Featured Image Credit: A25/ Vortex
Ben Thompson
Winnie the Pooh is usually known for his happy personality and love of honey, but a new horror starring the bear is set to be a bloodbath.
The director of Winnie The Pooh: Blood and Honey, Rhys Frake-Waterfield, claims to have taken inspiration from iconic slasher flicks.
Speaking to SFX Magazine, Frake-Waterfield said: "The main franchises I was thinking of while making this were Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Wrong Turn.
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"I really like Wrong Turn. It’s not as big as the other ones, but the first one is on my little list of horror movies that I love."
The independent slasher film has gained notoriety before it's even hit the big screen, as the plot sees Pooh and his pal Piglet 'turn feral' and hunt down an adult Christopher Robin.
This is a far-cry from the lovable bear and pig duo seen in A.A. Milne's books and Walt Disney's animated features, in which Pooh and Piglet are close friends of the young Christopher.
The character of Winnie the Pooh entered the public domain in January 2022, meaning that the Walt Disney Company no longer hold the exclusive film rights to it.
However, Frake-Waterfield still had to be careful to distinguish his own characters from those shown in the Disney movies, for which they own the copyright.
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He said: "When we were coming up with this we knew that we would have to be really careful about what elements we used.
"We couldn't be influenced by the Disney version at all, so I consciously didn't watch anything by them.
"I went through the book and I purposefully tried to make our Pooh and Piglet as distinct as I could."
The film isn't due to hit cinemas until 15 February, but Frake-Waterfield is already weighing up inspiration for a sequel.
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"And as we’re going into the sequel soon, Terrifier 2 is going to be one of my key reference points. I want to make sure I go as big and epic as they went with that. I want to try and push it even more," he explained.
One character from the Hundred Acre Wood is noticeably absent from the slasher flick - Tigger, Pooh's hyperactive tiger friend.
This is because Tigger is still under copyright protection as he didn't appear in A.A. Milne's books until 1928.
Frake-Waterfield is looking to put some other beloved characters into the horror genre, with titles such as Bambi 2: The Reckoning and Peter Pan: Neverland Nightmare being promised.