Worth: $11.50
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Scott Chambers, Ryan Oliva, Peter DeSouza-Feighoney, Eddy MacKenzie, Lewis Santer, Marcus Massey, Simon Callow
Intro:
… greasy teenage horror obsessives or jaded media-savvy stoners will probably get a chuckle or two out of it.
There are many reasons to make movies; some of them good, some of them bad. Passion for the medium, an abiding greed, the desire to pay off gambling debts to the mob – all have produced movies of certain quality. Surely, however, the weirdest reason to add to the cinematic arts is “because the copyright of a beloved children’s character expired, and I want to make a gory horror movie about it.”
Nonetheless, that’s the motivation behind Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 and its prequel Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey. Now, the original was a cheap and nasty affair that made a surprising amount of money on a budget of bugger all. The sequel, released a year after the original, is a much more ambitious affair. But does that mean it’s any good? The answer is a little more complicated than you might expect.
Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 continues the story of Christopher Robin (recast in the new flick as Scott Chambers), who since the events of the previous film has become the town pariah. See, not many people believe Christopher’s story that a bunch of his childhood imaginary friends were responsible for the grisly murders that occurred in the Hundred Acre Wood and, hell, even Christopher is beginning to doubt his own sanity. The audience, however, knows better. And that’s because we keep seeing the lengthy, gory sequences where grown up versions of Winnie-the-Pooh (Ryan Oliva), Piglet (Eddy MacKenzie), Tigger (Lewis Santer) and new addition, Owl (Marcus Massey), hack, slash and butcher their way through a cadre of attractive, but dopey Poms who are pissfarting about in the woods basically begging to have their scones pruned.
Although Blood and Honey 2 is a clear improvement of the much derided original, it also suffers from something of an identity crisis. The stuff with Christopher Robin and his investigation into the origin of Pooh is actually pretty gripping. Scott Chambers is a decent lead and there’s one scene with Simon Callow (of all people) that is really well acted and tense. However, those more cerebral scenes are swiftly juxtaposed with well-executed but derivative (one kill from Chucky Season One is straight up cut-and-pasted) and repetitive slasher moments that are oddly mean-spirited and play out like a furry’s worst nightmare.
That said, a moment where Pooh and Tigger play “Poohsticks” with severed human limbs did raise a smile and an extended sequence at a rave, while a bit pointless in the overall story, will no doubt delight gorehounds and 15-year-old boys.
Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 is no masterpiece. It’s not even particularly “good” in any meaningful sense. However, it’s competently shot, sporadically well-acted, features a lot of gore (and will no doubt please the Terrifier crowd) and is considerably more ambitious than the original. It’s trash, but it’s self-aware trash and is set to launch an entire expired copyright cinematic universe that will feature Peter Pan, Tinkerbell and Bambi. It’s not really your humble word janitor’s cup of honey anymore, but greasy teenage horror obsessives or jaded media-savvy stoners will probably get a chuckle or two out of it.
