The Life of Chuck

One of my favorite podcasts is The Kingcast, created by Eric Vespe and the late Scott Wampler. A question they often ask of their guests is what is their “Stephen King origin story”. And while I read my first King book almost 40 years ago, all the way up to reading his latest novel Never Flinch earlier this week. I have to admit my origin began with the films. Particularly Kubrick’s The Shining, (which I watched mostly through my fingers) followed closely by Cujo. Over the years and the 50 plus film/TV versions of his stories, something I have learned to appreciate more and more is a strong film adaptation.

Adapting King is not always easy, you can get the beats and bits of dialogue right, but landing the tone and the feel is something many directors have not been able to capture. The ones that stand out are Frank Darabont and Rob Reiner. Both have made strong films based on King’s work. Coming up fast on that list is Mike Flanagan. This will be his third film adaptation of a King story, the first being Doctor Sleep and Gerald’s Game both thought to be unfilmable, but he proved that wrong on both counts. His latest attempt is based on King’s novella The Life of Chuck. A story in three chapters told in reverse order. While the film follows the story almost to the letter, which revolves around the character of Charles ‘Chuck’ Krantz, it’s about so much more.

Our narrator (Nick Offerman) introduces us to Marty Anderson (Chiwetel Ejiofor) a teacher dealing with quite possibly the literal end of the world. The internet is going down, parts of the world are falling into the sea, there are mass suicides. But surprisingly we see very little chaos in Marty’s part of the world. He is still frightened along with his ex-wife Felicia Gordon (Karen Gillan) who is a nurse experiencing the human loss first hand. As they go along their seemingly pointless days they begin to notice billboard and TV ads popping up thanking a Mr. Charles Krantz (Tom Hiddleston) for 39 great years. As the end looms closer and the couple become more scared we move to the next chapter with Chuck, the man from the ads just living his normal, some would say boring life on a day where he does something out of character for him. Leading the the third chapter where we see Chuck as a young man played by Benjamin Pajak. Who after losing his parents moves in with his grandparents played by Mia Sara and Mark Hamill.

A superpower King has is making his stories feel effortless. When you read some of his work, you think ‘that’s simple’ but it’s not, there is always more there and his character development is nearly unparalleled. Here in The Life of Chuck writer/director Mike Flanagan does the same. He didn’t alter the story to make it overly dramatic or even more cinematic. He kept the story virtually unchanged even keeping the reverse narrative intact. And Nick Offerman as the narrator, while not doing a King impersonation, he certainly captures the essence of King when you listen to him performing an audiobook version of one of his stories. The cadence and tone are spot on.

What also makes this film unique aside from its storytelling device is the cast. It truly is an ensemble piece. Most of the actors get one to two scenes total. We get to see David Dastmalchian, Matthew Lillard, Carl Lumbly, Q’orianka Kilcher, Jacob Tremblay, Kate Siegal, Heather Langenkamp, and Samantha Sloyan. They all simply crush it in their limited screen time. And where has Mia Sara been? She is incredible as Chuck’s grandmother. She is sweet, sincere, funny and you love her in every scene she is in. Hamill also pulls his weight as a crotchety old grandpa, quite a ways from how I was introduced to him nearly 50 years ago as Luke Skywalker.

The boldest move however has to go to studio NEON to put this film out in the middle of summer.. Chuck doesn’t have a cute blue CG alien, there are no superheroes punching things, and there is not a digital dinosaur or dragon to be found. But it does capture something rarely seen in film. Life. Our lives. The things that matter to us. The connections we create throughout our lives, and what an interesting journey it can be. It’s also a wonderful reminder of what cinema can accomplish when a touching story is placed in the right hands. It’s clear that Flanagan like so many others, loves King’s words. And this is by far his greatest adaptation of King’s work and world’s he able to create. They honestly all do contain multitudes, and it’s incredible to see.

Some general audiences, specifically ones that mostly go to the movies in the summer may say The Life of Chuck is “a movie about nothing”. To which I would reply: “Yes, it is about nothing, and it’s about everything. Isn’t that beautiful?”