Butterfly Kiss (1996)

Eunice, an unpredictable social outcast, one day meets Miriam, a beautiful yet withdrawn gas station attendant. Before long the two are on the road and in love. Even when Eunice starts murdering horny truckers and pesky salesmen, Miriam believes she can save her friend. The question is, can Miriam make Eunice good before Eunice makes Miriam bad? Product Description

A quirky little art film

Butterfly Kiss is this bizarre little art film centered around a chance meeting (and deranged whirlwind romance) between two very different women. Eunice (Amanda Plummer) is a delusional drifter who's wandering the countryside in search of her lost (and most likely fictional) ex-lover, Judith. Miriam (Saskia Reeves) is a very timid, clingy woman who works at a gas station and takes care of her elderly mother. She's overtaken by the need to protect Eunice, and rightly so - devolving constantly into deeper levels of insanity and violence, she's completely unmanageable, even to herself.

The film has a few definite issues that are hard to overlook, such as why Miriam is so compelled to stay with her murderous, harsh lover, or, on a lighter note, the constant chain lingerie (literally, it's a collection of chains) Eunice wears under everything, which is sort of unintentionally comical. (My first thought was, "Well, if I had on a chain thong, I'd be a little irritable, too!")

But overall, it's a really good movie: challenging, simultaneous bleak and giddy, with a wonderfully morbid denoument. I'd recommend it. April 6, 2007

Very nicely done

This film is, as other reviewers have mentioned, sad and disturbing in many ways. However, I also found some parts of it hilarious--for the relationship between "Eu" and "Mi" is a mirror, albeit an exaggerated one, of so many relationships. When I saw this in the movie theater, my best friend and I turned to each other and burst out laughing several times with "Oh, I've heard *that* before." Two terribly flawed people in a destructive relationship that can come to no good end. February 1, 2007

Deranged Woman and "Good" Woman Hook Up

Unrated version of an R-rated film (for profanity, violence and simulated sex).

DVD features: The DVD contains the film and some special features. The special features include a photo gallery, a trailer gallery (four trailers, does not include Butterfly Kiss; the movies: "Live Nude Girls Unite" (union organizing for strippers), "Girls Who Like Girls" (clips of scenes from the past), "The Fluffer" (a guy becomes a male gay porn camera man and begins to question is sexuality), and "Cleopatara's Second Husband"), and "About First Run Features" (which briefly describes the entity).

Credits: The film stars Amanda Plummer (Eunice; 8 ½ Women), and Saskia Reeves (Miriam; TV: "Dune"; Movie: "The Knickerman"). Directed by Michael Winterbottom ("Welcome to Sarajevo").

Plot: Briefly, the movie is about a deranged woman, Eunice, that goes on a murder spree through England (she claims she is looking for some woman named "Judith"). She hooks up with another woman, Miriam, during her escapades, and this second woman ends up wanting to help Eunice (covering up the deaths, trying to make Eunice good).

Review: The movie opens on a black and white scene of a woman we later learn is named Miriam. Miriam is in some room talking about what happened. These little black-and-white moments pop up every once in a while.

After that scene, the movie opens up in color to reveal a somewhat unattractive woman (Eunice) wondering down the roadway talking to herself and stopping off at gas ("petrol") stations "looking for a record of a love song" she states (and looking for "Judith"). At the first station she visits she kills the female attendant. At the second station she runs into the second star of the movie, gasoline station attendant Miriam. They hook up. Strange really, hooking up with an obviously insane woman that poured gasoline on herself.

Well, they go back to Miriam's place, which she shares with her mother. In front of the mother, the insane woman, Eunice, takes her top off while uttering nonsense (she's covered in chains and piercings). Truly, a smart idea of Miriam's to bring this wacko back to her place.

Bed time, and Eunice and Miriam share the mother's "big bed" after Eunice deposits the mother in Miriam's bed. Miriam is wearing rather heavy night clothes and Eunice is wearing chains (and the chains also cover her lower body, the chains have padlocks on them; all Eunice will say is that she is being punished). Well, Eunice isn't going to allow Miriam to keep that heavy thing on, and she takes it off, with no resistance from Miriam. Now the "wild night."

Well, after that wild night, Eunice leaves after leaving a note on the mirror that Miriam isn't Judith. Eunice continues her trek looking for this maybe mythical woman (and along the way she ends up hitchhiking, and when asked if she is making clicking sounds, she opens her shirt to reveal the chains). Interesting, when in the vicinity of men, Eunice acts as if she is kinky but heterosexual (Eunice and the male truck driver end up having some "fun") but when she is around women, Eunice sends off lesbian vibes.

Miriam's having none of this abandonment and heads off in search of Eunice. After a relatively short while, the two women find each other again. Eventually Miriam spots the dead man in the back of the truck and is confused. Oddly enough after Miriam learns that it was Eunice that killed him, she is more interested in hiding the body than in helping the police. She wants to "save" Eunice from police trouble and also she wants to find "the good" in her, and maybe more importantly, she "likes doing things for her."

Well, Miriam is a "good" girl but easily lead and Eunice is deranged (though Eunice wanders around killing people, Miriam breaks traffic laws at first). (3.25) May 17, 2005

sad and disturbing

I had been on the lookout for this movie since it received a thumbs up review an a noted movie review program. It only played in art houses for a short time so I never saw it in the theater. The sad depths that two people can descend to as one clings on to the other is very painfully depicted. This movie will stay with a person for a long time, and that is the mark of a well crafted movie. This was not a high budget film but gets a lot out of each buck, or in this case, pound sterling. Amanda Plummer does a great job and all the more disturbing since you never find out the why that is her basis for searching. If you finish watching the movie and are not a bit unsettled, check your pulse. Not sure the ease of having guns in England is on target, but Amanda (Eunice)seems to readily use hers. March 14, 2004

Ouch and "Huh"?

Let's see, now - this makes how many movies about lesbian couples with violent tendencies? Seems to me they're starting to outnumber films about lesbian couples who nurture or at least exhibit a more normal balance of light and dark attributes. To a point, women may be excited by female characters who do whatever they like. Butterfly Kisses, however, goes far beyond this point. While also disturbing, Heavenly Creatures is superior for its greater success at showing human complexity and for at least being drawn from reality. HC had its brilliant moments - moments that have stayed with me. Amanda Plummer's dead-on acting was my sole reason, along with mild curiosity re: the conclusion, for watching this in its entirety. Otherwise I'd advise against it unless you're turned on by violence and other disturbances. August 24, 2003

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