MOVIE OF THE WEEK June 12, 2026: HONEYJOON
Part mother-daughter comedy, part grief drama, part generational clash, and part travelogue, writer/director Lilian T. Mehrel’s charming, poignant Honeyjoon tells the story of two women in mourning whose complicated feelings — for themselves, for each other, and for the loved one they’ve lost — must be sorted out before they can move forward. The fact that it’s all happening while they’re in the gorgeous Azores Islands both helps and hinders their journey.
June (Ayden Mayeri) and her Persian British mother, Lela (Amira Casar), have come to the Azores to honor June’s father/Lela’s husband on the first anniversary of his passing. He spent time there briefly long ago and always remembered it fondly, so the two women decided it was an appropriate place to mark the somber occasion. What they didn’t plan for was to be the only pair of people around who aren’t on a romantic honeymoon. For widowed therapist Lela, seeing happy couples makes her both wistful and cynical — and for single-and-looking June, it makes her all the more annoyed by the fact that she’s sharing a bed in paradise with her mom.
As they tour the island and get to know their handsome guide, João (José Condessa), Lela and June also negotiate their sometimes prickly relationship. Lela is distracted by memories of her dead husband and horrified by stories of women who are being oppressed and hurt in her beloved Iran. June, meanwhile, often rolls her eyes at her mother and begs Lela to lighten up — but her sarcasm and disaffected demeanor are also defense mechanisms that she uses to avoid the big emotions she’s terrified to feel.
Before the sun sinks over the North Atlantic for the last time during their sojourn, Lela and June will make significant strides toward healing and reconnecting, all of which Mehrel handles with a light but meaningful touch. The women’s dialogue sounds authentic, the pacing is leisurely without being slow, and the story doesn’t overstay its welcome, clocking in at a tight 75 minutes. Moments of wry humor, especially involving the resort concierges, keep things from getting too maudlin, and the end result is a film that, much like the process of mourning itself, is a mix of laughter and tears.
— Betsy Bozdech
Team #MOTW’s comments:
Nell Minow:Honeyjoon is a lyrically filmed story of a mother and daughter who are very different in temperament, outlook, experience, and even culture. They are also different in the way they are grieving their husband and father a year after his death, so decide to visit for the first time a place he loved. Writer/director Lilian T. Mehrel’s film is lyrical, poignant, and thoughtful and the performances by Ayden Mayeri and Amira Casar are exceptionally sensitive and authentic.
Leslie Combemale That Honeyjoon is marketed as “a sexy dark comedy” in some ways does it a disservice. Lilian T. Mehrel’s film is much more about a complicated yet tender mother/daughter experience in which they grieve as both individual women and as family. There’s much to appreciate in the performances and nuanced script, with Mehrel bringing you an adult story and asking you to approach it head on, with maybe even some subjectivity from your own experience with loss or child/parent relationship.
Jennifer Merin Filmmaker Lilian T. Mehrel’s superb first feature, Honeyjoon, is the poignant and humorous, perfectly paced and entirely entertaining story of a Persian-British mother and daughter who are vacationing together to mark the first anniversary of the death of ther beloved (respectively) husband and father. The two have traveled to an Azores island on a special deal intended for honeymooners. They find that they are the only guests at an all inclusive resort who are not hotly in love. The poolside smooching is distracting, to say the least, and their travel package provides for a room with just one queen size bed. As they rub up against the resort’s ambience of romance and each other, the generational differences in their social expectations and behavior create clashes. However, their mutual grief and their consoling each other brings them to a mutual understanding that is truly heartwarming. Honeyjoon is an exquisitely crafted film. The performances are brilliant. The cinematography captures intimate interpersonal moments and the wide scope of the sea. And the island scenography is so alluring that you really want to be there.
Sandie Angulo Chen: Honeyjoon is a dramedy from first-time director Lilian T. Mehrel about a Persian/Kurdish mother and her American-born daughter on a commemorative trip to the Azores on the first anniversary of their husband/father’s death. Their tour package is meant for honeymooners, and the resort is full of canoodling couples. The film captures the nuances of intergenerational relationships, the ways both women experience loneliness and grief, and the importance of intimacy, whether through heartfelt conversation, physical touch, or romantic connection. Actors Amira Casar and Ayden Mayeri deliver standout performances as mother Lela and daughter June.
Loren King You may feel like you’ve been transported to a remote vacation idyll mere minutes into Honeyjoon as the film drops us onto a sparsely-populated, sumptuous island in the Azores so mountainous and lush that visitors and locals alike describe it as “paradise.” But for Lela (Amira Casar) and her twenty something daughter June (Ayden Mayeri), the trip is more nuanced and somber. They have traveled back in time to a site that was special to Lela’s husband and Joon’s father who died of cancer just a year ago. Director Lilian T. Mehrel intersperses silent home movie footage of the sparkling ocean and verdant hills presumably shot on that long ago trip. We only glimpse Lela’s husband in a photograph from that visit. But through these grainy, evocative images his presence informs the story, just as memories of her life in Iran before 1979 when she fled to England, still haunt Lela. Mother and daughter, each processing grief in her own way, have traveled to the island seeking closure. But, it turns out, they find a new beginning.
Liz Whittemore Directed by Lilian T. Mehrel, Honeyjoon is a heartfelt and humorous mother-daughter vacation film that explores generational nuance, cultural identity, and shared grief. The narrative centers on the contrasting desires and personalities of Lela, a grief-stricken Persian-Kurdish mother deeply tied to her heritage, and June, her self-absorbed, millennial American daughter who uses a detached attitude to mask unresolved emotional trauma. Their relationship organically evolves from miscommunication to genuine connection through their interactions with a charming local tour guide named João and his grandmother, who suffers from dementia. Anchored by the powerful chemistry and authentic performances of Amira Casar and Ayden Mayeri—alongside a vibrant performance by José Condessa—the film is further elevated by Inés Gowland’s thoughtful, naturally lit cinematography. Ultimately, Honeyjoon serves as a poignant, beautifully framed exploration of the unspoken turmoil and healing that exists within the complex bond between adult children and their parents.
Monique Jones Honeyjoon is a funny and heartfelt film about the pains of growing beyond the life of a loved one who has passed on. The film is about a mother and daughter who are figuring out how to move on after the one-year anniversary of the man they call husband and father. But there’s also a stealthy conversation about how Iranians who escaped the Iranian Revolution of 1979 can find a way to live again despite the “slow goodbye” they’re experiencing with their country. Read full review.
Cate Marquis director/writer Lilian T. Mehrel sets her quiet family dramedy Honeyjoon, her directorial debut, a film which explores the relationship between this mother and daughter and their different styles of dealing with loss. Read full review.
FILM DETAILS:
Title: Honeyjoon
Director: Lilian T. Mehrel
Release Date: June 10, 2026
Running Time: 75 minutes
Language: English
Screenwriter: Lilian T. Mehrel
Lead Performers: Amira Casar, Ayden Mayeri, Jose Condessa
Distribution Company: Circle Collective, Utopia
AWFJ Movie of the Week Panel Members: Sandie Angulo Chen, Betsy Bozdech, Leslie Combemale, Monique Jones, Loren King, Cate Marquis, Jennifer Merin, Nell Minow, Liz Whittemore
Other Movies Opening This Week
Edited by Jennifer Merin
