The Life of Chuck review: Dancing through life and death

TIFF 2024 | The Life of Chuck follows an enigmatic man starting as a surrealist meditation on existential dread and ending as a life-affirming portrait of youth.

The Life of Chuck is a dramedy that ponders existential dread through surreal comedy (and a dance number!). A philosophical pondering of the moments that add up to a life set against the temporariness of it all. Airy, abstract but entertaining, it may be polarizing but will deeply move many.

The Life of Chuck premiered at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. It is seeking distribution.

At the beginning of The Life of Chuck we learn California has sunk into the sea, Florida is underwater and the internet has gone out (maybe for good). But somehow the most inexplicable occurrence in the small town where teacher Marty Anderson (Chiwetel Ejiofor) lives is a billboard that's seemingly appeared out of thin air with the words “Charles Krantz. 39 great years. Thanks Chuck!” scrawled across it and the photo of a clean cut bespectacled man behind a desk. It begs the question from the townsfolk: who the hell is Chuck?

Unfolding in three distinct acts, The Life of Chuck is a time and universe hopping story about, well, the life of Chuck based on a short story in Stephen King's novella collection If It Bleeds. However, in the first act—labeled as “Act 3”—we have no clue who he is. As the world around Marty slowly falls more and more into disarray, he remarks that both marriages and divorces are up. It's partially what spurs his ex-wife Felicia (Karen Gillan) to call him up amidst the quiet chaos of the end of the world. They talk about whether more people are getting married or divorced in the face of their demise and how in the concept of the Cosmic Calendar by Carl Sagan that explained if the existence of the universe were conceptualized as a single year, humans would occupy just the last few minutes of December 31st.

It's the kind of existential pondering that the movie itself tussles with. What does it mean to exist? Does it matter when we occupy so little space and time? Why do advertisements thanking Chuck keep popping up? As the final moments of the world approach, and Marty and Felicia find comfort in each other, images of Chuck begin to appear in the window of every house on the street. Marty jokes that it's the world's final meme before blinking out completely and we careen into “Act 2.”

When we finally meet Chuck (Tom Hiddleston), underscored by narration by Nick Offerman, he's much more human than his larger-than-life portrayal in the first act. In fact, he's the most human thing imaginable: an accountant. We also meet a busking street drummer (Taylor Gordon), who we learn recently dropped out of Julliard, as she sets up for the day playing at an outdoor mall and a young woman crying over a break-up (Annalise Basso). The trio all cross paths in front of where the drummer set up her kit for the day. Instead of walking past, Chuck starts to dance.

It's one of those moments that feels like movie magic. The kind that puts a knot in your chest. Not because you understand the feeling, but because you don't.

The third part of the movie, labeled “Act 1,” brings us back to Chuck's childhood. It pulls together all the threads of the story that have remained loose and unpacks the enigma that is chuck. From school dances to early losses to days living with his kooky grandfather (Mark Hamill). While the magical surrealism of the first two acts carries over in some ways, the story becomes grounded in something real. If Chuck was a mysterious otherworldly figure in act three and an enigmatic human in act two, then he's simply Chuck (played by young actors Benjamin Pajak, Cody Flanagan and Jacob Tremblay) in act three.

We follow him as he navigates loss, grief and, of course, the horrors of middle school as he discovers who he is. Where the first two acts were abstract and airy meditations, this one feels more trite—for better and worse. While the earnest lessons are admirable, I longed for the most obtuse meditation from the start of the movie that felts more like Charlie Kaufman (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and I'm Thinking of Ending Things) or David Lynch (Mulholland Drive). Your mileage with where the story go will vary. But watching Chuck navigate the highs and lows of childhood is admittedly charming.

The Life of Chuck is about how all the little moments where our lives intersect or divert or run parallel to others eventually lead to, in the case of Chuck, thirty-nine great years. It's not the big moments or notable accomplishments, it's the way your mom danced while making breakfast or that drummer you heard on a business trip or one of your grandfather's ramblings. While it never feels quite as big as it should, that just might be Stephen King and Mike Flanagan's point.

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Hey! I'm Karl. You can find me on Twitter here. I'm also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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Karl Delossantos

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Hey, I'm Karl, founder and film critic at Smash Cut. I started Smash Cut in 2014 to share my love of movies and give a perspective I haven't yet seen represented. I'm also an editor at The New York Times, a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, and a member of the Online Film Critics Society.