25 August 2024. Wes Anderson, widely known for his unique and spectacular symmetrical framing, narrative style and eccentric melodramatic characters. On an interview with IndieWire, Wes Anderson confirmed his upcoming short-film “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar”. It will be officially released on the streaming platform Netflix.
Netflix was the ideal platform for this movie screening because the film is only 37 minutes long and isn’t actually a full length feature. There was a well-known show that the BBC used to produce called “Play for Today” under the direction of filmmakers like Steven Frears, John Schlesinger, and Alan Clarke. They lasted hardly an hour. That is how Anderson envisioned “Henry Sugar”.
It seems like “Henry Sugar” will resemble Anderson’s 2007 short “Hotel Chevelier,” a 13-minute prequel to his full-length film “The Darjeeling Limited,” which starred Jason Schwartzman and Natalie Portman.
Henry Sugar, the antagonist in the title of the story, takes a book that teaches him how to foresee the future and see through things. This sets off a series of incidents that involve eluding Mafia goons, creating new identities with a Hollywood makeup artist, and founding orphanages all over the world.
Wes Anderson’s First Movie for a Streaming Platform
Director also said regarding “Henry Sugar” adaption that since one would never release a short film like that in theatres, the decision is more likely to be a streaming release than a full-fledged theatre release. The theatres would need to provide cheaper tickets or show two films. Anderson only had positive experiences with Netflix, but he’s thrilled to be releasing “Asteroid City” in theatres. Focus and Universal are doing this in a true cinematic manner. Anderson actually wants his films to be shown that way.
Robert Yeoman, Wes Anderon’s longtime associate since both of them were attending college, provided certain details about the production. On a stage, three of the stories were filmed. One of them is in a jungle on its own. So, putting all of this together on stage was quite challenging. And they all have a pretty distinctive appearance. When he watched the finished film, the first thing he wrote to Wes was that he just adored the 16mm. They shot the entire thing on 16mm. It has such a distinctive appearance.
Prior to its Sept. 27 release on Netflix, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar will have its Venice Film Festival premiere.
The film is adapted from the author Roald Dahl’s collection of short stories from 1977. The film is going to be 37 minutes long. The filmmaker’s stop motion animated movie “The Fantastic Mr. Fox” was the first Dahl adaption.
The director, Wes Anderson, said it was more out of necessity than personal desire that he worked with the streamer. Anderson, who has long been passionately in favour of movie theatres and adamantly opposed to the use of streaming services, created this film for Netflix in response to the streaming service’s 2018 acquisition of the Dahl library’s rights.
Ben Kingsley, Dev Patel, Ralph Fiennes, and Benedict Cumberbatch are all featured in the movie. Remarkably, “Henry Sugar” is Anderson’s first Netflix original.
