Judging by the art being released so far, 2022 is kicking off the year of young feminine rage both in front of and behind the camera. Writer-director Avalon Fast’s HONEYCOMB, written with Emmett Roiko, premiered at this year’s Slamdance Film Festival. It’s an entrancing dive headfirst into the twisted labyrinth of young femme friendships at a time of unparalleled freedom—the time-outside-of-time known as summer vacation—where everyone and everything feels almost untouchable, consequences are hardly thought of, and any idea can come to life. Stuck in a repetitive rut somewhere in the middle of summer, Willow (Sophie Bawks-Smith) longs for the freedom to shed the skin of expectation and become something wholly new, away from the judgements of society. When she finds an abandoned cabin in the middle of the woods and begins to live there, she soon entices her group of friends to leave their responsibilities and other relationships behind and join her. As they begin planning their new lives together, the shine of novelty begins to wear away and they descend into a dreamlike sense of chaos.
One of my favorite things about indie film festivals is that they present opportunities for young and/or up-and-coming filmmakers to showcase their passion projects. Every inch of HONEYCOMB is the kind of labor of love that shines even when it falters. Even a cursory glance at the end credits shows almost every member of the cast also leant themselves, in true indie fashion, as part of the crew. Though made with her group of friends in mind and on hand, 21-year-old Avalon Fast’s abilities and passion for the craft and story she strives to tell are apparent in nearly every frame. HONEYCOMB transcends the realm of summer outing and catapults itself into a land of vaguely threatening sweetness. To underestimate it because of how or by whom it was made is to incur its wrath.
Willow and her friends Leader (Destini Stewart), Millie (Rowan Wales), Jules (Jillian Frank), Vicky (Mari Geraghty), and June (Jaris Wales) soon construct a social contract of their own for their new land of self-imposed exile, emphasizing the importance of both keeping the outside world out and keeping individual conflict resolution in. The rules are a means of both freedom and control, and just the kind of thing you would expect from your own friend group. Most notably is the tenet of unloading secrets and the concept of “suitable revenge”; where one emphasizes group input and reassurance, the other is entirely dependent on an individual concept of justice. Perhaps predictably, this hazy social construct is, much like in HONEYCOMB’s lifeblood LORD OF THE FLIES, its undoing.
The atmosphere of their new land of freedom is almost immediately conveyed to us as a place with violence boiling just barely under the surface waiting to spring out thanks in part to Fast and Roiko’s script, seemingly stitched together at its seams with the blood, sweat, and tears it must have taken to make the film itself, and Max Graham’s unsettling score. At every turn of phrase there is the hint of isolation and rage, of primal longing for freedom from consequences and ennui in the face of ordinary social ideas. Every decision they make feels almost unreal because the world they’ve crafted for themselves is outside their usual understanding of reality. A world they made on their own with no input from anyone who would force them to be anything other than whoever they wanted—so long as who they want to be falls in line with their own rules.
HONEYCOMB does away with the usual hierarchical structure of femme friendships; there is no individual girl in charge or enforcing her will upon any of the others after Willow convinces them to stay. Each of them makes their own choices, enacts their own justice, and has their own struggles with how they feel about the world they left behind. They also, at one point or another, use their own influence to achieve a desired outcome. As a result, there are hardly any fully innocent parties by film’s end. And perhaps that’s as it should be. No one comes out unscathed, and no matter how you frame it, the future is an imposing reality none of us can run from.
HONEYCOMB shows us one thing is certain, however: the future of film is safe in the hands of women like Avalon Fast.
Tags: Avalon Fast, Destini Stewart, Emmett Roiko, Film Festival, Honeycomb, Jaris Wales, Jillian Frank, Mari Geraghty, Max Graham, Rowan Wales, Slamdance 2022, Slamdance Film Festival, Sophie Bawks-Smith, Women In Horror
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