TIFF 2024: The Life of Chuck

Courtesy of TIFF

Newly minted as the Toronto International Film Festival People’s Choice Award Winner, it’s easy to see why Mike Flanagan’s newest Stephen King adaptation resonates. Taken from one of King’s gentler tales, scares are (mostly) absent as we delve into Chuck’s titular life, moving in episodic and nonlinear fashion from the seeming end of the world to a singular moment of joyous spontaneity to the tribulations of childhood. There’s dancing, there’s crying, there’s metaphysical talks about the nature of the universe and the importance of living life to the fullest — it shoots for heartwarming and crowd-pleasing, and if you’re in the right mood Flanagan and company might just hit the mark.

But as the mystery unravels, the conceit becomes clearer and so do the flaws. The film is structured such that each of the three chapters has its own distinct cadre of actors (Nick Offerman’s gratingly omnipresent narrator being the primary exception), a few of whom pop up here and there in the other acts but for the most part remain siloed. There’s a purpose to all of this, a slow-drip attempt to create a portrait of totality from a series of snapshots, but the overarching feeling is that of vaguely connected anthology. To the film’s credit, by the time the credits roll the various knots have been tied off, the disparate threads stretched backwards over the past two hours — it’s just too little too late, the thematic resonance of the pieces snapping into place undermined by a ponderous journey to get to that point.

Ironically, given the subject matter, what The Life of Chuck misses most is an anchor, something (or more likely, someone) to truly convince us of the importance of this story and this character. Tom Hiddleston will be the film’s face, but he’s onscreen much less than one would expect — worse, he makes such an impact that it’s hard not to feel disappointed with his relative absence. The same goes for the likes of Chiwetel Ejiofor, Mark Hamil, and Mia Sara, each of whom briefly shines but doesn’t set down enough roots for us to hold on to. Flanagan has become, if not the premier, the most frequent King translator in recent memory, showing a respect for the source material that has earned him praise from an author who has notoriously taken umbrage with the more substantial taking of artistic license. But as The Life of Chuck plays out, one has to wonder if perhaps the concept is simply more effective on the page.