TMS Movie Review: The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar
(Netflix)
How lucky for movie fans when a beloved filmmaker releases not just one, but two features in a single year. In 2023, we not only get Asteroid City from indie film legend Wes Anderson, but also The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar, which is his second screen adaptation of a Roald Dahl story since Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009). If you’re familiar with Anderson’s work and are one of those casual fans who feel his style and technique have become ‘indulgent,’ ‘bloated,’ ‘spastic,’ and ‘predictable,’ then Henry Sugar might actually be for you. At a swift 40 minutes with only six actors inside a soundstage, this is Anderson at his most ‘less is more’ since Hotel Chevalier (2007).
Set in early 20th century England and India, we follow both Henry Sugar (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Imdad Khan (Ben Kingsley) as they reveal to the audience how they developed the ability to levitate and interact without direct eye contact. Imdad learned a magical method of meditation from an old guru known as The Great Yogi (Richard Ayoade), and Henry discovered the method from a study on Imdad published by Dr. Chatterjee (Dev Patel). Ralph Fiennes portrays Dahl himself as one of the narrators, and the five actors play most of the minor roles throughout the film as well.
(Netflix)
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar was produced and released by Netflix, along with three 15-minute shorts, The Swan, The Ratcatcher and Poison, directed by Anderson also based on Dahl stories. Henry Sugar has been receiving great reception for its small production values to match the modest runtime [i.e. no special effects beyond some basic props and not even an official score], as well as all the characters perfectly cast. Cumberbatch and Patel in particular stand out nicely and would fit in well with Anderson’s usual ensemble. It is nice to see the filmmaker have a calming, mellow atmosphere compared to the overly ambitious and exciting nature of his pictures in recent years. But ironically, the scaled back effort here made me realize I do like when he makes the most of his resources too. I especially missed Anderson’s usual stellar soundtracks of either 1960s/1970s tracks or original music by composers like Mark Mothersbaugh and Alexandre Desplat. Anderson’s choice to have all the dialogue just be the original book text from Henry Sugar spoken as narration by the actors might not work for some viewers either [it didn’t for me]. But at the end of the day, it’s good to be a Wes Anderson fan this season.