If only the baddies had more awful endings in this, I would have smiled more broadly. That's my only complaint. My wife and I have very different tastes in movies-- she's into fantasy, I prefer realism, but occasionally we find a show which we enjoy equally. This is one. It's refreshingly different, and I find the suggestion that it's a Thelma & Louise wannabe quite ridiculous. So it's two women against everybody else...but by comparison, T & L was a quite forgettable movie for me. This one doesn't try to milk laughter out of its audience; indeed, it almost dares one to laugh, which makes it special and probably explains why it didn't do well at the box office. An imaginative little movie, far more entertaining than most of the stuff served up to us.
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milbankj14 January 2012
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rosscinema13 March 2003After watching this film I came away thinking that the filmmakers made this with a smirk on their faces. I know its done in tongue in cheek but this story seems to ramble and then aimlessly wander about, especially towards the end when I had grown tired of this messy story and the film wants to trick you and not end when you think it should. The actions of the two leads are inexcusable and the film uses the fact that they get knocked around to somehow give credence for they're actions. The best reason for watching this film are the two actress's that star. Susan Lynch and Rachel Weisz are engaging enough but its to bad that the material isn't better. Film plays like a second rate version of "Bound" but without the lesbianism. This is a script that really needed a rewrite. A little of everything seems to have been thrown in! Film really has no focus. Too bad, because they have two good actress's that probably could have done something with this material.
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scottkoue26 January 2003This film reminds me of Bound or Goodbye Lover but with an british ala Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels style. It was entertaining ,not great but good, with a fair number of twists. 3 1/2 stars out of five.
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fran172719 February 2001I felt like I had to leap to the defence of Beautiful Creatures' after what everyone had been saying about it. I made it my film of the month in my college magazine film pages. I loved it! I think that not only is it a great British film but a great film full stop. I know it only survived two weeks and was slated by the critics. I think perhaps lots of people were put off by the director's claims of it's dark humour and general shockingness whereas in reality (or unless I am unknowingly deeply psychologically disturbed) it wasn't all that bad. It does deserve it's certificate rating though, I wouldn't go that far.
I found it a welcome antidote to the recent deluge of lad's gangster/thriller flicks. It was fresh and much freer than any of those films. With good reason it has been compared to Thelma and Louise' but as far as I can see it has more in common with the Wachowski brothers' Bound'. Susan Lynch and Rachel Weisz were excellent. Their characters of Dorothy and Petula never came close to being your stereotypical man's-eye women. This reversal on the general way of gangster/thriller films was great stuff. The film was unapologetically British, the very British sense of humour was one of it's best points. Americans do not spare our feelings with their cruel characterisations of British people - why do our films have to America-friendly?
I think it's a shame no-one really gave a chance cos far as I'm concerned you've missed out on one of the warmest, funniest and most realistic films. -
lingmeister28 December 2002Beautiful Creatures is a British dark comedy about these two women who meet up with each other under undue circumstances and plotted a scheme so that they will come out ahead. It is somewhat funny, with most of the males in the film being their enemy standing in their way. Many of them are portrayed as seedy, opportunist or just plain lowlifes. The women eventually somehow overcomes them all. It is similar to Thelma & Louise, but our heroine are not so innocent themselves, and we have a happy ending.
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Beautiful Creatures is one of those British crime dramas. You know the ones I'm talking about. Snatch, Layer Cake, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, etc.. Movies that sill hold to the pretense that criminals are smart and sexy and fun to be around. I'm not entirely sure why British crime movies can still get away with that stuff, while American crime dramas seem to have become overwhelmed by the reality that almost all criminals are stupid, unattractive and massively screwed up. Maybe it's the accents.
Anyway, Beautiful Creatures tells the story of Petula (Rachel Weisz) and Dorothy (Susan Lynch), two women brought together by fate who try to navigate their way through murder, lies, betrayal and happenstance. The story starts with Dorothy getting her apartment trashed by her abusive boyfriend. She takes her dog Pluto out to grab a bus and Pluto runs away. Dorothy follows to find Petula getting beaten by her boyfriend. Dorothy clunks him in the head with a 15 foot long metal pipe and knocks him out. They take him back to Dorothy's apartment because Petula won't leave him in the street. But back in the apartment, the guy ends up dying.
It turns out, he was the little brother of Petula's boss, one of those tough as nails, criminal kingpins that populate British crime dramas. He owns a large business but everyone knows he's really a vicious killer and even the cops do him favors. Petula and Dorothy first try to dump the body and when that doesn't work out, they concoct a kidnapping scam to try and get enough money to get away from evil big brother. That brings in a detective inspector who wants a cut of the action and the return of Dorothy's abusive boyfriend, leading to one of those everybody-rushes-to-the-same-place-and-almost-everybody-ends-up-dead sort of endings.
Except for a strange, 5 minute stretch when it morphs into a stalker movie, Beautiful Creatures is a fine movie that sets itself above other British crime dramas in two ways.
1. No one's really that smart. These films usually involve people crafting brilliant, intricate plans that go wrong in complicated ways. This film involves people coming up with desperate plans by the seat of their pants that go wrong because they weren't that well thought out to begin with.
2. It lets its two female leads be normal woman. Female protagonists in crime dramas either start out or evolve into cunning, hard assed rogues who are just as tough and deceitful as any man, usually more so. But Weiz and Lynch are allowed to play characters who are physically weaker than men, who aren't as cruel and violent as the cops or the crooks around them. These are two women in horrible situations, who come together to help each other out and succeed as much by luck as anything else.
One of the other notable things about Beautiful Creatures is that it is probably the film where Rachel Weisz is the most attractive and sexy she's ever been and ever will be in a movie. She's also a platinum blonde, if that trips your trigger.
Though it's not as good a film, Beautiful Creatures could also be ranked alongside The Silence of the Lambs as one of the best, little-f feminist crime dramas that doesn't fall into the big-F Feminist trap of letting its take on sexual and gender politics overpower the story and turn it into "a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle" propaganda. -
The British have the reputation for being an eccentric race, and "Beautiful Creatures" is one of the eccentric oddities that the British film industry occasionally comes up with. The film, which is set in Glasgow, can best be described as an attempt to remake "Thelma and Louise" as a black comedy. A young woman named Dorothy comes to the defence of another young woman, Petula, who is being beaten up in the street by her abusive boyfriend, Brian. In the struggle Dorothy hits Brian over the head with a length of metal piping, which leads to his death after the women have taken his unconscious body back to her flat. They decide not to tell anyone about the death as they think that nobody will believe that the killing was carried out in self-defence. Instead, they decide to pretend that Brian has been kidnapped and to blackmail his wealthy brother, Ron. The complex plot also involves a corrupt policeman, Dorothy's boyfriend (just as unpleasant as Brian) and a pink-tinted dog.
The original "Thelma and Louise" took a similar theme but treated it seriously, without any attempt to turn it into a comedy. There are also some similarities with "Bound", although any lesbian attraction between Dorothy and Petula is implied rather than explicit. Those two films work better than "Beautiful Creatures", largely the leading characters are much more believable and, at times, sympathetic. Susan Lynch and Rachel Weisz do not succeed to anything like the same extent. The most memorable thing about either of them was Weisz's horrendous peroxide blonde wig. (She looks much better as a brunette). I wonder if she took this part because she needed to appear in an oddball independent film in order to convince herself that she was still a bohemian free spirit despite having acted in Hollywood blockbusters like "The Mummy".
Black comedy can be a difficult subject to get right, either in the theatre or the cinema. If it is not supported by a brilliant wit (as in some of Joe Orton's plays) or by pertinent satire (as in "Dr Strangelove") it can come across as simply gross. The main rule of successful black comedy is that it is not enough to be black; one must be comic as well. Done well, black comedy can be tasteless but hilarious; done badly, it is merely tasteless.
Unfortunately, "Beautiful Creatures" falls into the second category. The film's attempts at satire all fall wide of the mark. There was presumably some attempt at feminist satire on male attitudes to women, but this does not really work as Dorothy and Petula come across as being just as twisted in their attitudes as any of the males on display. There is plenty that is black, with plot developments involving drugs, violence, cruelty and various sexual perversions, but little that is comic. 4/10 -
kenjha29 December 2010Surrounded by violent men in their loves, circumstances cause two women to form a protective partnership. This is an entertaining black comedy but lacks the pacing, clever script, and bizarre edge that distinguish the best of this sub-genre of films. Weisz, sporting a blonde do, and Lynch are pretty good, playing a variation on the Thelma and Louise theme. This is the only feature film made by TV director Eagles, and he lacks the absurdist touch of the likes of the Coen Brothers, Guy Ritchie, and Quinton Tarantino. A similar film that is superior in every respect is the Wachowski Brothers' stylish and alluring "Bound." The dog is cute.
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wes-connors20 December 2014After escaping an attack from her abusive man, attractive Susan Lynch (as Dorothy) decides to leave him. While waiting on a bus to London from Glasgow, Ms. Lynch witnesses another abusive man. He is attacking beautiful blonde Rachel Weisz (as Petula). Lynch takes a long metal bat and swings at the attacker. It's a solid hit and Ms. Weisz' abuser is knocked out of the park. The women drag him home and put him in the bathtub, with comfortable quilt. While not funny, the bathtub scene does suggest "Beautiful Creatures" is a comedy. Lynch and Weisz get high and bond. Lynch is attracted to Weisz' platinum blonde locks and plays hairdresser...
The women team-up and agree about how to dispose of one lover. The other, businessman Iain Glen (as Tony), causes problems. He's a real mean junkie who plays an awful trick on the dog Lynch's dog "Pluto". In return, Pluto plays a magic trick with Mr. Glen's ring finger...
Later, Weisz gets to take a swing at Lynch's husband; here and there, director Bill Eagles provides a lot of synchronicity. He and editor Jon Gregory try not bore the viewer. Best performance honors go to lecherous police detective Alex Norton (as George Hepburn), with an honorable mention to Maurice Roeves. Sexiest moment is when Weisz removes her stockings to relax during some violence. She doesn't need nudity to be sexy. The real heroes and/or heroines are not the two leading women, strangely. They are the dog Pluto and, possibly, the guy at the window (Robin Laing) with the dirty magazines. It should have been the women.
**** Beautiful Creatures (8/23/00) Bill Eagles ~ Rachel Weisz, Susan Lynch, Alex Norton, Iain Glen -
spinbunny31 December 2002A very twisted, dark comedy ... laugh out loud funny at times ... lots of plot twists to keep you wondering .... just the kind of movie to fill an evening and it makes you want to watch it again and wonder what you missed the first time as it is so warped you were undoubtedly laughing and probably missed something. (love the dog, Pluto, no matter what colour he is!)
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gridoon3 November 2003Too routine for a thriller, too unpleasant for a "comedy" (a comedy? please!), too contrived for a crime caper (let me get this straight: the whole mess begins when a dog bites off a corpse's finger?) and too reverse-sexist (all the men are vicious, sleazy b******s) for its female characters to be even the least bit sympathetic. A misfire. (**)
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I went to see this film at an early sneak preview. Ordinarily I would not have gone to see a film like this as I am not a big fan of British cinema (although I enjoy stuff like Lock Stock & 2SB), but I am very glad I got to see this preview.
The director Bill Eagle was at the preview, and as he mentioned before the film "if you don't think that death, S&M, mutilation of dead bodies, and drugs etc are appropriate for a comedy, then you better leave now". To be honest, I couldn't have put it better myself. The sense of humour in this film is indeed quite gross in places.
The basic plotline is that Petula and Dorothy both have violent boyfriends, and after one of them goes into a blind rage and almost kills Petula, Dorothy accidentally kills him. Both of them try to cover this up, but it isn't going to be easy. While this may sound like a quite depressing drama, it is actually done with a very tongue in cheek humour sometimes and is actually very funny (although this is probably not the sort of thing we should be laughing at!
Overall, if you enjoyed the dark comedy of Lock Stock, like the quirkiness of British movies, and can withstand a barrage of jokes in the worst possible taste (way more dark and gross than a lot of other movies labelled as "gross out comedy" or whatever), I would recommend going to see this film. After the movie ended there was a short question and answer with the director himself, and most of the audience seemed to have enjoyed the movie tremendously... I know I did! -
It always helps having no expectations about a film, and just go with its flow. And "Beautiful Creatures" just happens to have a fun flow, along the film noir lines. A simple mixture of a black comedy & a mild crime thriller, ultimately making up for a an effective 90 minutes of entertainment, wrapped up on a comfortable budget, supported by a decent enough cast. A grain of that noir-comedy touch the Coen Brothers sometimes use, done UK-style (but without Guy Ritchie's hectic pacing & editing) and more in sync really with films like "Head Above Water" (1996) and the more recent "The Ice Harvest" (2005). If you've liked any of the stuff I just mentioned, you'll probably have some fun with "Beautiful Creatures" too. It stars the perfectly capable Susan Lynch & Rachel Weisz, both forced by coincidence into the role of a femme fatale duo, desperately trying to solve & ultimately exploit the messy situation they've gotten themselves into.
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(spoilers)
The plot is fairly solid, but it's messy. Horribly messy. I really can't say vague. It's fairly obvious that the girls win over the boys. But getting there seems a bit too confusing for many to handle. I merely wanted to watch this because of Rachel Weisz. You get to see her legs up close. (drool) but she's not nude here. You'll have to settle for her butt in Enemy at the Gates.
This movie wasn't sure if it wanted to be a comedy or a drama. It aimed for being a comedy-drama, but pretty much missed. The trailer jolts us around thinking it's a comedy.
It was nice seeing the guy from Last of the Mohicans.
In the end, it's just not one of Rachel's best movies. And perhaps down near the bottom. About A Boy is a bit better in her dept than this. Although I did find her blond hair a bit interesting in this movie.
5/10
Quality: 4/10 Entertainment: 6/10 Replayable: 6/10 -
Chris_Docker22 January 2001We finally see the one film that has crawled out of wasted lottery money and it is, indeed, a disappointment. Perhaps foreign audiences who want to lap up anything British will enjoy this badly told tale more than I did. Two not-too-bright girls both have violent boyfriends, one of whom accidentally gets killed as the girls are thrown together and try to help each other. They make maladroit attempts to cover up the murder, which is where things go even more wrong. Wanting so hard to be a black comedy thriller along the lines of Shallow Grave or Blood Simple, Beautiful Creatures is ultimately little more than worthy of mid-week TV viewing.
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FlashCallahan12 April 2013Dorothy and Petula's lives are inextricably thrown together, bonded by a common flaw.
Dorothy's on the run from her boyfriend and Petula should be doing the same.
Evasion, blackmail, murder, betrayal, revenge, and a suitcase full of money.
it's all there....and then some....
Back in 2000, these films were ten a penny. Still riding high on the Guy Ritchie bandwagon, this falls into the same category as Circus, Rancid Aluminium, Love Honour and Obey, and Hard Men.
These were all films with major flaws, but for some reason, apart from Hard Men, they were all highly watchable, with some very kooky elements to them.
You really had to be around at the time of the films releases to appreciate this particular sub genre, and this one is no different, having been critically panned on initial release, there was something screaming in the film stating 'I am a very good idea, but poorly executed'.
And while the film has a very poor narrative and so many clichés, it's hard not to enjoy it.
Basically Thelma and Louise for generation X, Lynch and Weisz are really very good in their roles, but the writers have made a fatal error in making all the male characters rogues, and all the females victims, right up until the third act.
There's red herrings galore come the final act, but it's just too bonkers to be a bad movie, its never boring, but makes very little sense.
Luckily for me, I loved this sub genre, looking forward to all the wannabe crime dramas with style us Brits churned out.
a great companion piece with High heels and Low Lifes, basically a carbon copy of this movie. -
0rson8 December 2000Not a British version of Thelma and Louise but almost a weird caricature. An unusual mixture of three things: British comedy, Violent thriller, Role reversal - where the women really are the main characters and all the surrounding men are two dimensional stereotypes - violent and/or lecherous who get their just rewards. All in all good fun and not half as black or sick as some people have said (even the director!).
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lee_eisenberg8 February 2006Part of what makes a movie good is that the viewer can follow the plot. Alas, "Beautiful Creatures" failed in this respect. This story of two women who accidentally kill one of them's hubby does not make itself comprehensible. Rachel Weisz has starred in much better movies ("Sunshine", "The Constant Gardener"), so why would you want to focus on this? I expect England to make really good flicks ("The Man in the White Suit", "The Italian Job", "Letter to Brezhnev", "The Full Monty", "Billy Elliott"), but even the best don't succeed every time. There's always got to be something better this out there. It's not an awful movie, but not worth your while.
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raulfaust13 July 2013Two girls thrown together by their boyfriends' violence accidentally kill one of them: that's what IMDb's synopses says and that's just the beginning of a crazy movie. You know, "Beautiful Creatures" is one of those ironical thrillers that makes you enjoy the criminal, since they are portrayed as the good guys in the story. Characters are not well developed, given that they're too simple; however, they're unintentionally hilarious, and this plot just show how many corrupt people we have out there. Even the inspector-detective started lying and fooling around just to make some free money. Even thought the main story is original, sometimes it feels much like 2000's "Panic". I dare to say that sometimes director makes it feel like a Tarantino thriller, considering how shallow the subject "death" is portrayed. I just don't give it a higher rating because there are some few plot holes and the story isn't that genius, but I guarantee it's a good adventure, in every way.
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rogerclementjones25 March 2006We sat through "Beautiful Creatures" in the hope that it would get funny or at least get better. It did neither. On DVD in Australia it's rated MA15+ but probably should be R for violence and drug use. What a waste of two great female leads! The scenes of physical abuse, threatened violence and forced drug taking are appalling. This film has absolutely no redeeming features and is a waste of film stock. It adds nothing to the human condition - not that every film has to do that by any means, but it doesn't entertain or amuse either Take my tip, just don't bother. An this is coming from someone who can usually find something good in any film.
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rmax30482315 January 2015It's an odd movie that my TV Guide gave too low a rating in my opinion. But the low rating is understandable because the movie IS so odd. Some may take it for a failed comedy. Others may see it as a murder story gone haywire.
Mostly, it resembles Lina Wertmuller's "Seven Beauties" in that it's most serious moments are treated lightly, backed up by a score of period music that tells us not to take the events seriously. It's as if someone had tried to turn "Streetcar Named Desire" into a funny movie. And it partially succeeds.
Dorothy is Susan Lynch, who comes to the aid of Petula (Rachel Weisz). Weisz's drunken boyfriend is beating the hell out of her -- don't worry, no blood -- and after downing him, Weisz and Lynch take him to Weisz's flat where they leave him in the bath tub, puking. He accidentally falls and dies. For various reasons, all of them specious, the two strangers don't want to go to the police, so they stash the body out on the balcony while they deliberate. Pluto, the sizable dog, acts genuinely in love with Lynch, and has a pivotal role in the story. No, kidding; either that dog is a damned good actor or Susan Lynch's pheromones are inordinately powerful.
I won't bother going through the rather complicated plot except to say that everyone winds up mincemeat except for Lynch and Weisz, who run off with a couple of million pounds, plus Pluto who is minus an ear.
The acting is fine on everyone's part. Weisz is all gussied up like a blond tart but she looks striking, with her black eyebrows, dark gypsy eyes, and flattish nose in that wan environment.
Nobody acts quite the way you'd expect them to, and if they try, the trick often fails. There's the dispassionate Detective Inspector, Alex Norton, for instance. Suspecting that the disappearance of Weisz's boy friend is part of a kidnapping plot he visits her at home while she has only a bath towel wrapped around her. She bends over and most of her breasts are exposed for a moment. Norton notices it but pays no attention. A cold-blooded cop, right? Except that he sneaks into her flat one night leans over her bed and while whispering about the vile things he'll do to her, he slips a shotgun under the covers between her knees. Gulp. Where did THIS guy come from? It's rather like that, all the way through, so I can understand TV Guide's not quite knowing how to handle the movie. I, for one, enjoyed it despite it's occasional sluggish moments. -
samkan28 March 2011BEAUTIFUL CREATURES blatantly tries to fit in among dozens of British underworld action flicks starring the likes of; e.g., Bob Hoskins, Ewan McGregor, Ray Winstone, Clive Owns, etc., only this time with females in the lead roles. Unfortunately, virtually every aspect of this movie falls short. The plot is plain vanilla with few twists or tricks. The characters are neither engaging nor developed. The "action" scenes are not arousing. If the two leads are supposed to "bond" or form a convincing alliance such is not apparent. Apparently one had had a drug problem and the other was sexually exploited, though such comes off not as adversity but rather a product of the girls' respective shallowness, stupidity, etc. Indeed, the viewer can never "get behind" these characters or care for them. As a result, they are most undeserving of the "happy ever after" ending provided. What I think the makers intended to be sleekness and style just comes off as glib and pretentious.
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PredragReviews22 May 2016What I liked about the film "Beautiful Creatures" is that the lead female characters, Petula and Dorothy, are not strong women initially. They have allowed themselves to be dominated by physically, mentally and sexually abusive men. Neither seem to be capable of helping themselves out of these relationships. But, ironically, they each have the ability to help the other. And in helping each-other, they find the strength that had been beaten out of them. Even though the film addresses a serious subject, I found it to be very funny without making light of the domestic abuse issue. Susan Lynch is terrific as Dorothy, the fed-up heroine who comes to the aid of a stranger and finds herself facing murder charges. And "Mummy" fans will hardly recognize Rachel Weisz from her most familiar role as "Evie." Weisz is proving herself to be one of the most versatile actors making films today. There is an uninhibited quality about her performances that make every character she takes on totally believable.
Beautiful Creatures was real fun to watch. It won't really change your outlook on life but will make you happier with the one you have. The plot is ridiculous, the coincidence make you feel like buying a lottery ticket, but it gets you involved. It moves on a pace and the humor is very non-PC but the naughtiness makes it more enjoyable. Susan Lynch and Rachael Weisz are superb actresses and seemed to enjoy the filming and this comes over. It is, however, morally corrupt but that is part of the fun once you switch your morals and brain off (don't try this at home).
Overall rating: 8 out of 10. -
elo-equipamentos9 February 2021Unsatisfying black humor comedy oriented, about two women that seemingly are passive and weak, both are abused, in many ways, sexually and mentally by their opposites, all this began almost accidently when Dorothy (Susan Lynch) saves Petula (Rachel Weisz) to be stifled until death hitting Mike McMinn (Tom Mannion) by a steel pipe at the street, however he did not die, the scary women taken his body to Dorothy's apartment, which he gonna die after falling down in bathroom's floor.
Such unexpected mishap Dorothy and Petula settle together a bold plan as Mike was supposedly kidnapped by somebody else, asking for to his richest brother Ronnie McMinn (Maurice Roeves) a trife two million pounds by the ransom, the proves was a finger that the dog Pluto almost eaten, then appears the dubious and lewd Det. Inspector Hepburn (Alex Norton) in charge of the case, sniffing around with double meaning questions, including a sudden interest of sexual nature on Petula.
The plot in going fairly well, when appears at apartment Dorothy's husband Tony (Iain Glen) a menacing, addicted and grim man, drugs himself and also enforcing Dorothy to do the same even her unwilling, worst tie up Dorothy to be violated by the own Dog Pluto and demands under a gun Petula to make sex concurrently, this sequence is so disgusting and sickening that spoils the picture for good, you may have a strong stomach to go ahead.
Thanks for reading.
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First watch: 2021 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 6.25 -
rbrb19 April 2004I barely lasted more than 30 minutes with this rubbish. Whoever financed this garbage needs their heads examined. I suppose it is meant to be a comedy but I could find nothing amusing, as the film-makers seem to think is, with violence again women which it at the crux of this movie. What I saw of the picture was unfunny, unconvincing and totally absurd. Unsurprising no one can touch the American film industry with British trash like this. 1 out of 10.