By Steve Erickson

Directors Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli indulge in a few too many changes of tone, but their film offers a pleasantly oddball romance.

Honey Bunch, directed by Madeline Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli. Streaming on Shudder beginning on February 13.

Grace Glowicki in a scene from Honey Bunch.

The setting: a quiet house in the country, where women go to recover from memory loss. Since Honey Bunch is airing on Shudder, one might anticipate that a crazed killer is lurking in the nearby woods or that cult members are lying in wait. Refreshingly, the film’s horror is more personal than stereotypical, remixing the Gothic from a new perspective. The narrative is not short on film references: the dialogue refers to Rebecca and The Stepford Wives; its themes and images pay homage to Vertigo (with a degree of critique.) Its darkly sadomasochistic dynamic — where a heterosexual relationship turns into a twisted form of caretaking — is reminiscent of Phantom Thread. Directors Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli indulge in a few too many changes of tone and have trouble bringing this all together in the end. Still, their film offers a pleasantly oddball romance.

Diana (Grace Glowicki) has survived a car crash. Released from the hospital after waking up from a coma, her husband Homer (Ben Petrie) takes her to a mysterious retreat.  (The two actors are a couple in real life, as are the directors.) She begins taking a new medication and also undertakes sessions of hypnosis under a flickering orange light. Another couple, Joseph (Jason Isaacs) and his daughter Josephina (India Brown), arrive for treatment. Diana begins to regain her memories, yet the resurgence leaves her even more fragile than before. She pictures doppelgangers everywhere. A painting of Joan, a woman who killed herself in a waterfall near the retreat, looks just like her. Although surrounded by sunlight, the building is full of shadows, its corridors filling up with strange visions. Whatever Diana is experiencing, it’s far from conventional medicine.

As part of its nuanced approach, Honey Bunch never establishes a setting of baseline normalcy. Although the film was shot in Ontario, uncertainty about where it is taking place (aided by the blend of accents) prevails. From its very opening, something’s off. Of course, Diana’s condition means that she will look dazed and drugged, but Homer’s behavior seems odd in a subtler way. He comes across as a passive-aggressive “nice guy.” The couple’s car winds up being one of Honey Bunch‘s key locations. It’s the scene of Diana’s trauma, but it’s also the location for an ongoing tension between Homer and Diana. He can’t stop poking at her anxieties. As complicated houses do in Gothic literature and film, the automobile brings something dangerous out in the couple.

In this film, Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli are following up on their terrific debut, Violation. A rape-revenge saga starring Sims-Fewer, the narrative burrowed into the experience of surviving sexual assault, but in a way that was provocative and confrontational without being exploitative. As an actor, Sims-Fewer put herself on the line. It was reported that, in the scene where her character vomited after committing a murder, the performer chugged salt water to make herself throw up. Violation is a film without clear heroes and villains: Sims-Fewer’s character kills her rapist — but ends up committing sexual assault herself.

Honey Bunch dwells in the same grey areas, though it applies a lighter touch. At many points in the film, Homer acts like a villain. Petrie speaks in a soft register whose strident gentility quickly turns slimy. His words and actions don’t match up, so he emanates nuanced menace. For example, he snaps a knife open right after saying, “I know I’ve been acting strange lately.” He and Diana discuss aging — their possible end points — with a disturbing frankness. Still, by the end of Honey Bunch Homer’s become much more complex than a simple sexist jerk. Learning what lies behind some of his odder statements reveals his good intentions, albeit carried out in rather screwed-up ways.

Ultimately, Honey Bunch exists in a hallucinatory space created by Diana’s wounded consciousness, which is uncertain about reality. In her eyes, the past and present are interwoven, leaving her in a disassociated state. The ’40s and ’70s collide. Homer’s clued-in enough to the times to use the word “patriarchy” — he also wears shoulder-length hair, long sideburns, and a mustache. Diana, on the other hand, resembles blonde ‘60s icons such as Catherine Deneuve and Sharon Tate.

As a film about a woman piecing together her memories, Honey Bunch is a triumph. Diana wanders about the house, dreaming while she’s awake. The problem is that the time comes for this story to end, aesthetic coherence falters. Citations to Vertigo are transformed into body horror (one scene involves a colostomy bag) and an infusion of science fiction. The final scene complicates everything we have seen before — and fails to feel emotionally convincing. Nevertheless, Honey Bunch has its virtues — rarely have the difficulties of a couple living together — and growing older together — been treated with such savage wit.

Steve Erickson writes about film and music for Gay City News, Slant Magazine, the Nashville Scene, Trouser Press, and other outlets. He also produces electronic music under the tag callinamagician. His latest album, Bells and Whistles, was released in January 2024, and is available to stream here. He presents a biweekly freeform radio show, Radio Not Radio, featuring an eclectic selection of music from around the world.