Stephen King on screen is as lucrative as any mega-budget superhero franchise. Since the 70s, the Maine-based writer's work has made cinematic works that have thrilled audiences. Some directors have drunk from the well of King a few times – Rob Reiner, Frank Darabont and Mick Garris – but in recent times, the best example is Mike Flanagan. Having adapted the “unfilmable” Gerald's Game as well as Doctor Sleep, the book and sequel to the film, despite both being wildly different.
With The Life of Chuck, Flanagan takes a short story by King, told in reverse order, about the life of the seemingly normal accountant Charles “Chuck” Krantz. At first, the film seems a little confusing, as it doesn't reveal its ideas straight away. We begin with Act Three, in which the world appears to be slowly dying while signs celebrating “A great 39 years” for Charles Krantz seem to be everywhere. Later, we meet Charles as he starts spontaneously dancing in the street to a drumming busker, and then wind the clock back more.
The film slowly reveals itself, through moments that slowly make up the importance of this thing called life. Flanagan has always been interested in this, the tiny moments that are, in themselves, everything. Despite working mainly in horror, his work has always dealt with these big themes, and in their best moments, allows people to talk about these existential ideas in humanistic ways. Here, Flanagan crafts a film that lets moments of emotion sit and embrace the joy and despair of life.
In one beautiful sequence, Mark Hamill – as Chuck's wounded but kind-hearted grandfather – delivers a soliloquy about the importance and magic of maths. It's this that captures what is so wonderful about the film: people embracing things. Maths. Dance. The bitter irony of life. The concept of time. While Hamill and Mia Sara, as Chuck's grandmother, get the best roles in the film, the ensemble is simply wonderful.
Chiwetel Ejiofor, Tom Hiddleston and Karen Gillan all do wonderful work, navigating the film's slowly unwinding secrets, while Flanagan's wife, and regular, Kate Siegel, manages to imbue one moment of “author's message” with such warmth that it's hard not to smile through it all. It's also a beautifully scored film thanks to The Newton Brothers.
People who don't always warm to Flanagan's merchant for an overly wordy monologue might baulk at some of the more overtly sentimental speechifies, but as has always been the case, Flanagan loves to let actors sit in a moment and embrace the complexities of feeling things. The Life of Chuck is one of those rare things, a film that wraps you up in its slowly unfurling spell and tells you, it's all okay. That might be shocking to hear from two masters of horror stories, but as the film keeps telling us: we contain multitudes.
The Life of Chuck is in cinemas from August 22nd
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