now consigned to a psychological hell largely of
her own making. Paradise (as she's come to conceive it) is most
certainly lost. Irony once again.
It occurs to me that J&W must've done a hell of a lot of research on this
music. Either that, or divine providence led them to their choices.
It's slightly spooky that Mario Lanza recorded the song. The
musical/thematic closure it puts on the film is almost too perfect for
comfort. Funny how these things work out.
--Jefferson
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n059.4 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Melanie
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 1996 23:58:19 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Hi everyone,
By saying Melanie smirked at Christmas, I actually wasn't thinking of
her reaction to her father's present, which _was_ a smile, but more of
general attitude earlier in the scene watching her parents opening
presents, and the expression on her face as she gave Wendy the record. I
guess "smirk" was the wrong word, but I meant she didn't really seem into
the Christmas spirit.
"Her smoldering eyes still scorch my soul" - This can only be said
about Melanie Lynskey, and I see her in movies in my head all the time,
and yet Liv Tyler is on the cover of every magazine. I do believe very
often that the entertainment buisness is not about talent and emotions at
all, but just about money and superficiality and manipulating the public.
I'm sorry I only have to watch this great actress play characters in my
head. I'm glad the situation with Kate is different.
By the way, thanks for the warning, Michaela, about characters being
named Lynskey in The Frighteners, for I would have jumped up in the theater
in front of everyone and yelled "Oh my God!" or something.
_ kate
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n059.5 ---------------
From: michaela drapes <oleanna@mail.utexas.edu>
Subject: Re: more music...
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1996 03:05:58 -0600
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Re: "You'll Never Walk Alone"
Jefferson said:
>It's slightly spooky that Mario Lanza recorded the song. The
>musical/thematic closure it puts on the film is almost too perfect for
>comfort. Funny how these things work out.
Not really spooky...'Carousel' was first performed in 1945, ran for 890
performances on Broadway, and was made into a film in 1956. Considering
that Broadway tunes made up a sizeable chunk of popular music until rock and
roll began, and that "You'll Never Walk Alone" was one of the big songs from
the show, and that it is a bonanza number for a tenor-- its not surprising
that it became part of Lanza's repetoire, and one of his greatest hits.
...and don't ask how I know all this useless information...I just do...I'm
the answer-girl... (:
regards,
michaela "just call me Agent Dana Scully" drapes (;
--
Michaela R. Drapes
oleanna@mail.utexas.edu
NEW URL! http://www2.cibola.net/~michaela
Welcome to the tragic kingdom...
--
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n059 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id OAA29353 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Thu, 27 Jun 1996 14:06:47 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id NAA22977; Thu, 27 Jun 1996 13:00:29 -0700
Date: Thu, 27 Jun 1996 13:00:29 -0700
Message-Id: <199606272000.NAA22977@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n060
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n060 --------------
001 - GorillaBlu@aol.com - Ba-bye...
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n060.1 ---------------
From: GorillaBlu@aol.com
Subject: Ba-bye...
Date: Wed, 26 Jun 1996 15:40:01 -0400
Sorry but could you please remove me from the list?
Thanks all...
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n060 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id NAA11591 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Mon, 1 Jul 1996 13:01:22 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id NAA01532; Mon, 1 Jul 1996 13:00:59 -0700
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 13:00:59 -0700
Message-Id: <199607012000.NAA01532@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n061
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n061 --------------
001 - Thaiphong Vo <thaivo@ea.o - Melanie Lyskey Page Up.. partially at least.
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n061.1 ---------------
From: Thaiphong Vo <thaivo@ea.oac.uci.edu>
Subject: Melanie Lyskey Page Up.. partially at least.
Date: Sun, 30 Jun 1996 12:15:02 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
the url is http://www.best.com/~thaivo
hope it's interesting to yah.. : )
-Thai
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n061 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id VAA04347 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Tue, 2 Jul 1996 21:00:49 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id VAA28415; Tue, 2 Jul 1996 21:00:36 -0700
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 21:00:36 -0700
Message-Id: <199607030400.VAA28415@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n062
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n062 --------------
001 - mailcall <mailcall@kiva.n - Re: E non ho amato mai tanto la vita!
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n062.1 ---------------
From: mailcall <mailcall@kiva.net>
Subject: Re: E non ho amato mai tanto la vita!
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 23:00:23 -0500 (EST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
tosca is a perfect opera for them. when i was their age, i loved it
too. it is a very borovnian story. it takes place during the
napoleonic wars, so right after the french revolution (antoinette).
the music is some of the most grandiose (or just plain ose) puccini
ever wrote, and the plot is simple but effective. it has court
intrigue, torture scenes, a villain you'll never forget, daring
escapes, transvestism, i could go on and on. it was perfect for them.
the very best version of "tosca" that was ever recorded is a
much-circulated bootleg tape featuring maria callas, franco (forget
about lanza!) corelli, and tito gobbi. the scenes between callas and
gobbi are bone-chilling. some of them were filmed and you can
occasionally see them on television if you're lucky. paul and julie
would not have heard any of this at the time. i hope they got to hear
it later.
tito gobbi was a venetian actor with a bizarre voice which didn't
sound at all operatic, and a magnetic stage presence even in his elder
years. his portrayal of baron scarpia still influences baritones and
basses who attempt the part today.
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n062 ---------------
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id SAA15760 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Mon, 8 Jul 1996 18:04:41 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id SAA03516; Mon, 8 Jul 1996 18:01:14 -0700
Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 18:01:14 -0700
Message-Id: <199607090101.SAA03516@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n063
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n063 --------------
001 - Bao Ly <lybao@earthlink.n - Association for Mormon Letters Roundtable re: Anne Perry
002 - Bao Ly <lybao@earthlink.n - Association for Mormon Letters Roundtable re: Anne Perry II
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n063.1 ---------------
From: Bao Ly <lybao@earthlink.net>
Subject: Association for Mormon Letters Roundtable re: Anne Perry
Date: Sun, 07 Jul 1996 17:23:20 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi everyone,
I have just recently stumbled across the Association for Mormon Letters
Roundtable (AML-List) and found some rather intriguing 'rumors' regarding
Anne Perry that I thought you might be interested in reading.. Their
website is located at http://cc.weber.edu/aml/
However, I will just post my findings here to save everyone some time from
having to dig through their log files for 1994-1995. What I basically
found was rumors of Anne Perry breaking surface in May 1995, two articles
that I wasn't aware existed, a citation of AML awards for Anne Perry_The
Sins of the Wolf, and a book review of 'A Sudden, Fearful Death.'
I will only post the 'rumors' and the separate article here, unless
somebody (-bryan?) want me to post the remainder..
There are also two new websites re: Heavenly Creatures as of late!
The Frighteners
http://frighteners.com
A Melanie Lynskey Worship Page
http://www.best.com/~thaivo
Come on everybody, lets go and give them our support!
- BEGIN -
Association for Mormon Letters Roundtable
(AML-List)
Archive for April 1996
376 messages
========================================
Date: 1-APR-1996 09:05:22.40
From: IN%"aml-list@cc.weber.edu"
Subject: Anne PERRY in Utah (Deseret News)
To: IN%"aml-list@cc.weber.edu"
-----------------------------------------------------------
Greatest mystery is one she won't reveal
-----------------------------------------------------------
By Susan Lyman-Whitney
Deseret News staff writer
If you kill someone and serve a prison sentence and pay your debt to
society, then society is supposed to let you have a fresh start. People
aren't supposed to keep on thinking about the murder.
But when that fresh start includes being a murder-mystery writer? Well.
Her readers can't be blamed for remembering that Anne Perry has firsthand
knowledge of murder. They can't blame themselves for being fascinated.
In 1994, a journalist revealed Perry's original name to be Juliet Hulme.
That was also the year of the movie ''Heavenly Creatures,'' the story of
how 15-year-old Juliet and her best friend, Pauline, came to murder
Pauline's mother some 30 years ago in New Zealand. They beat her head with
a brick.
Perry won't talk about her past. If she could give some tidy explanation
of how it felt to be a brilliant and fantasy-driven 15-year-old, perhaps
she would do so. But she doesn't. She doesn't chat about murder. She
writes it. We, her readers, are drawn in by her complexity, the complexity
of who she was then and who she is now.
And even before 1994, Perry's readers found themselves drawn in by her.
Her mysteries are set in Victorian England, and she creates the world in
exquisite detail. Then, too, her characters have always been mysterious.
On the surface, they lead placid and privileged lives. The reader can
never be sure what motivations and turmoil hide within, can never be sure
which of them has committed a violent crime. None seems more evil than the
others.
Perry comes to Utah this week on a book tour to promote her 22nd mystery
novel, a Book-of-the-Month Club main selection titled ''Pentecost Alley.''
She'll sign copies from noon to 1:30 p.m. Thursday, April 4, at the
Deseret Book in the ZCMI Center. She will also be at A Woman's Place in
Park City from 7-8:30 p.m. that evening.
Perry talked with the Deseret News from a hotel in California. She spoke
of her home and of the way she works. She spoke of evil, too. The evil her
characters commit.
Her imagination is vivid, says Anne Perry. She lives in bucolic rural
Scotland, in a lovely house with two acres of gardens and a view of the
sea. In her mind, however, she walks through drawing rooms and slums of
Victorian London -- seeing, smelling, hearing, living. She says, ''How can
I expect
to take you there if I'm not there?''
Perry has never married and lives alone, but near her mother and other
good friends. She works hard. She writes six days a week from 9 a.m. to 5
p.m. Sometimes after dinner she returns to her writing. On Sunday, she
rests, if teaching Primary can be said to be restful. (Perry joined the LDS
Church 20 years ago.)
She works so hard, she says, because she wants time for writing something
besides mysteries, and she is committed to producing two mysteries a year.
In a short press-release biography, Perry explains her other writing: ''I
am writing an epic fantasy which I began when my agent said to me that I
had a better book in me than I had so far written, because I always held
something back, 'pulled my punches.' She told me to do something entirely
for myself, regardless of whether I thought it would sell or not. I thought
for a long time as to what kind of story I wanted -- war story, mystery or
love story. . . . .''
Thus the reader, who would be fascinated by Anne Perry's autobiography,
learns that even when she's trying to not hold anything back, Perry still
finds herself writing fiction.
Perry writes, annually, one mystery in the Charlotte and Inspector Pitt
series and one featuring William Monk, a detective who can only partially
remember his own dark past. Monk allows Perry to ''raise questions about
responsibility, particularly that of a person for acts he cannot
remember.''
Charlotte and Thomas Pitt allow Perry to write about loyalty, devotion and
love, a restrained sort of love. They met in the first book of the series
and married, and in successive books are raising children. They have their
ups and downs, says Perry, but they will never separate. ''There is enough
angst going on everywhere else. I am tired of reading about people who
cannot form happy relationships.''
Her topics come from modern life. She ''transmutes'' them back in time.
Perry watches television, reads the papers. She hears of a murder,
something with a basis in child abuse or incest or some other social ill,
Perry finds herself fascinated.
She says, ''You just hear about this crime and you know there has to be
more to it. You want to know what happened before and you want to know
what happened after.''
Yes. Precisely. Anne Perry's readers can understand that feeling of
compelling curiosity.
Published 31 March, c. 1996 Deseret News Publishing Co.
[used with permission]
========================================
- END -
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n063.2 ---------------
From: Bao Ly <lybao@earthlink.net>
Subject: Association for Mormon Letters Roundtable re: Anne Perry II
Date: Sun, 07 Jul 1996 17:40:11 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------684338DC2E2A"
This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
--------------684338DC2E2A
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Beware!! This may work differently than what I intend it to do..
--------------684338DC2E2A
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; name="AML-Rumors.txt"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: inline; filename="AML-Rumors.txt"
Association for Mormon Letters Roundtable
(AML-List)
1995 Subject Table of Contents
-------------
May 1995
183 Messages
snip! (1-89)
90 Mon May 15 09:15 Rumors
91 Mon May 15 10:02 Re: Rumors (ANNE PERRY)
92 Mon May 15 10:20 Re: Rumors (Anne Perry)
93 Mon May 15 12:22 Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
94 Mon May 15 12:24 Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
95 Mon May 15 12:59 Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
96 Mon May 15 13:26 Forwarded Message
97 Mon May 15 13:27 Re: Rumors (PERRY, EDDINGS)
98 Mon May 15 13:30 LDS MYSTERY WRITERS (TOURNEY)
99 Mon May 15 14:55 Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
101 Mon May 15 15:06 Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
102 Mon May 15 22:05 Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
105 Tue May 16 09:00 PERRY & EDDINGS on the Web
112 Wed May 17 12:33 Re: Rumors
118 Wed May 17 17:17 Re: Rumors, Diaries
119 Wed May 17 17:56 Re: PERRY, LIFE WRITING
120 Wed May 17 21:11 Re: PERRY
121 Wed May 17 21:17 PERRY in SL Tribune
snip! (122-183)
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 09:15 MDT 1995
From: BENSON PARKINSON <BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu>
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Rumors
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 09:08:28 -0700 (MST)
Can someone help me track down these rumors:
I heard a prominent British mystery writer was interviewed on NPR
a little while ago. This is the same writer who as an adolescent
helped her friend murder her mother, as portrayed in a recent
move. (This is one of the disadvantages of working at home.
I've thrown out all the reviews I've read and can't easily get to
the library to look up the names and titles). In any case, she
indicated she had converted to Mormonism as an adult. Can anyone
verify this and fill in the gaps?
Also, a couple of young sf/fantasy fans in my ward told me they
had seen a lot of Book of Mormon parallels in David Eddings
_Belgariad_ cycle, and in a similar cycle by a different author.
Can anyone shed any light on this?
Benson Parkinson
Moderator, AML-List
BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
Ogden, Utah, USA
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 10:02 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: Rumors (ANNE PERRY)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 09:53:40 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"dcombe@rain.org" "Dave Combe" 15-MAY-1995 09:46:58.71
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC: IN%"AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu" "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List"
Subj: RE: Rumors
The "British" mystery writer is Anne Perry, who under her previous name, as
a teenager supposedly helped another teen murder the other girls mother.
She is actually from New Zealand, that is where the murder occured. My
recollection now is that at the time of the death, Anne Perry was on a
medication for a mental illness; this is my current recollection of the
news article describing this case. Later emigrated to England, where she
joined the church, I understand that she currently lives in No. California.
This has been discussed on other LDS related lists, but I am sure I have
saved none of these posts. This was covered in an article in the
NYTimes, and ads for the film made of this case, at least in the LA
papers, made much of the fact that Sister Perry had not seen the film and
the ads stated that one ticket for each showing would not be sold so she
could come and see it for free. The name of the film is escaping me at
the moment, but it received at least one Academy Award nomination in a
writing category this past April. It did not win.
Ann Perry writes two series of mysteries, both set in Victorian England,
In one series, the policeman is recovering
from amnesia and is trying to learn more about himself as he continues
working on the cases. I like this series better then the other one,but
for some reason the names of the detectives and the film are escaping me
right now.
Dave Combe
dcombe@rain.org
On Mon, 15 May 1995, BENSON PARKINSON wrote:
> Can someone help me track down these rumors:
>
> I heard a prominent British mystery writer was interviewed on NPR
> a little while ago. This is the same writer who as an adolescent
> helped her friend murder her mother, as portrayed in a recent
> move. (This is one of the disadvantages of working at home.
> I've thrown out all the reviews I've read and can't easily get to
> the library to look up the names and titles). In any case, she
> indicated she had converted to Mormonism as an adult. Can anyone
> verify this and fill in the gaps?
>
> Also, a couple of young sf/fantasy fans in my ward told me they
> had seen a lot of Book of Mormon parallels in David Eddings
> _Belgariad_ cycle, and in a similar cycle by a different author.
> Can anyone shed any light on this?
>
> Benson Parkinson
> Moderator, AML-List
> BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
> Ogden, Utah, USA
>
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 10:20 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: Rumors (Anne Perry)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 10:09:09 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"kevinc@lks.csi.com" "Kevin Christensen" 15-MAY-1995 09:58:45.37
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC: IN%"kevinc@lks.csi.com"
Subj: RE: Rumors
>I heard a prominent British mystery writer was interviewed on NPR
>a little while ago. This is the same writer who as an adolescent
>helped her friend murder her mother, as portrayed in a recent
>movie.
The file is called "Heavenly Creatures." The writer is Anne Perry, psuedonym
for Juliet Hulme. I chanced to see her interviewed by Barbara Walters on
20/20. She is a thoroughly captivating individual, coming across to me as
unpretentious and sympathetic, in stark contrast to the rather tacky woman who
decided to tell the tabloid press where she was and what she was doing. The
crime took place in New Zealand in 1954. Quoting from the San Francisco
Chronicle, Monday, Nov 21, 1994:
-According to Perry, Pauline was suicidal, "I sincerely believed that her life
was in the balance. Crazy as it sounds, I thought it was one life or the
other. I just couldn't face the thought of being responsible for her dying."
There were extenuating circumstances. "Because of this chest ailment," Perry
said, "I had been treated with drugs that have since been withdrawn because
they tend to warp judgement. And though the normal course of treatment was
three months, I had them for nine."
End quote.
She served 5 and 1/2 years in prison, a lot of it in solitary. After being
released, she moved to Scotland. Before being baptized as Mormon, she told
the local leaders about her history. She reports that everyone in her
community has been supportive since the story broke. She lives quietly with
her mother, and writes mysteries set in turn-of-the-century London.
--Kevin Christensen
Technical Writer
Lawrence, KS
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 12:22 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 12:17:03 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"sburton@unr.edu" "Stacy Burton" 15-MAY-1995 12:01:37.27
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: PERRY (was Rumors)
> I heard a prominent British mystery writer was interviewed on NPR
> a little while ago. This is the same writer who as an adolescent
> helped her friend murder her mother, as portrayed in a recent
> move. (This is one of the disadvantages of working at home.
> I've thrown out all the reviews I've read and can't easily get to
> the library to look up the names and titles). In any case, she
> indicated she had converted to Mormonism as an adult. Can anyone
> verify this and fill in the gaps?
Her name is Anne Perry. There was a long article about her in the NY
Times last fall and another by Peggy Fletcher Stack in the SL Tribune on
April 22nd.
Stacy Burton
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 12:24 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 12:17:29 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"sburton@unr.edu" "Stacy Burton" 15-MAY-1995 12:01:36.79
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: PERRY (was Rumors)
Here's the text of the NY Times article last fall. The SL Tribune article
last month dealt more with Perry's Mormonism. Perry is British; she lived
in New Zealand as an adolescent and in the United States in the later
1960s, where she joined the LDS Church in California.
Stacy Burton
____
The New York Times, Wednesday, August 17, 1994
BOOK NOTES
Uncovering A Mystery Writer's Hidden Past
by SARAH LYALL
For years Anne Perry hs been a prolific and very succesful author of
exqusitely detailed mystery novels set in Victorian England. She is
a familiar figure to readers and booksellser here as well as in her
native Britain, so much so that three million copies of her 19 novels
are in print in the United States alone.
That is why it comes as such a shock to those who know here and those
who read her that Miss Perry, who is 55 and lives with her mother in the
tiny Scottish village of Portmahomack, has a hidden past as startling
as anything in the most melodramatic mystery story. Forty years ago,
sent to New Zealand to recover from an illness. Just 15, she served five
and a half years in prison before changing her name and beginning a new
life.
For all these years, only her family and most immediate circle have known
MIss Perry's secret. But it all surfaced recently when a forthcoming
film about the infamous incident--in which Miss Perry helped a friend
kill the friend's mother--caused journalists in New Zealand to track her
down. The news about Miss Perry has been seeping out, with articles in
New Zealand and Britain, but isn't widely known in the United States.
Miss Perry's 20th book, "The Sins of the Wolf," which deals with a young
nurse imprisoned for a crime she did not commit, is due to be published
by Fawcett Columbine in September and the publisher has been positioning
it as a big book that might put Miss Perry on national best-seller lists
for the first time. Through her publisher and agent, the author
turned down requests for an interview.
But she told a London newspaper last week that the murder took place when
she was suffering from a severe chest ailment and her lone friend, a
desperately unhappy teenager named Pauline, was threatening to commit
suicide. So Miss Perry--who said she had been taking medication that
has since been withdrawn from circulation because it impairs judgment--
helped Pauline kill her mother by hitting the woman on the head with a
rock. "I've completely blocked it out," Miss Perry told The Daily
Telegraph. "All I can say is that it was violent, and quick."
About her friend Pauline, she said: "I sincerely believed that her
life was in the balance. Crazy as this sound, I thought it
was one life or the other. I just couldn't face the thought of
being responsible for her dying. And I made a very foolish choice."
Miss Perry has done plenty of atoning over the years, living quietly
and becoming involved in the Mormon church. Her literary agent in
Loondon, Meg Davis, who first heard the story from a reporter in
New Zealand, said Miss Perry had always feared that her past would
overtake her.
"She wanted to put it behind her and make something of her life,"
Miss Davis said. "She's got a very strong ethical sense and she
was very worried, because obviously this is something that makes
you instantly judge a person. She's really had to take her courage
into her hands and go into the local shops and tell them, because
where she lives, everybody knows everybody else."
Miss Perry has been surprised, Miss Davis said, by the support she
has received from colleagues and neighbors. And the author said
in the interview that her faith had helped her make peace with what
she did. "I think all Christian faiths will say that if you
have paid the price and truly repented," she said, "there is for-
giveness."
___
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 12:59 MDT 1995
From: BENSON PARKINSON <BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu>
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 12:48:54 -0700 (MST)
Stacy Burton answered my querry:
| Her name is Anne Perry. There was a long article about her in the NY
| Times last fall and another by Peggy Fletcher Stack in the SL Tribune on
| April 22nd.
You typed out the NY Times article for us. I wonder if you (or
someone else) saved the Tribune review?
(Just to be sure, I called the Tribune. We can reprint their
reviews in full as long as we say where they came from.)
Benson Parkinson
Moderator, AML-List
BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
Ogden, Utah, USA
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 13:26 MDT 1995
From: BENSON PARKINSON <BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu>
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Forwarded Message
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 13:09:19 -0700 (MST)
I am forwarding a message from Joyce Beazer, which I believe she intended
for the list, though it is addressed to me personally.
Benson Parkinson
Moderator, AML-List
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 13:27 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: Rumors (PERRY, EDDINGS)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 13:10:27 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"beazer_j@lib.dixie.edu" "Joyce Beazer" 15-MAY-1995 13:02:22.50
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: Rumors
Benson, The author's name is Anne Perry. She is a very! popular mystery
writer. She was written up in Christian Science Monitor and the New York
Times....sometime in January/February. I clipped the CSM review and
probably the NYT but have since pitched them. She joined the Church when
she lived in California [I think] but am not sure she is active now.
Yes, my friends who read David Eddings claim he is a Mormon. At least,
his writings reflect Mormonism. There is a female writer who name slips
me at the moment who is cataloged both in fiction and mormon
fiction...When I go to work there tonight, I shall try and recall the
name, I think I remember where her books are located.
Joyce Beazer
Val Browning Library
Dixie College
On Mon, 15 May 1995, BENSON PARKINSON wrote:
> Can someone help me track down these rumors:
>
> I heard a prominent British mystery writer was interviewed on NPR
> a little while ago. This is the same writer who as an adolescent
> helped her friend murder her mother, as portrayed in a recent
> move. (This is one of the disadvantages of working at home.
> I've thrown out all the reviews I've read and can't easily get to
> the library to look up the names and titles). In any case, she
> indicated she had converted to Mormonism as an adult. Can anyone
> verify this and fill in the gaps?
>
> Also, a couple of young sf/fantasy fans in my ward told me they
> had seen a lot of Book of Mormon parallels in David Eddings
> _Belgariad_ cycle, and in a similar cycle by a different author.
> Can anyone shed any light on this?
>
> Benson Parkinson
> Moderator, AML-List
> BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
> Ogden, Utah, USA
>
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 13:30 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: LDS MYSTERY WRITERS (TOURNEY)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 13:12:46 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"austin@humanitas.ucsb.edu" "Michael Austin" 15-MAY-1995 13:09:05.67
To: IN%"byparkinson@cc.weber.edu" "AML-LIST"
CC:
Subj: LDS MYSTERY WRITERS
The discussion of Anne Perry has been quite interesting and has reminded
me of a question I was going to pose to the list about another LDS
mystery writer. One of my friends and colleagues here at UCSB is Leonard
Tourney, an English professor who also writes excellent mysteries on the
side. All of the mysteries are set in late-Elizabethian/Early-Stuart
England and deal with the adventuress of a part-time constable (Matthew
Stock) and his wife (Joan Stock) who solve murders. The titles include:
_The Player's Boy is Dead_, _Familiar Spirits_, _Low Treason_, _The
Bartholemew Fair Murders_, _Old Saxon Blood_, _Witness of Bones_, and
_Frobisher's Savage._ All, I believe, are published in hard abck by St.
Martins Press and in Paperback by Ballantine.
>From what I have seen, the books have been well-reviewed by critics.
However, I have never seen anything that discusses Leonard's religion. He
is an active Latter-day Saint and a member of the Santa Barbara Stake High
Council. I'm just curious as to whether or not anyone else has ever heard
of Leonard's books (in an LDS context or otherwise). I have read most of
them, and I think that they are great--but, because of the situation, I
am somewhat biased.
Regards,
Mike
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 14:55 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 14:47:14 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"sburton@unr.edu" "Stacy Burton" 15-MAY-1995 14:07:15.15
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: PERRY (was Rumors)
> You typed out the NY Times article for us. I wonder if you (or
> someone else) saved the Tribune review?
The NY Times piece I had an electronic copy of from last year. I do have
the Tribune article (happened to be in Utah for a narrative conference the
weekend it was published). It is fairly long, and I am swamped with
finals and seminar papers to grade. At the end of the week, if someone
who has access to a scanner hasn't sent it to the list, I'll make time to
type it in.
Stacy Burton
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 15:06 MDT 1995
From: BENSON PARKINSON <BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu>
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 14:58:47 -0700 (MST)
Stacy Burton wrote:
| The NY Times piece I had an electronic copy of from last year. I do have
| the Tribune article (happened to be in Utah for a narrative conference the
| weekend it was published). It is fairly long, and I am swamped with
| finals and seminar papers to grade. At the end of the week, if someone
| who has access to a scanner hasn't sent it to the list, I'll make time to
| type it in.
It may be Stack's article on Anne Perry is available over
Utah Online, the Salt Lake Tribune's electronic service. This is
available free I believe to all Salt Lake area Tribune subscribers.
Do we have anyone out there who subscribes (or who could)?
Benson Parkinson
Moderator, AML-List
BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
Ogden, Utah, USA
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Mon May 15 22:05 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY (was Rumors)
Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 21:58:59 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"jmaxwell@thelair.zynet.com" "Jim Maxwell" 15-MAY-1995 21:50:46.64
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: Rumors
If you want a good insight into the whole controversey rent the movie
_Heavenly Creatures_. The film is the story of the murder. I know that
the author in question moved to New Zealand and hopeful anonimity after
the murder. I believe it was there that she converted. Seh had her
snonimity until a reprter from one of the British tabloids started to
research the story behind the film and stumbeled accross the author. I
also know that her community has backed her 100% since the story broke.
=============================================================================
Jim
jmaxwell@thelair.zynet.com
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Tue May 16 09:00 MDT 1995
From: BENSON PARKINSON <BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu>
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: PERRY & EDDINGS on the Web
Date: Tue, 16 May 1995 08:52:17 -0700 (MST)
AML-Listers,
I found a WWW page with an interview of Anne Perry by David
Lyman. It's a subpage on a page called Cinecism, which I think
is an online film magazine, perhaps with ties to a Seattle film
festival. (I came into the middle through a search engine, which
often makes orienting yourself difficult.)
It refers to her as a devout Mormon, speaks of her distress
at having her past dragged out and at being hounded by the media,
and (surprise) actually treats her novels.
The URL is:
http://www.film.com/film/news/
or to go there directly:
http://www.film.com/film/interviews/perry.lyman.html
I also located a David Eddings home page at:
http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/rshah/eddings.html
This contains biographical note and bibliography. No mention of
Mormonism.
While you're at it, check out Gideon Burton's Mormon
Literature page:
http://humanities.byu.edu/MLDB/mlithome.htm
(If all this is Greek to you, get someone to introduce you to
Netscape, Mosaic, Lynx, or another Web browser. Many or most of
you will have one on your networks. I can provide background if
required.)
Benson Parkinson
Moderator, AML-List
BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
Ogden, Utah, USA
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Wed May 17 12:33 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: Rumors
Date: Wed, 17 May 1995 12:20:39 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"geb@dsl.pitt.edu" "Gordon Banks" 17-MAY-1995 11:27:02.96
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: Rumors
On Mon, 15 May 1995, BENSON PARKINSON wrote:
> Can someone help me track down these rumors:
>
> I heard a prominent British mystery writer was interviewed on NPR
> a little while ago. This is the same writer who as an adolescent
> helped her friend murder her mother, as portrayed in a recent
> move. (This is one of the disadvantages of working at home.
> I've thrown out all the reviews I've read and can't easily get to
> the library to look up the names and titles). In any case, she
> indicated she had converted to Mormonism as an adult. Can anyone
> verify this and fill in the gaps?
>
Yes, she's quite famous, but I forgot her name, not being a mystery fan.
They apparently are making a movie out of her story (without her permission).
> Also, a couple of young sf/fantasy fans in my ward told me they
> had seen a lot of Book of Mormon parallels in David Eddings
> _Belgariad_ cycle, and in a similar cycle by a different author.
> Can anyone shed any light on this?
I didn't notice that in Eddings, but obviously, you know about Scott Card
and his latest series which is essentially a SF re-write of the BoM.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gordon Banks N3JXP |"Reality must take precedence over public relations,
geb@cadre.dsl.pitt.edu | for nature cannot be fooled." --Richard Feynman
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Wed May 17 17:17 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: Rumors, Diaries
Date: Wed, 17 May 1995 17:07:45 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"BEECHERM@acd1.byu.edu" 17-MAY-1995 16:55:30.57
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: Rumors
New Zealand born Anne Parry (Perry?) is the writer in question, and
the movie has already appeared. Sorry I can't recall its title, but
it played in SLC recently--my kids would know.
We met Anne in England in 1987 when she attended the Mormon History
Association meetings at Oxford. She was then a recent (?) convert,
and her contact there brought her to Utah--all this before her story
came out. Ida Smith at the BYU Alumnae office would know her current
whereabouts.
Maureen Beecher
P.S. I'm pleased to be part of the exchange, but overwhelmed with the
volume to date. I'd like to see some talk of life writing--diaries,
letters, autobiographies--become part of the dialogue. I'll put
together a post sometime, but it would be helpful to have some
background of what you may already have considered.
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Wed May 17 17:56 MDT 1995
From: BENSON PARKINSON <BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu>
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY, LIFE WRITING
Date: Wed, 17 May 1995 17:45:51 -0700 (MST)
Maureen Beecher wrote:
| New Zealand born Anne Parry (Perry?) is the writer in question, and
| the movie has already appeared. Sorry I can't recall its title, but
Several have written in with information on Anne Perry (nee
Juliet Hulme) and the film _Heavenly Creatures_. Our
correspondents disagree on whether she was born in New Zealand or
emmigrated there from Britain, and whether she presently lives in
Scotland or California.
We've been promised a copy of an interview by Peggy Stack that
ran April 22nd in the Salt Lake Tribune that we've been told
deals with her Mormonism.
I'd personally like to see a bit more on her books (I've enjoyed
what info we've had), our correspondant's reactions to them,
whether they contain references to Mormonism or gospel themes,
etc.
| P.S. I'm pleased to be part of the exchange, but overwhelmed with the
Glad to have you here.
| volume to date. I'd like to see some talk of life writing--diaries,
| letters, autobiographies--become part of the dialogue. I'll put
| together a post sometime, but it would be helpful to have some
| background of what you may already have considered.
Please do. There has been some discussion on genres, including
life writing, along the lines of whether or not it forms part of
"Mormon Literature." I believe all correspondents (and the
moderator) agree that it does.
The archive is available from me if you wish to go through it.
It's large (400K) with 118 messages to date.
Benson Parkinson
Moderator, AML-List
BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu
Ogden, Utah, USA
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Wed May 17 21:11 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: Re: PERRY
Date: Wed, 17 May 1995 20:59:44 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"sburton@unr.edu" "Stacy Burton" 17-MAY-1995 19:32:47.37
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: RE: PERRY, LIFE WRITING
> correspondents disagree on whether she was born in New Zealand or
> emmigrated there from Britain, and whether she presently lives in
> Scotland or California.
The articles published about Perry in the last year in the NY Times, the
SL Tribune, _People_, and so on consistently say that she is English, that
she lived in New Zealand as an adolescent, and that she presently lives
in Scotland.
> I'd personally like to see a bit more on her books (I've enjoyed
> what info we've had), our correspondant's reactions to them,
> whether they contain references to Mormonism or gospel themes,
> etc.
There are two series, one with Thomas and Charlotte Pitt, another with
William Monk, both set in Victorian England. I've read a few of the first
series, set in the 1880s, and none of the second, apparently set in the
1860s. One of the novels in the first series deals, eventually, with a
character who has connections to a socially-suspect American religious
group not unlike the Mormons.
Stacy Burton
========================================
>From BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu Wed May 17 21:17 MDT 1995
To: "Association for Mormon Letters Discussion List" <AML-LIST@chp.weber.edu>
Subject: PERRY in SL Tribune
Date: Wed, 17 May 1995 21:06:02 -0700 (MST)
From: IN%"sburton@unr.edu" "Stacy Burton" 17-MAY-1995 20:28:58.16
To: IN%"BYPARKINSON@cc.weber.edu" "BENSON PARKINSON"
CC:
Subj: Perry in SL Tribune
The Salt Lake Tribune
22 April 1995
pp. D1, D4
Through the Past Darkly: Mormon Writer Was Convicted of Murder at 15
By Peggy Fletcher Stack
Characters in Anne Perry's mystery novels all inhabit the restricted
world of Victorian England. In her own life as a Mormon, Perry has chosen a
faith with clear-cut ideas about God and humanity.
But there are times, she says, when a good writer who would be great must
go beyond the safety of known territory.
"You have to make a deeper and deeper journey into yourself," Perry, 55,
said this week in a telephone interview from her home in Scotland. "If you
are going to dredge up something of yourself, it is hard work."
Perry knows firsthand the agony of self-discovery.
She always wanted to be a writer. As a child in England she was
hospitalized repeatedly for lung ailments and passed the time inventing
stories.
She was 41 when her first mystery was published, and since then Perry has
worked at a furious pace, often producing two novels a year. With 20 titles
and 3 million books in print in the United States alone, Perry has finally
achieved commercial success.
Last summer, when the future looked nothing but rosy, Perry was hit with
a bombshell.
The international press got wind that 40 years earlier in New Zealand,
Perry--born Juliet Hulme--was convicted of murder for helping to kill the
mother of a friend.
Since she was only 15 at the time, Perry served just 5 1/2 years in
prison.
The crime is the subject of a film, "Heavenly Creatures," playing in Salt
Lake City. Perry has not seen the film and has no plans to do so, objecting
to its depictions of her and her friend.
After prison, Perry changed her name and rejoined her mother and
stepfather in England. She kept busy in mostly clerical jobs in sales and
fashion and worked as a flight attendant and insurance underwriter.
Her search for a career led her to Southern California, where she lived
for five years. It was there, 27 years ago today, that she joined The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
"I was raised agnostic," Perry said, respecting most religions but
belonging to none.
But in California, an LDS neighbor "seemed to have something special."
She began to learn more about the Mormon faith. Though she struggled
initially with some of its precepts, her friend urged her "not to work it
through in your brain, just get down on your knees and pray."
She took the advice. The next morning, she recalled, "I knew I had the
answer."
After deciding to join the church, Perry told LDS authorities about the
murder. Though Perry didn't mention it, her baptism was probably approved by
the church's governing First Presidency because church policy requires such
approval before a convicted murderer can be baptized.
Perry said that among other doctrines, the Mormon notions of freedom and
sin appealed to her.
"Sin has got to be having a choice and deliberately taking the wrong
one," she said. "You sin when you turn your back on the light. You can't sin
without the light to know the difference."
Jesus Christ's resurrection was not only about the body, Perry said, but
"the cosmic regeneration of the whole Earth."
"Every day we can make a new start," Perry said.
In the late 1980s, Perry received an "apostolic blessing" from Elder
Russell Nelson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.
"It was about my writing and what I can accomplish," she said. Though
she declined to share details of the ritual because she considers it private
and sacred, she said "it has provided the complete direction for my life and
everything I do."
Like most active Mormons, Perry quickly became immersed in the church's
communal life. Members of a congregation staff all the leadership positions
in a local unit. Perry held positions in the Relief Society for adult women,
in Young Women, in Primary for children under 12, and in Sunday School. She
even served as a spokeswoman briefly.
"As a novelist, one of the best schooling grounds is a church calling,"
she said. "What a great thing it was for me as a writer to be a Relief
Society president. I got to know people well and care about them."
Though her books are set in Victorian England, Perry has drawn on her
Mormon experiences to create real and memorable characters. She also has used
her faith to explore social issues such as spouse abuse, abortion, anti-
Semitism, child abuse, slum profiteering and child prostitution.
Her books also examine psychological issues such as loyalty, identity and
guilt.
But for the past several years, Perry has taken a new tack. She is
working on a fantasy novel.
At first, she felt herself holding back, censoring the "inner passion"--
fearing her fellow Mormons might not accept her work.
"I wish to obey, I have no desire to rebel, for to do so would be to
imagine I know better than God what is good for me, or for others," Perry said
in a 1988 speech. "I have had too many contrary experiences now to suffer
that illusion any more."
Still, Perry knew that to be an artist, not an artisan, a person must
"let go of the safety of known territory, that which is orthodox, already
charted and pronounced safe, and strike off to explore a new region."
And so she has continued working on the fantasy, now planned for three
volumes, which will explore Mormon themes of freedom and personal
responsibility.
"It answers the question of who I am," she said.
In the last eight months since the news about her past became public
knowledge, Perry has been forced to "dig down into my gut."
"It has made me ask questions I haven't asked before, or go into parts of
myself I haven't explored," she said.
Her faith has also deepened.
"So often we trust in God with one foot on the ground," Perry said. "But
when you are shoved into a whirlpool, you learn a different kind of trust."
She said she never wanted her past to be revealed in such a public way
but maybe her story will help others.
"Let's remember that God's in charge," she said.
----
Two photos: one of Perry's books, the other of Perry. The first is captioned,
"Anne Perry, who lives in Scotland, has published 20 titles and has more than
3 million books in print in the United States alone. Her mysteries often
explore sin and redemption, something she is familiar with." The second is
captioned, "Anne Perry was 41 when she published her first mystery novel."
----
========================================
- END -
--------------684338DC2E2A--
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n063 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com Wed Jul 10 01:02:48 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id BAA11734 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Wed, 10 Jul 1996 01:02:43 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id AAA06317; Wed, 10 Jul 1996 00:00:28 -0700
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 1996 00:00:28 -0700
Message-Id: <199607100700.AAA06317@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n064
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n064 --------------
001 - kate ann jacobson <kjac@u - Re: Letters on Anne Perry
002 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - The Frighteners (fwd)
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n064.1 ---------------
From: kate ann jacobson <kjac@unm.edu>
Subject: Re: Letters on Anne Perry
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 00:53:40 -0600 (MDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
That was fascinating, thanks Bao! She seems so honest and articulate,
I would love to hear her review of HC someday (even negative), or her
side of this story told with the same openness she talks about God.
But I did get to meet her actually, a few months ago at a talk and book
signing. Here are a few things she said:
** when asked what inspired her to make Charlotte Pitt such a
free-thinking woman, she said all women had, but mostly it
was her mother, Hilda!
** describes her brother Jonathan as someone who's had most of his
good ideas put into his head by women, but would never admit it
** said the inspiration for the eccentric "Aunt Vespasia" character
in the Pitt novels was her Auntie Ina from South Africa
** when some cheesehead in the audience asked her if she'd ever been
to a real trial, she paused a moment and said,"I don't usually sit
in on court procedure, but tape it from the television."
** lives in the same house with her secretary (didn't elaborate on
whether anything romantic)
** when speaking of Bill Perry, twice she said, "My father - I mean
stepfather....."
** made a lot of comments about her age, like, "My age is a number
and it's unlisted," "I've been 45 for a few years," "Aunt
Vespasia hasn't aged a day in 15 years and neither will I."
** quoted Hilda's favorite expression, which is "You can do a lot
more with honey than with vinegar" (in influencing people)
** when the back cover of someone's book, with her picture on it, was
facing her from the front row, she said, "Oh, could you turn
that over, please. I hate looking at pictures of myself!" and
made a face that looked just like Kate Winslet "taking her seat"
in the Windsors scene.
Can't wait for the fantasy trilogy!
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n064.2 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: The Frighteners (fwd)
Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 00:24:03 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 1061
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Forwarded message:
> From lelak@sydney.healey.com.au Mon Jul 8 22:58:23 1996
> Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 15:59:48 +1000 (GMT+1000)
> From: Lela Kaunitz <lelak@sydney.healey.com.au>
> To: bryanw@666.org
> Subject: The Frighteners
> Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.3.93.960709155702.7300A-100000@sydney.healey.com.au>
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>
>
> in all the hoo-ha about there being characters in the frighteners called
> "lynskey", did anyone happen to mention sheriff Walt Perry as well?
>
> "Please... call me Bill."
>
> Lela
>
> ps. bryan, can you pls fwd above to the list? i think it's that i'm using
> pine, where i subscribed via eudora...
> did this letter arrive from sydney.healey.com.au or just healey.com.au?
>
> - L
>
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel, bryan woodworth
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryanw@borovnia.666.org
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 PGP Public Key obtainable
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/ via finger: bryanw@best.com
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n064 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com Thu Jul 11 04:06:41 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id EAA01135 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Thu, 11 Jul 1996 04:06:36 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id EAA18954; Thu, 11 Jul 1996 04:00:59 -0700
Date: Thu, 11 Jul 1996 04:00:59 -0700
Message-Id: <199607111100.EAA18954@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n065
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n065 --------------
001 - Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@6 - Announcements -- dear readers
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n065.1 ---------------
From: Bryan Woodworth <bryanw@666.org>
Subject: Announcements -- dear readers
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 1996 03:49:15 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Length: 2000
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hello!
WEEKLY VIDEO CLIPS
Don't forget, even though I do not always update the NEWSTUFF, there is a
weekly MPEG clip!
This week it is the opening from the HC film, with the "It's mummy! She's
terribly hurt!" line.
Lamentably, no sound. (I can rectify this if someone wants to donate a
grabber for video AND sound..) :-)
P.S. -- SPECIAL TIP FOR 'HC' MAILING LIST SUBSCRIBERS!!! You may
access old MPEGs via this URL
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/heavenlyclip/alt/
Shh!! top secret!!! :-)
LIFE
I'm very sorry that I haven't updated HeavenlyWeb lately. I've been busy
living life! Sorry to be so lame about not updating the site. I hope to
be able to keep the site interesting over the coming months. Thanks to
all for their support!
THE MAILING LIST
I have no worries whatsoever about the list! While the list has been
low in traffic lately, that is ok. I'm sure it will pick up as ideas and
insights warrant.
MELANIE LYNSKEY WISH LIST
I have 5 requests of Melanie Lynskey for '96:
1. Make another movie!
2. Make another movie!
3. Make another movie!
4. Make another movie!
5. Make another movie!
I am devastated to see that Melanie hasn't made another film yet. It's
such a waste, to see people like Juliette Lewis making lots of films,
when they seem not to have as much talent and intensity. Please, Melanie!
I hope you find the perfect script soon.
P.S. -- If any Juliette Lewis fans are insulted.. I'm not sorry! :-)
Just kidding. Perhaps I used a bad example. Ok, how about, Madonna in
films? "What a waste!" Or, "Soleil Moon Frye in films! What a waste!"
(Soleil was in "Punky Brewster," some lame sitcom that Americans will find
dreadfully familiar..)
Bye for now!
b
--
"'Tis indeed a miracle, one must feel, bryan woodworth
that two such heavenly creatures are real." bryanw@borovnia.666.org
-- "Heavenly Creatures," 1994 PGP Public Key obtainable
http://www.reflection.org/heavenly/ via finger: bryanw@best.com
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n065 ---------------
From heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com Sun Jul 14 09:01:00 1996
Received: from lists1.best.com (lists1.best.com [206.86.8.15]) by shellx.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) with ESMTP id JAA22913 for <bryanw@shellx.best.com>; Sun, 14 Jul 1996 09:00:59 -0700
From: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Received: (root@localhost) by lists1.best.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id JAA28153; Sun, 14 Jul 1996 09:00:45 -0700
Date: Sun, 14 Jul 1996 09:00:45 -0700
Message-Id: <199607141600.JAA28153@lists1.best.com>
Subject: Digest heavenly-c.v001.n066
BestServHost: lists.best.com
Sender: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Errors-To: heavenly-c-errors@lists.best.com
Reply-To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
To: heavenly-c@lists.best.com
Status: RO
-------------- BEGIN heavenly-c.v001.n066 --------------
001 - mailcall <mailcall@kiva.n - Re: Letters on Anne Perry
002 - mailcall <mailcall@kiva.n - Heavenly MUSH
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n066.1 ---------------
From: mailcall <mailcall@kiva.net>
Subject: Re: Letters on Anne Perry
Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 10:21:08 -0500 (EST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
: ** when the back cover of someone's book, with her picture on it,
: was facing her from the front row, she said, "Oh, could you turn
: that over, please. I hate looking at pictures of myself!" and
: made a face that looked just like Kate Winslet "taking her seat"
: in the Windsors scene.
you know what's funny? there is and has always been on every book by
anne, a picture of her along with the usual publishers' blurb. this
picture looks to me exactly, but *exactly*, like kate winslet's
reaction to "i think your drawing's fantastic!" if i had not known
that she was juliet before seeing this picture, i would have
recognized her instantly. "it's SO OBVIOUS!" apparently a lot of
people in the publishing world and elsewhere did know for many years,
it was almost an open secret.
**--==--** melanthe alexian **--==--**
--------------- MESSAGE heavenly-c.v001.n066.2 ---------------
From: mailcall <mailcall@kiva.net>
Subject: Heavenly MUSH
Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 10:27:54 -0500 (EST)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
i want to go on adding to the mush environment. i am doing borovnia
and port levy next. for port levy i need to know how far it was and
in which direction from ilam, and a description of what it is like and
how it is laid out. i will see st boffin today and maybe we'll work
on girls' high this evening. he will need floor plans to create it
exactly. please to let me know if there is anything special you want
to see in the mush.
also, i have been getting email from people having trouble connecting.
purple.cow.net 8888 has been going down a lot. the techs know it is
happening and are working on trying to fix it. if you cannot connect,
try later. they bring it back up as quickly as possible when it
crashes.
**--==--** on the good ship lollipop! **--==--**
**--==--** melanthe alexian **--==--**
--------------- END heavenly-c.v001.n066 ---------------