When it was first announced back in May, Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey was met with an amused shrug. Sure, everything else in the world is on a fast-track expressway to hell, so why not make a horror movie about AA Milne’s beloved teddy bear transforming into a living nightmare and embarking on a bloodthirsty rampage? Nice idea, good luck to all involved.
But sometimes wishes do come true. Because while Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey might have sounded like a one-gag pipe dream destined to be ensnared forever within Disney’s litigious machinery, now there is tangible proof that the thing actually exists. The first Blood and Honey trailer has been released into the world and, for better or worse, it is every single thing you ever thought it would be.
The story of the film appears to be this: like all boys, Christopher Robin one day outgrew his cherished childhood toys and left Hundred Acre Wood to explore the vast horizons of adulthood. However, in his absence, Winnie the Pooh and Piglet grew malicious and resentful, apparently feasting on the forest animals for sustenance while plotting to wreak a terrible revenge on their one-time friend. And when Christopher Robin finally returns home, a bloodbath ensues.
The trailer paints the film as a standard home invasion flick. Pooh and Piglet – while never shown face-on – seem to be adult humans in animal masks, perhaps in a nod to the forgotten Liv Tyler film The Strangers. They violently kidnap a bikini-clad young woman from one of Hundred Acre Wood’s famous jacuzzis, and daub “GET OUT” across some windows in blood. They take a girl’s eye, behead a woman in a swimming pool and then ritualistically gorge themselves on honey. Had the antagonists been anyone else at all, Blood and Honey would be the sort of zero-budget horror that would find itself aggressively destined for the bargain bin.
But the whole point of the film revolves around who the antagonists are. Up until now, Winnie the Pooh was known for his reassuring acceptance of the wider universe around him, so much so that latter-day revisionists had him pegged as a Taoist. He was a creature of the simple life; taking every new day as it came, just happy to be part of a beautiful world. There is, not that it needs to be spelled out, quite the gap between that mindset and the mindset of a hideous sentient pig-man who appears to be sexually aroused by graphic violence.
Winnie the- Pooh: Blood and Honey knows this, which is why its entire trading currency is controversy. Hot out of the gates, Rolling Stone has already called the film “childhood-ruining”, and everyone involved in the making of the film has to be hoping that this is the narrative that continues until the film’s release. It won’t matter whether the film is actually any good or not, because the whole point of it is that it gets to subvert an innocent icon like Pooh.
I’m not so sure, though. Blood and Honey has popped into existence with incredible speed. We’re promised a streaming release “soon”, but it’s important to remember that Winnie-the-Pooh only lapsed into the public domain in January. You sense that the makers were desperate to be the first film out of the gate. You don’t seize this quickly on a project, no matter how iconoclastic, unless there is real affection involved.
What’s more, the Milne estate should probably look upon this film with nothing but pride. True, they aren’t going to see any money out of it, but the simple fact that Winnie the Pooh has endured for this long – the character is now 95 years old – while remaining so indelible that he can still be an instantly recognisable cultural touchstone in a micro-budget exploitative horror movie is a triumph in itself. Deep down, anyone involved in the creative industries would be happy to learn that something they invented will be singled out for a classless gore-fest like this a century from now. I know I’d be thrilled.
Better yet, the advent of Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey means that something even bigger is on the horizon. True, Pooh might be the talk of the internet now but, in 2024, Steamboat Willie becomes public domain. That’s right, unless Blood and Honey is a commercial disaster, we are just two short years away from seeing a similarly schlocky film where Mickey Mouse murders a bunch of bikini-clad women on a paddleboat. It can’t come quickly enough.
