HONEY BUNCH: 3 STARS. “a strange story of love justifying everything.”
SYNOPSIS: In “Honey Bunch,” a new horror-thriller now playing in theatres, disturbing visions plague a woman recovering at an experimental trauma center after a brutal car accident. “Everything is gonna go back to normal… it might just take a little more time.”
CAST: Grace Glowicki, Ben Petrie, Jason Isaacs, Kate Dickie and India Brown. Directed and written by Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli.
REVIEW: A gothic, unsettling study of devotion and sacrifice, “Honey Bunch” starts off odd and doubles down on its weirdness as it winds its way to the end credits.
Following her recovery from a coma that resulted in partial memory loss and physical challenges, Diana’s (Grace Glowicki) husband Homer (Ben Petrie), for reasons she doesn’t understand, enrolls her at an out-of-the-way trauma facility for experimental treatment to repair her memory and motor skills.
As the procedures intensify her fragmented memory begins to rebuild, like puzzle pieces falling into place.
Unfortunately, for another patient, Josephina (India Brown), accompanied by her father Joseph (“White Lotus’” Jason Isaacs), the unusual treatment leaves her suffering from terrible side effects.
While Joseph pushes for his daughter’s recovery, Diana’s shattered memories lead her to troubling truths about her marriage and husband’s true motives.
“Honey Bunch’s” first hour takes some time to get where its going. Directors Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer immerse the viewer in the remote facility to hammer home Diana’s isolation. By the time her memories—or are the hallucinations?—return an unsettling, unpredictable atmosphere attaches itself to the film like the buttons on a blouse.
The rhythms take some getting used to, but patience is rewarded with a bonkers second half that let’s go of building suspicion and in favor of body horror touched by tragedy and revenge. Some swing-for-the-fences story turns defy credulity but, because they are based in affection, ultimately become a look at the see saw of married life, and how blind devotion may not be a suitable relationship building block.
A throwback to the films of the 1970s, “Honey Bunch” utilizes crash zooms and other retro techniques, accentuated by Andrea Boccadoro’s eerie, irreverent score, to tell a strange story of love justifying everything.
Comments are closed.
