REVIEW: 'The Life of Chuck' is a beautiful, joyous ode to life
With a career built on psychological horror fare such as The Shining, Misery, and Carrie, it would be remiss to overlook the decidedly non-horror entries in Stephen King’s impressive oeuvre.
Indeed, for as many times as he’s dived into the depths of human fear, King has proven equally adept at crafting stories of hope, resilience, and the power of the human spirit with the likes of Rita Hayworth and The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile.
The Life of Chuck, the latest film to be adapted from a King work, falls decidedly into the latter category. Playing out in non-chronological order, the film tells the story of Chuck Krantz (played by the MCU’s Loki himself, Tom Hiddleston), a man around whom the entire world seemingly revolves. While it’s never explicitly stated, Chuck’s importance becomes obvious in increasingly offbeat ways, appearing everywhere, from billboards to TV ads. As director Mike Flanagan takes us through three distinct phases of Chuck’s life, the journey that takes us from a global apocalypse and a showstopping dance number, to childhood and eventual adolescence, will delight and surprise viewers in the unlikeliest of ways.
While Tom Hiddleston crushing a six-minute dance number (brilliantly choreographed by Mandy Moore!) is getting the lion’s share of press, the film features a stacked ensemble with Chiwetel Ejiofor, Karen Gillan, and Matthew Lillard as people seeking friends at the end of the world. Flanagan’s Haunting of Hill House alumni Kate Siegel, Annalise Bass, and Samantha Sloyan appear in key supporting roles, while Cody Flanagan, Benjamin Pajak, and Jacob Tremblay play Chuck in his younger years.
Ejiofor has made a career of roles that require him to apply logic and reason in situations devoid of them, and his turn here as Marty is no exception. When his students start abandoning their studies in the face of one global cataclysm after another, Marty’s decision to spend his remaining time with his ex-wife is entirely reasonable. Heck knows there are worse places to be when the Book of Revelation starts reading like a sneak preview.
Of the cast, Mia Sara and Mark Hamill leave an indelible impression as Chuck’s doting grandparents. It is Chuck’s grandmother (the appropriately named) Sarah who instills a love of dance in the young man, introducing him to her favorite steps and classic movie musicals. It may not be immediately clear when you see Hiddleston’s adult Chuck tapping his toes to a street-side busker, but the positive effect that Grandma Sarah has on the boy resonates through to the end of (his) days.
Hamill shines as Chuck’s grandfather Albie, a pragmatic accountant who believes in the sanctity of mathematics above all else, influencing Chuck to essentially follow in his number-crunching footsteps. Lovably gruff, Albie has an ironclad rule forbidding Chuck from exploring the cupola atop their Victorian-era home. It is here that Stephen King’s penchant for supernatural plots and magical realism comes into play in a way that makes Albie’s concerns feel altogether justified.
To director Flanagan’s credit, the film’s non-linear structure lets the audience piece the story together for themselves in a way that never feels pandering or forced. Even when all is (somewhat) revealed, the picture the film paints is far from linear, effectively guaranteeing post-screening discussions.
Wibbly wobbly, timey wimey? You don’t know the half of it. To say more would be doing the movie and its endlessly talented cast a disservice; suffice it to say that if you only see one film this year blending dance, grief, advertising, Gene Kelly, and Back to the Future in a sentimental, life-affirming tale from the legendary Master of Horror, let it be Life of Chuck.