Winnie the Pooh: Blood & Honey

It's 2024, and many of our favorite childhood characters are becoming public domain, meaning anyone can use the rights to Mickey Mouse and a variety of famous Disney characters in any format and genre. The same goes for Winnie The Pooh, the lovable chubby bear who loves honey and his human pal Christopher. But Pooh's time in the Magic Castle is up and has become a resident of the public domain where in no time whatsoever, some horror filmmaker took those characters and made a bloody horror slasher titled Winnie The Pooh: Blood and Honey.

This is by no means a big-budget film with named actors, but rather a movie from the U.K. that costs five figures only and does what it aims to be - a bloody great time that pits iconic family-friendly characters into a tale of murder and mayhem. It's not entirely sure if this film would play any better if it had a Michael Bay type of budget, but with the cash flow Blood and Honey has, the gore is on display for all to enjoy. But how does a filmmaker take universally loved characters of all ages and make them sadistic, cold-blooded killers?

Well, horror movie-maker Rhys Frake-Waterfield delivers a prologue in animated form about how great life was in the Hundred Acre Wood for a while, but then Christopher Robin grew up and left his animal pals Pooh Bear, Piglet, Eeyore, Owl, and Rabbit to their own devices. Life wasn't good for these animals in Christopher's absence. It all hit a boiling point when the animals were starving and they all turned on the sad-eyed donkey Eeyore and ate him alive. This all happens within the first few minutes of the film. After these horrifying experiences, the animals all make a pact of revenge on Christopher and anyone who gets in their way.

Now it takes a creative mind to dive into a family-oriented character list like Winnie the Pooh and serve up a horror show like that, but it magically works. And from that prologue, the fun doesn't stop as an older Christopher Robin and his girlfriend come back to the 100 Acre Woods, where Pooh and Piglet murder his girlfriend and hold Robin hostage by torturing him in hopes of having a maniacal reunion with his animal pals. But to keep the body count high, Waterfield adds a subplot of a woman and her friends vacationing in the woods where the animal killers can have their fair share of carnage throughout the movie. But again, this a super small budget where the costumes and masks are not exactly Hollywood material. But that doesn't matter. It's all about the blood splatter, guts, and weapons used in this movie to shock its audience with what these characters could do if the horror genre was born in their universe. It doesn't disappoint and is a far better film than Oppenheimer.

Vital Disc Stats: The Blu-ray
Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey eats its way to Blu-ray via Scream Factory with one disc housed inside a hard, blue plastic case. The artwork features the masked Pooh with his axe under a full moon with a full body shot of him waiting to kill underneath. It's not a bad poster. The reverse artwork features Pooh and Piglet inside a car with their hogtied victim in the middle of the road.

This film comes with a 1080p HD transfer that looks great with its $60k budget. Colors are robust in daytime sequences or when a fire lights up the darkened woods or sheds. Red blood brightens up the screen anytime it pours or spits on anyone. The fires give off a nice orange and yellow tint as well. Other greens in trees or brown and beige in grass look satisfactory as well. This isn't a particularly bright film so the darkness is key to its tone. Luckily, the black levels are mostly inky with very few spots turning up murky. Skin tones are also natural. The detail is sharp and vivid, even in the darker scenes where rubber and latex masks show their textures well. Other close-ups reveal decent practical gore and individual hairs on the actor's faces. There are no major hiccups with the video as far as aliasing or banding either. For what it is and where it came from, this little horror movie looks great in HD.

This release comes with a fantastic DTS-HD 5.1 audio track that utilizes all the screams and guts in the film. Sound effects are loud and robust with every chop, axe swing, gut punch, and skin slice sounding gooey and wonderful. The screams and footsteps can be heard from each speaker and there is a nice fluid and dynamic sound that flows and transitions over from the surround speaker to the next one. The low end of the bass has a great rumble to it when the chaos ramps up. The dialogue is clean, crisp, and easy to follow. This is a top-notch horror audio track. There is also a 2.0 stereo option available as well with English subtitles.

Only 18 minutes worth of extras are included here, all of which are Zoom-conducted interviews, which is a shame. A little more behind-the-scenes material would have been fun to see. 

• Something's Wrong With Piglet (HD, 16 Mins.) - Unfortunately, this featurette consists of Zoom interviews with the director, producer, and a couple of the actors. They discuss how the project got a $60k budget, the gore, and going all in on the horror. The group talks fondly of the shoot and how much fun it was, however, there is no on-set footage included.
• Trailer (HD, 2 Mins.) - Trailer for the film.

Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey certainly doesn't hold anything back. It's horror and creative gore and story re-telling is a lot of fun and oozes what it means to be a low-budget indie filmmaker. Plus to watch Pooh, Piglet, Owl, and Rabbit viciously eat the depressed donkey is amazing. The 1080p HD image looks very good and the DTS-HD 5.1 audio track sounds excellent. The one extra has some fun information but there's not a lot too it. Where else will anyone see Winnie The Pooh murder scantily clad women in cold blood? Nowhere. This is Highly Recommended! 

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