‘The Thing with Feathers’ Review – Benedict Cumberbatch Battles Familiar Grief Monster Metaphor [Sundance]

Director Dylan Southern’s melancholic dark fantasy drama, The Thing with Feathers, doesn’t exactly set out to scare, but it is cut from the same cloth as The Babadook and similar grief metaphor horror movies. The adaptation of Max Porter’s acclaimed novel Grief is the Thing with Feathers stars Benedict Cumberbatch as a newly widowed father so lost in his overwhelming grief that it manifests in the form of a monstrous, talking Crow voiced by David Thewlis. Despite the effectiveness of Crow’s acerbic nature and creature design, this grief metaphor languishes too long in its suffocating sorrow.

The story introduces Cumberbatch’s grief-stricken cartoonist, credited simply as “Dad,” just after he’s buried his wife, who died suddenly and unexpectedly. Her absence leaves an unfillable hole in the family’s life and disrupts their routine to a catastrophic degree. Adjusting to single fatherdom, raising two interchangeably rambunctious young sons presents a slew of painful and frustrating struggles that only exacerbate Dad’s grief. When time refuses to heal any of Dad’s wounds, haunting visions of a crow suddenly become more imposing and sinister. Soon, Dad begins to pour himself into his work and disassociates as the menacing Crow plagues the home and threatens to destroy a family that’s barely hanging on by a thread.

There’s a strong visual element to The Thing with Feathers that threatens to inject life into an otherwise dour affair.