Honeycomb, the feature debut from co-writer/director Avalon Fast, is a strange film in a variety of wonderful ways. A story about a group of teenage girls who discover and decide to move to an abandoned house in the woods near their town could be incredibly straightforward, especially in the horror genre, though Honeycomb is anything but straightforward.
It’s unclear if the writing and acting, from an entirely teenaged cast, are genuinely shoddy or simply reflect the sometimes stilted, sometimes overly excited way that teenagers talk. The look, which feels as though the teens simply filmed themselves on the first recording instrument they could find,lends the entire film an amateurish feel. Yet that makes perfect sense for a film about a group of teenage girls who decide to live in the woods by themselves. It makes more sense when we learn that the girls are in fact filming themselves as we see them address the camera to document their new lives.
The story itself is somewhat beguiling as well, not narratively, but in terms of how we as the audience are meant to engage with it. Honeycomb is somewhat of a horror film, as violence erupts and things go wrong and people are harmed, but it’s also a wonderfully cozy film. Honeycomb invites the audience to understand why these girls want to escape their current lives (which varies from simply wanting more out of summer than the same things everyday to escaping unfulfilling romantic relationships) and sympathize with their decision, if not outright admire their willingness to form a new community.
We can see issues with the girls’ rules for their new community from the start, particularly with the concept of “suitable revenge” by which if someone wrongs you, you may take “suitable revenge.” But even when fights grow more common and things take a violent turn, there’s still some strange magic in the house.
The movie never outright breaks into the supernatural or otherworldly, but the woozy and frequently soft focus way that Fast shoots much of the film and edits some of its more jarring sequences make it feel as though there’s something special going on in this all girl commune that matters even if it’s dangerous to everyone involved, and anyone who comes close. Beyond the editing and focus choices, though, there are some bolder moments, such as the opening title card which appears as a brief animation made of Play-Doh, and in a sequence where we hear each girls’ letter to the people she’s leaving behind, we see one of these letters written out in a choppy stop motion animation all the way to its being placed in an envelope.
While the community is closed, and only girls are allowed to live at the home, they do invite their boy friends (as opposed to boyfriends) to visit and to play shows at the home with their band. Unsurprisingly, as you would expect from a film about teenagers, these visits cause some boy drama that leads to the film’s finale, a sequence that’s remarkably understated but almost painful in its dramatic irony.
Honeycomb certainly isn’t for everyone, as its strange tone and low budget look and feel may put some viewers off, but for those willing to follow these girls to the woods, there’s certainly something rewarding to be found. More than any themes or visual or sonic delights, Honeycomb offers a feeling, one that’s wholly unique and lingers after the film ends.
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