Hands

3.1.16.2 Hands.

** What can hands do in "Heavenly Creatures"?
1) Hands can work, making things, or writing. 2) Diembodied hands can reach out to grasp something, actively seeking the future or the unknown. 3) Hands can communicate and connect two people, join people together when hands link or touch, or caress. 4) Hands can betray.

** Hands at work...
Jackson uses close-up shots of busy hands making things to communicate the excitement of creation, the joy of the arts. We see Pauline drawing, the girls painting and sculpting together and individually, making sand castles. All these scenes are happy, to begin with, but they drift a little into unsettled waters with Juliet sculpting in the sanatorium and Pauline painting severed heads (splotch!). And we see tight shots of Pauline writing in pencil, in her exercise books, and in pen and ink, in her diaries. These shots are darker in both lighting and mood. Christmas presents are despatched by disembodied hands. Pauline's hands unwrap her diaries in close-up.

** Hands reaching out...
These scenes with close-up shots of reaching hands stand out:

* Juliet reaches out for Honora's hand, hesitantly, when she "Meets the Riepers" and Honora is just as hesitant in her returning gesture. The music warns us this moment should be remembered, for later reference. * Juliet pauses, tearful but resolved, takes a deep breath, reaches out her hand and commands Pauline: "Come with me." Port Levy dissolves and becomes the Fourth World. * John-the-boarder reaches out for Pauline's door on the night the two are caught in bed together. His fingers are outstretched, his reach is cautious, maybe sly, maybe knowing, but probably not. That one, small gesture, so ordinary and quiet, precipitates his eviction from the Riepers, Pauline's alienation from her father, friction with her mother, and her painful and traumatic deflowering. "I love you (flush)." * Nicholas reaches out for the pink gemstone on the drawbridge of Borovnia. John's reaching out had led to sweeping changes in Pauline's life, none of them positive, and now his Borovnian alter-ego is lured to his death by the pink stone. Nicholas seals his fate by pausing, and reaching out... * Juliet reaches out for the branch in the "Humming Chorus" walk. Pauline had walked past, unseeing, Honora had walked past, seeing but not needing the branch, but Juliet stumbles and falters, just for the briefest of moments. And she reaches out to the branch to steady herself. The sound of her hand sliding over the dry bark breaks through the silence, and then the moment is lost, along with the small sound of her hand. We recall the hymn under the opening titles: "If I falter, Lord, who cares?" We do, and we are powerless to change the course of history. * Honora reaches out for the pink gemstone, in a terrible parody, a very-real echo of Nicholas reaching out in Pauline's fantasy. Her fingers are outstretched, her reach is slow, and hesitant. But she reaches out, and maybe helps to seal her own fate, in Pauline's imagination. It is an excruciating shot to watch. * Honora reaches out for help to Juliet after the first blows are struck, in another dark parody of an earlier scene. Juliet reaches out in return, and takes the brick from Pauline's hands, and strikes Honora. With both hands.

** Hands joining together..
At Port Levy, the girls stand side-by-side and face Henry Hulme, who is working, hold hands, backlit by the sun, and find out the Hulmes are leaving on a trip to England. * At Port Levy, in the Fourth World, in the garden by the fountain, the girls stand side-by-side and look out over the Port Hills and the inlet. They hold hands and we look out over their shoulders at the island in the blue sea. Everything was full of peace and bliss, just as Pauline said. There was something eerie about this scene, too. * Pauline sits on Juliet's bed and they hold hands during Pauline's first visit to the sanatorium. Honora says the word "letters" and Juliet pulls back her hand. * Henry Hulme collects Juliet from the sanatorium with Pauline in "The Ones That I Worship" scene. The girls sit together in the back seat, and their hands steal together. Henry adjusts the mirror and doesn't like what he sees. * Hearing about "divorce" from Dr Hulme ("the noblest and most wonderful person I have ever known of") the girls cling desperately to each other's hands. Just before Pauline leaves in the rain, their hands linger together when they kiss farewell. * Before their last night together, at sunset, at Ilam, the girls stood side-by-side and hand-in-hand. We gaze over their shoulders into the setting sun--they are back-lit-- and we see a pair of white unicorns grazing peacefully on the lawn. We are reminded of the Fourth World at Port Levy.

** Hands betraying...
Juliet scrubs her hands like Lady Macbeth through the entire last day. She begins at the Riepers' house and doesn't stop until after the first blow was struck in Victoria Park.