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Washington Post
12-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Washington Post
‘The Life of Chuck' is a wondrous affirmation by way of Stephen King
The cosmic calendar and Walt Whitman's 'Song of Myself' work in unlikely tandem in 'The Life of Chuck,' filmmaker Mike Flanagan's latest venture into Stephen King's multitude-packed mind. As the scientific conceit makes clear, our lives are but imperceptible blips on the vast timeline of the universe. Yet Whitman's poem raises the idea that every psyche contains another sprawling world unto itself, populated with the people, memories and scars we collect while navigating our finite existence. What are we if not the remarkable sum of our experiences and our imaginations? Adapted by Flanagan from Stephen King's 2020 novella, this meditation on the bittersweet beauty of the human condition is sweeping in sentiment and surgical in intent. Flanagan wants his audience to reflect on the passing moments of connection that carry outsize significance and the simple joys that make life worth living. Not saccharine but soulful, 'The Life of Chuck' arrives at life-affirming profundity through a blend of surrealist wonder and humanist truth. It's no wonder this marvel of a movie claimed the Toronto International Film Festival's coveted audience prize last fall. Tom Hiddleston stars as the titular Charles Krantz, a dying accountant with a dormant love of dance, though we don't properly meet him until the middle of three 'acts' that unfold in reverse chronological order. But we do get enigmatic glimpses of him in 'Thanks, Chuck,' an opening stanza that alternately unnerves and compels while posing a puzzle that's pieced together in due time. Even if Nick Offerman's narrator at one point asks, 'Would answers make a good thing better?' — seemingly setting the stage for ambiguity — this heart-on-its-sleeve venture doesn't leave much unsaid. In the initial act, environmental Armageddon has arrived. The internet, spotty for months, seems to have evaporated for good. Fires are blazing in the Midwest. Floods are sinking Florida. Earthquakes are ravaging California. And did a volcano just erupt in Germany? All the while, Hiddleston's smirking bean counter is being celebrated on billboards and broadcasts with the same platitude: 'Charles Krantz: 39 Great Years! Thanks, Chuck!' Yet no one recognizes the man or has any clue what the hoopla is about. As an affable undertaker (Carl Lumbly) says, he's the 'Oz of the apocalypse.' Chiwetel Ejiofor anchors the opening segment as a solemn schoolteacher reconnecting with his ex-wife (Karen Gillan), a nurse at a hospital so overwhelmed that the staff have started calling themselves the 'Suicide Squad.' Exuding palpable pathos, Ejiofor and Gillan are worthy vessels for this voyage into the void as the Newton Brothers' soothing score hums and Flanagan serves up fleetingly fantastical imagery. Set nine months earlier, the second act, 'Buskers Forever,' introduces Hiddleston's Chuck as a genial fellow with a loving wife, a teenage son and an undetected brain tumor. As Chuck strolls past a drummer busking on a street corner (Taylor Gordon), a dormant desire to dance takes over. Gleefully roping in a passerby fresh off a breakup (Annalise Basso), our startlingly loose-limbed protagonist struts up a storm in a euphoric jolt of live-life-to-the-fullest joy. How this exhilarating detour circles back to the opening chapter's existential despair is a satisfying journey explored in a final act that's best left unspoiled. Centered on a younger Chuck — played by Benjamin Pajak at age 10 and Jacob Tremblay as a teen — 'I Contain Multitudes' serves up love, grief and a dash of the supernatural, plus scene-stealing turns by Mia Sara and a gloriously grizzled Mark Hamill as Chuck's grandparents. Along the way, callbacks and connective tissue provide a path to the film's beating heart. While the horror auteur Flanagan is known for tapping into King's disturbing side — in film adaptations of 'Gerald's Game' and 'Doctor Sleep,' plus an upcoming 'Carrie' series — 'The Life of Chuck' marks an obvious departure. Now that he's delivered an elegy in the vein of 'Stand By Me' or 'The Shawshank Redemption,' Flanagan has made one thing clear: He's attuned to King at every frequency. R. At area theaters. Contains language, brief suspense and images of environmental disasters. 111 minutes.
Gulf Today
08-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Gulf Today
Tom Hiddleston leads the cosmic puzzle that is ‘Life of Chuck'
'Life of Chuck' is a peculiar movie with grandiose ambitions. It teases out a cosmic mystery about life and some guy named Charles Krantz ( Tom Hiddleston ) in a story told in reverse chronological order that gets smaller and smaller with each act. This is a story that begins with the apocalypse and ends with a middle school dance. Well, kind of. I'm not out to spoil (much) here. It's based on a novella by Stephen King (part of his 'If It Bleeds' collection of stories) and adapted by filmmaker Mike Flanagan, who was also behind 'Gerald's Game' and 'Doctor Sleep.' This, however, is not a horror movie, though there are spooky elements laden with ominous ambiguity. There are also big, joyful dance numbers, a fair share of cynical jokes, whimsical narration from Nick Offerman, earnest conversations about the end of the world and plenty of references to Walt Whitman's 'Song of Myself' — in particularly 'I am large, I contain multitudes.' That is most movingly conveyed in a sweet scene with a teacher (Kate Siegel) and a middle school aged Chuck ( Benjamin Pajak ) on the last day of school. 'Life of Chuck' wants to make you think, feel, laugh and cry about the most mundane of characters: Krantz, a white, American, middle-aged accountant, whose life is modest and whose childhood was full of tragedy and loss. And while I certainly enjoyed elements of this odyssey in reverse, I was ultimately left feeling very little — especially about Chuck and the questionable end-of-film explanation that ties it all together. Hiddleston, it should be said, is not in 'Life of Chuck' as much as one might expect for being the titular character. His presence looms large certainly — it's why we're here. But, in reality, Hiddleston as a performer is more of an ensemble player among a sea of recognizable faces. In the third act, which opens the film, he's everywhere - on billboards and television ads, cheerily smiling in a nondescript grey suit, coffee cup in one hand, pencil in another. 'Charles Krantz. 39 great years! Thanks Chuck!' the signs read. It's the background until it's all that's left as the world appears to be ending. The internet has gone out. Parts of California have drifted into the Pacific. Environmental disasters rage. Suicides are skyrocketing. Hail Mary life decisions are being made. And poor Marty (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is just trying to do his job as a school teacher. His parent-teacher conferences have become parent therapy sessions. Everyone — a maintenance guy (Matthew Lillard), a funeral director (Carl Lumbly) — seems to want to philosophize about what's going on, and who the heck Chuck is. He has big conversations about the history of the universe with his ex-wife (Karen Gillan). And together they wait for the end. In act two, a grown Chuck (Hiddleston) dances in the street in a joyful six-minute sequence. Compelled to move when he hears the beat of a street drummer (Taylor Gordon), he even pulls in a stranger to join him (Annalise Basso). In act one, he's a kid ( Pajak ) who has lost both his parents and unborn sister in a car accident and is living with his grandparents (Mark Hamill and Mia Sara, who it's nice to have back on screen). It's during this segment, which comprises nearly half the movie, that he learns to dance. First, it's through his grandmother freestyling to Wang Chung and curating a movie musical marathon (including 'Singin' in the Rain,' 'Cabaret, 'Cover Girl' and 'All That Jazz'). Then it's at school, where little Chuck learns the perks of being a straight man who can dance. There's also a possibly haunted cupola on the top floor of their house that's causing grandpa lots of anxiety. This is a film with a big heart that has already made a significant impact on some moviegoers. Last fall it won the audience award at the Toronto International Film Festival, an honor which has produced many best picture nominees and winners. And it's one where a second viewing might be rewarding, so you can more appreciate the thoughtful throughlines and the piece as a whole since you know what it's building toward. But I also suspect this particular flavour of sentimentality might not be for everyone. Associated Press
Time Magazine
06-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Magazine
The Life of Chuck Works Too Hard For Its Warm Fuzzies
Stories about the meaning of life tend to work at cross-purposes with the job of actually living it, particularly when they pedal hard to activate the tear ducts. Mike Flanagan's science-fiction life affirmer The Life of Chuck —adapted from a Stephen King novella—is an ambitious little film that has already earned some laurels: it was an audience favorite at last year's Toronto International Film Festival, winning the People's Choice Award. Thanks to a few key moments, and the strength of its actors, it's easy to see why audiences would warm to the film. But if you're immune to its charms, you won't be alone. From its cute-fake soundstage-town setting to the authoritative yet chummy voice-over narration (courtesy of Nick Offerman), The Life of Chuck works doggedly to give you the warm fuzzies—and a little bit of that fuzz goes a long way. The story is ingeniously—or pretentiously, depending on your mood—constructed to unspool backward, beginning with the third act and ending with the first. In the opening section, Chiwetel Ejiofor plays schoolteacher Marty, whose class is interrupted just as his students are digging into Walt Whitman's 'Song of Myself,' particularly its key phrase 'I contain multitudes.' A student gasps: she's just seen the news on her phone that part of California has fallen into the ocean. Then the internet shuts down altogether, possibly for good—the end times are near, maybe, and the world is getting ready. Marty sees a weird billboard, featuring a smiling man in a business suit and the words charles krantz, 39 great years!, and thanks chuck! (The missing comma in that last phrase is presumably just one of the mysteries of life.) Marty doesn't know who Chuck is, nor does anyone he asks. But this billboard, followed by other mysterious Chuck references, may hold the key to the end of the world. In the second act, we find out exactly who Chuck is: a pleasant accountant, played by Tom Hiddleston. And in the third—which is to say the first and final act—we learn Chuck's backstory, how he was orphaned at a young age and sent to live with his grandparents, Mark Hamill's gruff but kind bookkeeper Albie and his sensible but joyful homemaker wife Sarah, played by Mia Sara. Sarah loves to dance, and she teaches young Chuck—at this point played by an appealing child actor named Benjamin Pajak—her best moves. He's a natural, though something is holding him back. And he too will study that Walt Whitman poem: it will shape not only his destiny, but also that of the world. Because The Life of Chuck is based on a Stephen King story, all that heavy-duty supernatural pondering just comes with the territory. The problem is that Flanagan—known for eerie but subtle horror films like Hush and Oculus and Netflix series like Midnight Mass and The Haunting of Hill House —puts too many overly earnest quotation marks around what should be the most moving scenes. The score becomes grand and syrupy whenever there's a big emotional revelation; characters deliver solemn soliloquies on the orderly beauty of math. The Life of Chuck explores the joys and sorrows of a life well lived in the most precious way—though Hiddleston and Ejiofor succeed somewhat in counterbalancing the mawkishness. Ejiofor explains Carl Sagan's Cosmic Calendar with a Shakespearean authority that makes every word matter. And Hiddleston, in the second section, has an extended dance number that momentarily sends the movie soaring. As a street drummer (Taylor Gordon, also known as the Pocket Queen) beats out a fascinatin' rhythm, Hiddleston's Chuck taps, whirls, and moonwalks through a spontaneous routine that, for as long as it lasts, almost manages to connect you with the meaning of life. He's the spirit of Gene Kelly reincarnated in a regulation accountant's gray suit; when he's in motion, The Life of Chuck really is transcendent.
Winnipeg Free Press
04-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Movie Review: Tom Hiddleston leads the cosmic puzzle that is ‘Life of Chuck'
'Life of Chuck' is a peculiar movie with grandiose ambitions. It teases out a cosmic mystery about life and some guy named Charles Krantz ( Tom Hiddleston ) in a story told in reverse chronological order that gets smaller and smaller with each act. This is a story that begins with the apocalypse and ends with a middle school dance. Well, kind of. I'm not out to spoil (much) here. It's based on a novella by Stephen King (part of his 'If It Bleeds' collection of stories) and adapted by filmmaker Mike Flanagan, who was also behind 'Gerald's Game' and 'Doctor Sleep.' This, however, is not a horror movie, though there are spooky elements laden with ominous ambiguity. There are also big, joyful dance numbers, a fair share of cynical jokes, whimsical narration from Nick Offerman, earnest conversations about the end of the world and plenty of references to Walt Whitman's 'Song of Myself' — in particularly 'I am large, I contain multitudes.' That is most movingly conveyed in a sweet scene with a teacher (Kate Siegel) and a middle school aged Chuck ( Benjamin Pajak ) on the last day of school. 'Life of Chuck' wants to make you think, feel, laugh and cry about the most mundane of characters: Krantz, a white, American, middle-aged accountant, whose life is modest and whose childhood was full of tragedy and loss. And while I certainly enjoyed elements of this odyssey in reverse, I was ultimately left feeling very little — especially about Chuck and the questionable end-of-film explanation that ties it all together. Hiddleston, it should be said, is not in 'Life of Chuck' as much as one might expect for being the titular character. His presence looms large certainly — it's why we're here. But, in reality, Hiddleston as a performer is more of an ensemble player among a sea of recognizable faces. In the third act, which opens the film, he's everywhere — on billboards and television ads, cheerily smiling in a nondescript grey suit, coffee cup in one hand, pencil in another. 'Charles Krantz. 39 great years! Thanks Chuck!' the signs read. It's the background until it's all that's left as the world appears to be ending. The internet has gone out. Parts of California have drifted into the Pacific. Environmental disasters rage. Suicides are skyrocketing. Hail Mary life decisions are being made. And poor Marty (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is just trying to do his job as a school teacher. His parent-teacher conferences have become parent therapy sessions. Everyone — a maintenance guy (Matthew Lillard), a funeral director (Carl Lumbly) — seems to want to philosophize about what's going on, and who the heck Chuck is. He has big conversations about the history of the universe with his ex-wife (Karen Gillan). And together they wait for the end. In act two, a grown Chuck (Hiddleston) dances in the street in a joyful six-minute sequence. Compelled to move when he hears the beat of a street drummer (Taylor Gordon), he even pulls in a stranger to join him (Annalise Basso). In act one, he's a kid ( Pajak ) who has lost both his parents and unborn sister in a car accident and is living with his grandparents (Mark Hamill and Mia Sara, who it's nice to have back on screen). It's during this segment, which comprises nearly half the movie, that he learns to dance. First, it's through his grandmother freestyling to Wang Chung and curating a movie musical marathon (including 'Singin' in the Rain,' 'Cabaret, 'Cover Girl' and 'All That Jazz'). Then it's at school, where little Chuck learns the perks of being a straight man who can dance. There's also a possibly haunted cupola on the top floor of their house that's causing grandpa lots of anxiety. This is a film with a big heart that has already made a significant impact on some moviegoers. Last fall it won the audience award at the Toronto International Film Festival, an honor which has produced many best picture nominees and winners. And it's one where a second viewing might be rewarding, so you can more appreciate the thoughtful throughlines and the piece as a whole since you know what it's building toward. But I also suspect this particular flavor of sentimentality might not be for everyone. This critic felt a bit like the film was trying to trick you into caring about Chuck, while revealing very little about the man he became and explaining too much about the mystery. And yet it's a nice message, with nice performances and might be that kind of affirming hug of a film that someone is craving. 'Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself.' Film reviews can also contain multitudes. 'Life of Chuck,' a Neon release in theaters Friday, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for language. Running time: 110 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.
Scroll.in
04-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Scroll.in
Poet Walt Whitman used photography to curate his image – but ended up more lost than found
When I read and study Walt Whitman's poetry, I often imagine what he would've done if he had a smartphone and an Instagram account. Unlike many of his contemporaries, the poet collected an ' abundance of photographs ' of himself, as Whitman scholar Ed Folsom points out. And like many people today who snap and post thousands of selfies, Whitman, who lived during the birth of commercial photography, used portraits to craft a version of the self that wasn't necessarily grounded in reality. One of those portraits, taken by photographer Curtis Taylor, was commissioned by Whitman in the 1870s. In it, the poet is seated nonchalantly, with a moth or butterfly appearing to have landed on his outstretched finger. According to at least two of his friends, Philadelphia attorney Thomas Donaldson and nurse Elizabeth Keller, this was Whitman's favorite photograph. Though he told his friends that the winged insect happened to land on his finger during the shoot, it turned out to be a cardboard prop. Feigned spontaneity The scene with the butterfly reflects one of the main themes of Whitman's Leaves of Grass his best-known collection of poems: The universe is naturally drawn to the poet. 'To me the converging objects of the world perpetually flow,' he insists in ' Song of Myself.' 'I have instant conductors all over me whether I pass or stop,' Whitman adds. 'They seize every object and lead it harmlessly through me.' Whitman told Horace Traubel, the poet's close friend and earliest biographer, that '[y]es – that was an actual moth, the picture is substantially literal.' Likewise, he told historian William Roscoe Thayer: 'I've always had the knack of attracting birds and butterflies and other wild critters.' Of course, historians now know that the butterfly was, in fact, a cutout, which currently resides at the Library of Congress. So what was Whitman doing? Why would he lie? I can't get inside his head, but I suspect he wanted to impress his audience, to verify that the protagonist of Leaves of Grass, the one with 'instant conductors,' was not a fictional creation. Today's selfies often give the impression of having been taken on the spot. In reality, many of them are a carefully calculated creative act. Media scholars James E Katz and Elizabeth Thomas Crocker have argued that most selfie-takers strive for informality even as they carefully stage the images. In other words, the selfie weds the spontaneous to the intentional. Whitman does exactly this, presenting a designed photo as if it were a happy accident. Too much me As Whitman biographer Justin Kaplan notes, no other writer at the time 'was so systematically recorded or so concerned with the strategic uses of his pictures and their projective meanings for himself and the public.' The poet jumped at the opportunity to have his photo taken. There is, for instance, the famous portrait of the young, carefree poet that was used as the frontispiece for the first edition of Leaves of Grass. Or the 1854 photograph of a bearded and unkempt Whitman, likely captured by Gabriel Harrison. Or the 1869 image of Whitman smiling lovingly at Peter Doyle, the poet's intimate friend and probable lover. Some social scientists have argued that today's selfies can aid in the search for one's ' authentic self ' – figuring out who you are and understanding what makes you tick. Other researchers have taken a less rosy view of the selfie, warning that snapping too many can be a sign of low self-esteem and can, paradoxically, lead to identity confusion, particularly if they're taken to seek external validation. Whitman spent his life searching for what he termed the 'Me myself' or the 'real Me.' Photography provided him another medium, besides poetry, to carry on this search. But it seems to have ultimately failed him. Having collected these images, he would then obsessively chew over what they all added up to, ultimately finding that he was far more lost than found in this sea of portraits. I wonder if – to use today's parlance – Whitman 'scrolled' his way into a crisis of self-identity, overwhelmed by the sheer number of photos he possessed and the various, contradictory selves they represented. 'I meet new Walt Whitmans every day,' he once said. 'There are a dozen of me afloat. I don't know which Walt Whitman I am.'
