"When people visit Sunshine Hills, they comment on the beauty and the serenity. What they don’t talk about is the raw fear that resides in our eyes..."
Shy and awkward, fourteen year old Daniel Hobson is a quiet boy living on a quiet street in the idyllic, picture-perfect suburb of Sunshine Hills. Viewing his world through the lens of an old camera, Daniel is – like many in the neighborhood – both entranced and disturbed by the sinister rumors that circulate in whispers from house to house.
A third teenage girl has just disappeared without a trace, and while the police don't seem to have any answers, the locals all point to the derelict house at number 46, with the strange woman who stands at the front window from morning to night and the rumbling black Ford that creeps up and down the sleepy tree-lined streets once the sun goes down.
Daniel's primary obsession, however, is Suzy Thomson. Slightly older, an unabashedly provocative tease – much to her parents’ concern – Suzy is 'the girl next door of every boy's dreams, a volatile and compelling mix of innocence and burgeoning sexuality. Determined to uncover the truth behind the missing girls, the ominous house and the dark secrets of Sunshine Hills, Suzy enlists the help of Daniel and his camera. In exchange for her friendship, Daniel must become Suzy's eyes and ears, sneaking around the neighborhood unseen to capture the truth that exits behind its doors and curtains.
Thus begins a journey in which secrets become truth, innocence is lost, and the real world is a far more beautiful and terrifying place then either of them could ever have imagined. This is suburbia as never seen before – sexual, funny, sensuous and horrific, BEAUTIFUL is an ode to the end of innocence and the power of imagination.
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