Review | The Thing with Feathers movie review: Benedict Cumberbatch carries a moving tale of grief

The celebrated source is Max Porter’s prize-winning 2015 debut novella, Grief Is the Thing with Feathers, which was previously turned into a play by Enda Walsh that Cillian Murphy headlined in 2019 at London’s Barbican.

Here, the story is adapted by Dylan Southern, a first-time feature director whose previous work includes No Distance Left to Run (2010) and Shut Up and Play the Hits (2012) – documentaries about the bands Blur and LCD Soundsystem, respectively.

This claustrophobic, intense work, haunted by the shadow of death, could not be more different.

Known only as “Dad”, Cumberbatch plays a children’s author, illustrator and father of two young boys (played by siblings Richard and Henry Boxall). Widowed after the sudden loss of his wife, he must now cope with the mundane realities of parenting them.