Editor’s Be aware: This evaluate was initially revealed throughout the 2025 Cannes Movie Competition. Focus Options releases “Honey Don’t” in theaters Friday, August 22.
When watching final 12 months’s “Drive-Away Dolls,” I had the thought that, if I didn’t know this was a film directed by one of many Coen brothers, I might suppose this could be from somebody making an attempt very arduous to make a Coen brothers-esque movie.
The identical might be mentioned for Ethan Coen‘s follow-up to that movie, “Honey Don’t!” — one other lesbian caper with diminishing returns additionally starring Margaret Qualley. Like “Drive-Away Dolls,” Coen wrote the screenplay alongside together with his spouse Tricia Cooke. Additionally, like “Drive-Away Dolls,” it’s a slight work that’s too enamored with its personal quirkiness to quantity to a lot of something in any respect.
Whereas “Drive-Away Dolls” casts Qualley as a chaotic Southern broad, right here, Qualley performs Honey O’Donahue, a put-together non-public investigator in Bakersfield, California. Honey is a tough-talking gal who exhibits as much as the scene of a brutal automotive accident in crimson pumps, and brushes off come-ons from a dorky cop performed by Charlie Day by asserting she likes ladies. (Whereas not a lot about this movie is unbelievable, Honey’s wardrobe is to costume designer Peggy Schnitzer’s credit score.)
Honey is drawn right into a conspiracy of kinds when a lady who reached out to her for assist finally ends up lifeless on the backside of a cliff. Though Honey by no means formally began working for the sufferer, she’s curious sufficient to start out digging. This leads her to smell round a neighborhood church run by a lascivious Chris Evans as Reverend Drew, a holy man who offers medicine on the aspect and likes to have intercourse together with his congregants.
In the meantime, Honey strikes up an affair with an unassumingly seductive cop who goes by MG (Aubrey Plaza), all of the whereas Honey’s niece (Talia Ryder) will get into some hassle with a foul boyfriend and Honey’s sister (Kristen Connolly) is just too busy with too many kids to take care of that.
That is all to say there’s loads happening within the film’s very quick operating time, and when you’re hoping the threads all coalesce, properly, they don’t. As a substitute, “Honey Don’t!” appears like a mishmash of disparate elements that Coen and Cooke didn’t know the right way to match collectively. The tip result’s an exhausting disappointment, and a waste of the assembled expertise.
Whereas “Drive-Away Dolls” was psychedelically foolish — permitting it to get away with extra of its slipshod plotting — “Honey Don’t!” goals for a spin on noir however has zero curiosity in really growing a compelling thriller. It’s extra eager about the way it can reboot the aesthetics of the style. Although it’s set within the current day — with cell telephones as well — there’s a retro sheen that hangs over the affair. Honey wears stockings with seams and makes use of a rolodex despite the fact that her assistant (Gabby Beans) provides to digitize her operation.
Qualley sells the half properly, affecting a weary swagger, and but we’re by no means actually satisfied that she’s all that good at her job. She’s definitely higher than the police, who’re a bunch of bumbling fools, however she additionally by no means actually will get to the underside of any of the darkish goings-on in her city.
In reality, Evans’ plotline because the corrupt Reverend Drew basically runs parallel to Qualley’s and the shortage of intersection is a curious oversight. Evans is definitely relishing the prospect to play a big-headed jerk and is up for some gonzo intercourse scenes, however by the point his character leaves the narrative you’re undecided what the purpose of him being there was. Much more complicated: His drug operation is overseen by a French syndicate, who has despatched an alluring emissary performed by Lera Abova, who wears leopard print and rides round on a scooter. Once more, she seems cool, however to what finish?
I wish to say that Coen and Cooke have one thing on their minds concerning the state of America lately, however the perception doesn’t actually transcend the obvious condemnation of non secular greed and proper wing assholes. At one level, for instance, Honey destroys a foul man’s shotgun after which slaps a bumper sticker that reads “I Have a Vagina and I Vote” over his MAGA one. When the primary villain is revealed the motivation has one thing to do with anger over girls’s perceived submissiveness, however the screenplay may have used one other cross to make any of this sound logical.
The political commentary of “Honey Don’t!” additionally feels skinny as a result of Coen doesn’t have a powerful grasp on his setting. Working with cinematographer Ari Wegner, he provides up visuals that showcase the barrenness of the panorama and the rundown environment, however we by no means actually get a way of the social cloth of the place. My thoughts couldn’t assist wander over to “Fargo,” the Coens’ greatest identified crime comedy the place the setting shapes what we all know concerning the individuals we’re watching. In “Honey Don’t!” when individuals speak about being from Bakersfield, I don’t actually know what which means, precisely.
This particularly begins to grate when their respective upbringing within the place turns into a degree of rivalry between Honey and MG. It’s a disgrace as a result of, at the least for a bit of bit, the one place the place “Honey Don’t!” excels is within the chemistry between these two performers. That’s additionally the place the twist on noir conventions turns into intelligent. Plaza is a very butch femme fatale, wooing the daintier P.I. by fingering her in public at a bar.
However good intercourse doesn’t make a relationship, and it’s not sufficient to maintain a film both.
Grade: C-
“Honey Don’t” premiered on the 2025 Cannes Movie Competition. Focus Options will launch it in theaters on Friday, August 22.
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