Known chiefly as a horror helmer, and one of the best in the grisly business, Mike Flanagan turns his attention to something far sweeter. Following his adaptations of Stephen King novels Doctor Sleep (a sequel to The Shining) and psychological thriller Gerald’s Game, Flanagan takes on the author’s sci-fi short The Life Of Chuck (from his 2020 collection If It Bleeds). This is not the King of nightmares but the one behind such poignant stories as Stand By Me and The Shawshank Redemption. 

Narrated by Nick Offerman with ample avuncular charm, this film tells the tale of the titular American in inventively surreal, backwards fashion, beginning attention-grabbingly with the apocalypse. Chiwetel Ejiofor and Karen Gillan are Marty and Felicia, exes in the world’s dying days, who are drawn back together just as society falls apart; there’s an air of grim inevitability to it all, with the shellshocked populus seemingly worn down after a diet of relentless doom and gloom.

Although environmental catastrophe has a role in events, something much more mysterious is at play, as humanity is hastened to its demise. This mystery is epitomised by the presence of messages thanking someone called Chuck for ‘39 great years’, with this apparently unremarkable character popping up on billboards, radio advertisements and even on the emergency broadcast, to the bafflement of everyone. It’s a deliciously intriguing opener.

The film then skips back in time to fill us in on Chuck’s story. Played by Tom Hiddleston, he is a happily married accountant who also happens to be a surprisingly gifted dancer, as we see when he performs a spectacular, spontaneous routine in the street to the breathtaking beats of a busking drummer (nicely portrayed by social-media drumming phenomenon The Pocket Queen). In his exuberant, crowd-attracting efforts, Chuck is joined by Annalise Basso’s recently dumped Janice.

We’re then taken back in time again, this time to Chuck’s childhood where he’s played by Cody Flanagan (the director’s son), Benjamin Pajak and, as a teen, by Room’s Jacob Tremblay. We meet the grandparents who raised him, charmingly portrayed by Mia Sara and Mark Hamill, learn about both the tragedies this family has endured as well as the mystery of their home’s carefully locked cupola. Flanagan’s wife and frequent collaborator Kate Siegel pops up in a small role as a hippy, dippy schoolteacher.

Flanagan’s CV includes heinous horrors such as Absentia, Oculus and Ouija: Origin Of Evil, plus chilling Netflix serials The Fall Of The House Of Usher and The Haunting Of Hill House. Here, he eschews such terrifying tension for more of an 80s event-cinema feel, a magical, Spielbergian tone (a little like the one Jeff Nichols employed in Midnight Special), while the film owes a debt to Robert Zemeckis’ Back To The Future series too. Although it’s often rather lovely, Flanagan steers largely clear of overt sentimentality while the supernatural element ties it nicely to the rest of his oeuvre. 

The Life Of Chuck won the People’s Choice Award at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival, a prize often seen as a precursor to success at the Oscars (previous winners include Nomadland, Green Book and 12 Years A Slave, while the likes of Parasite and Anora have been runners up). But this arrives in the heat of summer, outside of awards season, a probable reflection of the fact that it feels less like an awards contender and more of a crowd-pleaser. That’s no bad thing, of course, with this narratively ingenious, reliably entertaining piece striking a satisfying balance between seismic drama and intimate emotion.

Despite mentions of the cosmic calendar and some light philosophising, there’s not a great deal of intellectual heft here (yet the cast give it weight), and an accessibility largely works in its favour. Will this film stay with you in the way it so clearly wants to? Perhaps not. It’s unlikely to actually change your worldview, though it’s nice to watch it try. And it sure is impressive how Flanagan, like King before him, spins something so life-affirming from the end of the world.

The Life Of Chuck is in cinemas from Friday 22 August.