You’ve probably seen the movie posters or caught a clip on TikTok. Abigail Breslin and Georgie Henley looking haunted, suburban gloom everywhere, and a plot that feels too twisted to be real. But here’s the thing: Perfect Sisters isn’t just some recycled Hollywood thriller. It’s a messy, uncomfortable reflection of a 2003 murder case that actually happened in Mississauga, Ontario.
Most people watch the film and think it’s just about "evil" kids. That’s too simple. Honestly, the real story—the case of the Bathtub Girls—is way more depressing and complicated than a ninety-minute runtime can really capture. It wasn't just about a couple of teenagers wanting to party. It was a slow-motion train wreck involving alcoholism, systemic failure, and a bond between siblings that turned toxic in the worst way imaginable.
The Reality Behind the Perfect Sisters Script
Stanley Brooks, the director, leaned heavily on the book The Class Project: How to Kill a Mother by Bob Mitchell. If you want the raw facts, that’s where they are. In the movie, the sisters are named Sandra and Beth. In real life? They were known only as "the girls" for a long time due to Canada’s Youth Criminal Justice Act. Later, the world learned their names were Linda and Sandra Andersen.
Their mother was an alcoholic. That’s not an excuse for what they did, but it’s the unavoidable context. The movie shows the girls living in a state of perpetual anxiety, never knowing if their mom would be sober or passed out. In the real 2003 case, the house was a disaster. The girls were essentially parenting themselves while their mother spent the family's meager resources on booze. They felt trapped. They felt like the only way to have a "normal" life was to remove the obstacle.
They didn't just snap one day. They planned it over lunch. They talked about it with friends. That’s the part that usually creeps people out the most. The film captures that bizarre social aspect—how they almost treated the murder like a school project. They weren't hiding it; they were testing the waters to see if anyone would stop them. Nobody did.
Why the Movie Divides True Crime Fans
Some critics hated the film. They thought it was too glossy or that it made the girls look like victims. Others felt it was a brave look at "shared psychotic disorder" or at least a very extreme version of sibling codependency.
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The acting is actually top-tier. Abigail Breslin plays the older sister with this brittle, desperate intensity. Georgie Henley (yeah, the girl from Narnia) is the younger one who seems more susceptible to the fantasy of it all. The movie focuses on their "secret world." They had a private language, a private set of rules. When you’re that isolated, the line between "this is a joke" and "we are actually going to kill her" gets blurry.
A Dark Social Experiment
What's wild is that they actually polled their friends. In the movie, and in real life, the sisters floated the idea of killing their mother to their peer group. They asked questions like, "What would you do if your mom was an alcoholic?" or "How would you get away with it?"
- Their friends thought it was a dark joke.
- The sisters took the lack of interference as a green light.
- The actual murder involved drugging their mother with Tylenol 3s and then drowning her in the bathtub.
The movie doesn't shy away from the aftermath, either. The girls went to a restaurant afterward to celebrate with their friends. They ate. They laughed. They created an alibi while their mother lay in the tub. It’s cold. It’s genuinely disturbing because it’s not a supernatural horror—it’s just two kids who decided their mother was better off dead.
The Legal Aftermath and the "Bathtub Girls" Legacy
In 2005, the real sisters were sentenced to the maximum possible for youth in Canada: ten years. They served time in separate facilities because the court realized their bond was the catalyst for the crime. If they were together, they were dangerous. Apart, they were just two young women trying to figure out how to live with what they’d done.
By the time Perfect Sisters hit theaters in 2014, the real-life sisters were already out. They’ve since moved on, changed their names, and tried to disappear into society. That’s a reality the movie can’t quite finish. It leaves you in the trauma of the act, but the aftermath for the real Mississauga community lasted decades.
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There’s a massive debate about whether the film "glamorizes" the crime. Personally, I don’t see it. The cinematography is sickly and the tone is oppressive. If anything, the movie serves as a warning about what happens when children are left to rot in abusive or neglectful homes. It’s a failure of the village, not just the kids.
What Most People Miss About the Climax
The ending of the film focuses on the guilt and the inevitable cracking of their story. In reality, it was a "friend" who eventually went to the police. The police didn't have a smoking gun until someone in their circle couldn't live with the secret anymore.
The movie compresses this, but the actual investigation took a year. Imagine that. A year of these girls living their "perfect" life, thinking they’d committed the perfect crime, all while the police were slowly closing in. The tension in those months must have been suffocating.
Practical Insights for Viewers and Researchers
If you're looking into this case or watching the movie for the first time, keep these points in mind:
Watch for the Sibling Dynamics
Pay attention to who is leading whom. In both the movie and the court transcripts, there’s a constant shift in power. One sister provides the logic, the other provides the emotional fuel. It’s a textbook case of folie à deux.
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Check the Sources
If the movie leaves you feeling like you missed something, read The Class Project. It details the 200+ hours of interviews and the cold, hard evidence that didn't make it into the cinematic cut. The book covers the "party" culture of the kids in that specific Ontario suburb, which explains why the sisters thought they could get away with it.
Understand the Sentencing
Canada’s laws focus on rehabilitation for youth. This is why the sisters were released in their mid-twenties. It’s a point of massive contention in true crime circles—did they serve enough time? The film doesn't answer this, but it forces you to ask the question.
Look at the Visual Cues
The director uses color to show the sisters' mental states. Notice how the world feels more vibrant when they are planning the crime and grayer when they are dealing with the reality of their mother’s addiction. It’s a subtle way of showing how the murder was, in their minds, a way to bring "color" back to their lives.
When you finish the film, the best thing to do is look up the 2003 news reports from the Toronto Star. Seeing the grainy photos of the actual house and the faces of the real people involved strips away the Hollywood polish. It reminds you that while Perfect Sisters is a compelling piece of entertainment, the reality was a tragedy with no winners. The mother lost her life, the sisters lost their youth, and a community was left wondering how they missed the signs.
The most important takeaway here is the danger of isolation. When the sisters were cut off from healthy adult intervention, their own logic became their law. That’s the true horror of the story—not just the act itself, but the environment that made it seem like a viable solution to two teenage girls.
Check the local archives for "Mississauga Bathtub Girls" to see the original court documents and the impact of the Youth Criminal Justice Act on the case's publicity. Reading the actual witness testimonies from their friends provides a chilling look at the social vacuum these girls lived in.