A reaffirmation of life through the lens of the inevitable, not to live in fear of but celebrated, cherishing each precious moment of being mortal.

Marty (Chiwetel Ejiofor) has noticed it over the last nine months, with the internet periodically going out and the increasing frequency of natural disasters: the world is falling apart. He discusses it with his neighbor Gus (Matthew Lillard), noting the appearance of random widening sinkholes across the United States, that California is completely gone, and the light has gone out in people’s eyes… becoming husks of their former selves. In an attempt to reconnect with his ex-wife Felicia (Karen Gillan), Marty sets out on foot as the roads are congested by abandoned cars. He meets Sam (Carl Lumbly) along the way and discusses the odd appearance of television ads and billboards regarding one Charles Krantz (Tom Hiddleston), thanking Chuck for “39 great years.” Does anyone know him? Is he of some importance? At the presumed end of everything, what’s the relevance of this ordinary yet mysterious individual?

From the Stephen King novella collection If It Bleeds, director Mike Flanagan takes on a new story of wonder in the vein of The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile… you know, films nominated for end-of-year awards that aren’t called The Monkey. With big sweeping trailers, character-moment clips, and an epic fanfare score, it’s reminiscent of the marketing for films like Big Fish, Forrest Gump, and Here, making huge promises to their potential audiences as must-see life-affirming events. It’s a big ask but well within the realm of possibility, especially since (yes, I’m saying it again) Flanagan successfully adapted King’s nigh-unfilmable non-supernatural Gerald’s Game for Netflix. Cameos from Flanagan’s usual stable of actors are a given, but after reportedly luring Mia Sara out of a 2013 retirement for the role of Sarah Krantz on the merits of “Midnight Mass” alone, who isn’t willing to play in his sandbox?

Told through three acts (in reverse order) with sporadic narration by Nick Offerman, “the mystery that isn’t” hangs over the production; while the plot invites the audience to figure out some presumed trick, it’s literal window dressing in terms of the story itself. If the point was to get “the scary truth” of everyone’s perspective out of the way, sure — it works, but it’s also a distraction rooted in the story itself unrelated to the director’s interpretation of the writer’s work. Hitching the film’s last moments to the third-act-shown-first even feels like a letdown compared to the existential nirvana throughout most of the film… until the truth of it snaps into focus: this isn’t a narrative. Like one’s life flashing before their eyes, it’s a blur of collective moments where time needn’t apply, a mind struggling in a dreamlike state to reorganize the bullet points of existence, everything everywhere all at once. No one should envy the hard choices the director had to make to minimize the intrusion of filmmaking into King’s prose, and while all of it isn’t perfect, the full impact hits once it has time to settle in: this is truly something special.

Addressing the reaper in the room, why is Death such a predominant topic throughout the story? A fair question… in spite of the answer being baked in. To quote the band Squirrel Nut Zippers, “beauty, talent, fame, money, refinement, job skill and brain” is all fleeting; you can’t take it with you. No single entity in all of existence can claim their life is exactly the same as any other, and that uniqueness is lost once their miraculous combination of mind, heart, and soul ceases to be. To everyone newly discovering his name, “Chuck” is just one more person in a big world, but from Chuck’s point of view, everyone is simply in his. There may be intentional inspirations from The Matrix, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and maybe even a bit of Brainstorm in the mix, but the science is removed from the fiction and there’s not a glimmer of religion. This is your life, Charles Krantz.

While Hiddleston sets the bar as the adult Chuck, three younger actors also bring the character to life. Jacob Tremblay plays the next younger Chuck, Benjamin Pajak plays middle-school Chuck, and Flanagan’s own son Cody plays the youngest. Similar to “The Fall of the House of Usher,” Mark Hamill’s mentoring role of Albie is a scene stealer, trading in the ferocious “Pym Reaper” for a wisdom-granting grandparent (who keeps a skeleton or two safely locked away). If it hasn’t been made clear, The Life of Chuck is best viewed with an open mind and a willingness to spend your whole life trying to fill it. Thanks, Zarkov!

The Life of Chuck is rated R for language, multitudes, and the devil for putting math into everything.

Four skull recommendation out of four.