disclaimer: I’m a blind film critic. Initially, I reviewed this film without audio description, because none was immediately available. Following my first review, I was contacted by Shudder, which provided me an audio described version with description by Diffuse.

In terms of audio description, IFC/Shudder/AMC Networks has just been really not great. I don’t know how else to say it, except they oddly have a near barren streaming service, despite making audio description for theatrical titles. With honey Bunch, which i believed went straight to Shudder, I wasn’t expecting audio description, as nearly everything else I’ve seen off that platform, minus Access horrror 2025 lacked AD. So color me shocked when someone reached out. I’m sure he has since been renditioned, and I’ll never get another AD track again, but for the moment, let’s talk about the one I got. honey Bunch.

Initially, my thoughts were that if I was missing gore, it wouldn’t be enough to get me over the hump anyway. I wanted the film to feel more like a psychological thriller than a body horror film, and with the audio description, it kind of did. Don’t get me wrong, there’s body horror in here, which isn’t really the focus, but more of like seeing what is behind door #2 than an actual commitment to excessive gore or body horror. Instead, the film does lean rather well on this bizarre facility that our primary couple is, and the potentially insidious nature of it.

So what changed? Grace Glowicki is still phenomenal. Her performance without audio description carried the film, but here, she’s supported by the AD really fleshing out her physical choices. Grace’s performance is one of maybe two in the first three months of 2026 thus far worth remembering potentially for awards consideration at the end of the year.

running a close second is Jason Issacs, who plays a secondary character, a father who has brought his daughter to this same facility for her to recuperate. It’s Issacs, so of course he’s good, but there’s a lot more pain in his character than Homer (Ben Petrie), who still reminds me a lot of Jack Quaid.

The film, without too many spoilers, is about a couple that is at a special holistic retreat because the girl suffered an accident, and her partner is paying to have her memory restored. Why I wanted it to be more of a psychological thriller is that the film mentions that they can’t control which memories come back, so she is restored, fragmented. I thought how cool would that be, for her to remember all the wrong things, slowly creating an anxiety over her partnership, then remembering when it was too late the good things. There is a movie for you. If all you kept remembering was every fight, or every barbed conversation, how would that shape your new reality?

We instead get a version that focuses a lot more on the how, like how this is all happening, and what this facility is really achieving, and the things they do to get results.With audio description, it is a tighter thriller than I gave it credit for, with some truly unnerving moments.Things seemingly that can’t be explained, things that seem random at first, until context is given. The audio description does quite a bit for the film, and it does focus a lot on the psychological edge of it all. this film isn’t nearly as gory or violent as I assumed, and does lean properly into an unsettling truth about trust.

Madeline Sims-Fear and Dusty Mancelli wrote, produced, and directed this. I’m more impressed now, but I shouldn’t have to crawl around on the floor begging for scraps for IFC/Shudder to take notice. Even a simple ask of being able to use a contact there for future accessibility requests was met with a wish upon a star. Complaining about a studio does not affect how I feel about a film. I’ve been calling out IFC/Shudder for a while now, and yet my favorite film of 2024 was Ghostlight, and my favorite of 2025 was The Plague. Go figure.

Yes, the audio description flipped this from rotten to fresh. Truthfully, it was high enough up the rotten side anyway, it was almost assured enough of a bump. In all my years, I think only once was I given audio description and the things clarified for me made the film work less. Here, it made it work more, and a lot more. My target demo is blind and low vision, and I have no earthly idea how you all will see it, but perhaps if you wish upon a star like me, the benevolence of AMC Networks will shine down upon us, and we will get the accessibility we need, which they made anyway.

Honey Bunch has a killer lead performance from Grace Glowicki, who manages to provide a sweet and earthy tone, while preparing us for final girl energy. A psychological thriller not to be missed.

Fresh: Final Grade: 7.7/10