I read a review of this a while ago and was instantly intrigued by the description of a story, based on real events, of two young girls who get lost in each other and their imaginations to the point that they murder one of the girls' mothers because she is an obstacle to their friendship. I put it off for a while because I didn't want to remember too much of the plot, making it more surprising, but I still knew throughout the movie how it all ended, and the last part of the film leading up to the murder was almost agonizing.
The movie will definitely stay with me, be under my skin for a while, but I didn't really like it, and I think part of that's because the girls, Pauline and Juliet, weren't very likable or sympathetic to me. Their self-absorption and hysteria was kept the center of the film throughout, and I couldn't help but feeling sorry for the more pedestrian but also kinder people around them, especially Pauline's parents. Her mother's simple cheer and genuine love for her daughter, despite the fact that she doesn't understand the girl's rage and intense passion for her best friend, was heartbreaking to watch. In the moments leading up to her death, she's simply enjoying a walk in the park with her daughter, and it's painful to know what's coming for her and to be certain that she doesn't deserve it. The film neither demonizes nor sympathizes with the girls, but I more or less hated them. I was kind of shocked when I saw that both were released from prison after 5 years and went on to lead presumably normal lives. Even though they were very young (15 and 16) and self-deluded when they committed the murder, I still felt as if they deserved a harsher punishment.
Maybe part of the reason I couldn't like the girls is that, although I've always been pretty introverted and sensitive, I don't know what it's like either to have one single best friend to whom you confide and trust everything or to retreat into imaginary worlds of your own creating. I did write a lot of stories from a very early age, and I did make up my own country when I was eight or so. But maybe I've always been more pragmatic, because where Pauline and Juliet fantasize gleefully about their "fourth world" in which their enemies are slaughtered and their favorite people are saints, I spent more time filling journals with textbook-like details about Zomdia's geography, history, and local customs. And I've always had groups of friends, usually several groups with whom I spend time separately. I've certainly been furious with my parents for restricting my free time in the past, but I never once imagined doing harm to them. It was hard to see the girls in the film as anything but selfish and egomaniacal, especially when actual excerpts from Pauline's journals were recited in voiceover, about how she and Juliet were geniuses misunderstood by the rest of the world, and how the night before she planned to kill her mother was like Christmas Eve.
I don't think you have to sympathize with a murderer to enjoy or appreciate a film about one, and I think this was a very good movie. There's just something about it that makes me cold.
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