Beautiful Creatures [VHS] [2001]

The dark comedy stars Rachel Weisz (The Mummy, The Mummy Returns, Chain Reaction) and Susan Lynch (Waking Ned Devine) as two women trapped in bad relationships. The two meet by accident, when Dorothy (Lynch) stumbles across Petula (Weisz) being beaten by her boyfriend. As the boyfriend begins choking Petula, Dorothy realizes she must help her. Acting on instinct, Dorothy grabs a large pipe and whacks the man in the head. The two take the unconscious man back to Dorothy's apartment. There, the two introduce themselves. When the boyfriend wakes up, he falls from the bathtub (where Petula and Dorothy had placed him for the time being) he bangs his head. Now Petula and Dorothy have a dead body to deal with. Not just some man either. Petula's boyfriend is the younger brother of a very wealthy and very powerful man. Determined to shift the blame away from themselves, (accident or not) the two conceive a plan not only to get off scotch free, but to get some money in the process, demanding a ransom from the older brother. But problems only get worse for the two. When the ransom is stated, the two now have to dodge a sneaky detective fond of Petula, Dorothy's druggie boyfriend, a severed finger and a very scary older brother!

I found myself thoroughly entertained. Weisz is absolutely superb as Petula. Not quite the brightest crayon in the box, she adds a lot of comic relief. Her abilities are definitely NOT limited to mummy flicks.
Lynch is perfect as Dorothy. I had seen Waking Ned Devine, but had not heard much of Lynch sense, but she was great. She's believable in her acting and I thought no one could play Dorothy better.

The movie has feeling of "Thelma and Louis," minus the road trip. I found myself laughing through the movie, moved by Petula and Dorothy's self-struggles to stay with their boyfriends, and on the edge of my seat with a very thrilling and unpredictable plot. I would definitely recommend the movie to anyone who liked Pulp Fiction, or, of course, Thelma & Louis.

The premise really isn't something new. It's like "Thelma & Louise" without the road trip, funnier, and I liked it better. Dorothy and Petula date mean, nasty men. It seems all men in this film are mean and nasty. One night, while tryin to escape her boyfriend Tony, Dorothy happens on Petula who is being strangled by her boyfriend Brian. Nice fellah, eh? She saves her by whacking Brian with a pipe. They decide to let him sleep it off in Dorothy's bath tub. Brian falls and dies. The girls have to go through and try and do something to get the blame away from them. They cannot let anyone know that they killed him, even if it was an accident. Dorothy happens on the idea of faking a kidnap and ransom plot. Along the way some more nasty men come into the picture.

This is a funny film and what makes it so is the performances given by Weisz and her co-star Susan Lynch. Both are perfect for their roles and their scenes together are great. But so are the other scenes. Dorothy is the level headed, smart one and Lynch can play that very well, balancing that and Dorothy's fear. The scene where Tony comes back and confronts them is fantastic. Weisz has shown that she is a fine comedic actress and you have to do a double take when you see her as a blonde. She's shown us that she has a very wide range.

I don't know that I could recommend this to many people. All I can say is that I found it to be very funny and would gladly see it again.

Now Brian, who is well off, works for his brother Ronnie, who is even more well off, so the women concoct a scheme to make it appear as if Brian has been kidnapped, and extort a large sum of money from Ronnie, in hopes of using that money to make a better life far away. The scheme doesn't go as planned, as a crooked cop gets involved, along with Dorothy's boyfriend, to which they both develop plans of their own. Complications abound, as the women try to stay on top of things, but eventually just end up riding out forces beyond their control.

I thought the actor who played Ronnie was especially good, presenting a calm yet menacing character, someone you wouldn't want to upset. He presented a very controlled exterior, but underneath you knew he was a dangerous man capable of providing a great deal of pain to those who crossed him. His concern for his missing brother seemed genuine, but his motivation appeared more to punish those who would dare to mess with him or his family, and restore face to his family name. I missed if he was 'connected' somehow, like a mob or something, but it certainly had that feel. I would have liked to see him get more screen time, as he presented a very interesting character.

Both Weisz and Lynch played their parts well, appearing as sort of helpless women trapped in abusive relationships, who find the strength in each other, realizing that they don't have to be victims. Weisz looked a little off with her bleached hair, but when it was cut short, it looked much better. I still prefer her with dark hair, but she is still an amazingly attractive woman. Compared to Weisz, Lynch has a more understated beauty, a more earthy quality, but equally attractive.

As I said before, the pacing kind of fell off around the middle, and there were some holes in the plot, but it's a fun ride. As far as the ending, I was a little disappointed as I saw it coming. All the threads got tied up neatly, with no surprises. Not a lot of originality, but great photography, with the movie set and filmed in Glasgow, Scotland. I was happy to see a fresh, interesting venue, providing a little extra spice to a decent meal. Along with good photography, I thought the music used really helped create a proper mood for this movie. One thing I really enjoyed about the score was it wasn't intrusive, and fit the scenes very well.

The presentation is in wide screen, and is excellent, along with the audio. There are the basic extras consisting of a trailer, production notes, and bios. A solid movie, but I'd be hard pressed to recommend anyone go out of their way to see it, unless you've got a real thing for Rachel Weisz. (I admit, she was the main reason I bought this) And no, I didn't forget about the dog. Seems I won't be able to get out of this review without mention Pluto (that's the dog's name in the movie), so I will say, for a minor character providing a key element in a number of scenes, he did quite well. I would even go so far as to say his performance was 'finger lickin' good'. (If you see the movie, you'll know what I mean) Also, a number of reviews reference the movie Thelma and Louise in comparison to this movie, but I didn't, as I never saw it. There was so much attention and hype around that movie at the time it came out, I got turned off to it. Maybe someday....