The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar

I have not read The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar by Roald Dahl, so I was unsure what to expect from this short film, but I was pleasantly surprised. The plot follows Henry Sugar when he finds a book about man who could see with his eyes closed, and from there, Henry Sugar attempts to learn how to do the same. The art style and direction of the film is unlike anything I have watched before thanks to Wes Anderson's directing. Benedict Cumberbatch is fantastic as Henry Sugar, and I quite liked the supporting cast as well. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is worth watching, and you will not regret spending the time on this book to film adaptation.

'The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar' is the first of four shorts by Wes Anderson. This production is the perfect visualization of a book. The transitions are peculiar and they contributed greatly to make the story flow smoothly. The editing was absolutely phenomenal with a few cuts placed in the right moments. The 1.33:1 aspect ratio immersed me even more in the story. All the trademarks of the director are there: the perfect symmetry of the sets, the actor placed exactly in the right spot and the fairy mood. The plot is engaging and exotic. I like the development and I was genuinely curious to see how everything was going to wrap up. This is how you tell a trivial story in an original and fresh way. The cast is composed of many great actors: with a team such as Benedict Cumberbatch, Ralph Fiennes and Ben Kingsley you know that simply you cannot go wrong. All of them have a very pleasant and clean British accent, which for me is an added value. My final mark is 7.5 stars out of 10.

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is a great short film that doesn't waste a second of its shorter run time and definitely works as a short film in a way a feature length film simply cannot. The energy, the pace and the complexity comes together so well in an exhilarating, immaculate story of kindness.

Unusually, this is a cast who are mostly new to the world of Wes but Benedict Cumberbatch, Dev Patel and Ben Kingsley are note perfect here in a way that hopefully results in many more future collaborations. Richard Ayoade on the other hand, feels surprisingly underutilised.

Wes Anderson has never had more control of the frame or everything inside it. It's standard issue that it's going to be gorgeous to look at and rife with detail but the real strength of his direction here is the way it's able to feel so theatrical in its construction yet still be inherently cinematic.

I am not familliar with any previous works or repuation of the creators whatsover, I just watched this short movie out of curiosity since it was on Netflix.

So this seemed to be a sort of first person narrative where the characters speak the story themselves? Think of it when a person reads a book out loud at home, but in this case they are reading to us the viewers.

The story of this piece focused on various qualities of generosity and depthful feelings. It was interesting to see the characters describe their feelings while not showing any type of emotions. Due to the nature of this film, I wasn't sure what to think, the concept is good but I found it perplexing.

My only issue is the pacing, I am unsure if this was on purpose or not. This flim piece moved way too fast, to where even I had trouble keeping up or understanding what was going on. Perhaps this is how the film was designed to be or I needed a deeper level of understanding?

I think we can all agree that the format of this 'content' is very different from what we are used to. On the one hand, it has the features of an "audible book". But it most certainly also has features that fit with a stage play. Actually, it seems like a hybrid of the two, which I for certain have never seen before.

And whilst it is different, people tend to start agreeing with extreme ratings: i.e. They either say they like it very well and give it a rating of 10 stars, or they hate it and go for a 1 star rating. And since I do not want my review being tainted by chosing either of the two camps, I simply chose to not give it an IMDb rating. This so that either camp can agree with my review instead of a rating...

That this is some new type of content is obvious. I personally think it is more a natural evolution of (1) reading books, to (2) audiobooks, and now (3) this new format.

I think a term of "cinematic book" may fit with what we see here: a book that is read to an audience by using renowned actors in a format that fits cinema.

With many new things, I was confused at what exactly I was watching when I started this content. And honestly said, it took me several minutes to adjust to it. As an avid bookreader myself, I have enjoyed quite a number of Roald Dahl's books. Not being a fan of audiobooks myself, I never ever listened to his books. But this "cinematic book" is just a different experience. There is so much added richness to it, that I really started to enjoy it. So rich actually, that I had trouble keeping up with the fast-paced storytelling. There is so much to see in each of the different sets that it is pretty difficult to ingest all you hear and see. And I think this will be even a bigger challenge for viewers from non-english speaking countries which need to rely on subtitles. So, I think it may be a recommendation to (1) first "watch" it with a primary focus on listening to the story, and (2) a second time to enjoy the richly detailed scenes.

Concluding, I think we witness here the evolution of how we may "read" books. An evolution that first started with the introduction of audiobooks, which we now see evolve in a content genre that I can describe best as a "cinematic book". And whilst it takes some moments to get used to, I definitely want to see more of it in the future.