Now that the Cannes Film Festival is drawing to a close, it's clear that HBO has grown into a major film-making force beyond the small screen.

Beautiful Creatures is wonderfully wrought, funny, smart and enchanting, the best film I've seen thus far this year. Indeed, it's a tale of young love set in a milieu torn between the status quo and the supernatural.

So much of Beautiful Creatures is so unexpectedly terrific that it's almost a tragedy when the picture eventually falls victim to its own plot.

Based on the first in a series of books by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, Beautiful Creatures (opening Thursday) hopes the "Twihards" can shift their focus from the undead to the magically endowed.