“The Life of Chuck,” as our Chuck saw it

What the hot new movie reminded me is that my life, as challenging as it’s been a couple times, has been so blessed!

DES MOINES, Iowa – On this weekend that is too hot to do much else, we RicheBurgers decided Friday afternoon was a good time to go to a movie in a nicely air-conditioned theater –with good concessions – like the Fleur Cinema & Café on the south side of the capital city.

Actually, going to the movie was my idea, which was unusual, since my wife Mary Riche is so much more knowledgeable and excited about films than I am.

But I’d noticed that there is a new movie playing in theaters in recent days, “The Life of Chuck.”

I had to go, didn’t I?

Ready for the movie. (Photos by Mary Riche)

“Have any Chucks been here to see this?” I asked one of the movie attendants at the Fleur. “And if so, what have they said about the movie?”

Her answer: “Well, none have self-identified.”

So, I did.

“What did you think?” she asked.

“A little weird,” I said, “but overall, profound. And pretty entertaining.”

“Yeah,” she said. “We’ve seen a lot of tears when people are leaving after watching ‘Chuck.’ ”

After all, the main character dies of a painful brain tumor when he’s only 39 years old. And, in cinematic ways, he watches it happening. What that immediately reminded me is that my life, as challenging as it’s been a couple times, has been so blessed.

The movie attendant didn’t realize it, but I have long been defending us Chucks against slights and mischaracterizations. We are a sensitive bunch.

Think of some of us: There’s the old Hawkeye quarterback Chuck Long, Senator Chuck Grassley, Chuck Van Hecke of Muscatine, my brother-in-law Chuck Bobcowski just east of Philadelphia, Chuck Isenhart of Dubuque, Chuck Holz of Le Mars, my pal Chuckie Ahlers (she, her) of Urbandale. the late Hawkeye basketballer Chuck Darling, the late Des Moines auto dealer and community leader Chuck Betts, the late restaurateur of north Des Moines Chuck Bisignano. And more.

Over the years I’ve used my columns to protest public use of “chuckholes” instead of the more proper “potholes.” I’ve suggested meat departments make a “chuck roast” seem less-than. People talking about “chucking” things they no longer want around home. And, oh Lord, “upchucking.”

The one positive adaptation of “Chuck” I can think of is a line we catchers used in our baseball chatter, urging our pitcher to “chuck it right in here!”

So, yes, I had to go to “The Life of Chuck” movie.

The official promotional poster for the movie.

My first after-thought: You might not want to go to this one in the afternoon when you’ve been to the funeral of a great friend that morning. We RicheBurgers were part of a huge crowd at Valley Church in West Des Moines celebrating the life of Bernie Saggau, the longtime, outstanding director of the Iowa High School Athletic Association who died at 96 on May 10.

In our chat on the way home from the service, Mary raised a good point. “I hope you’ll think about writing your own obituary,” she said. “I mean, I hope we won’t need it for years to come. But who else would write it? You’re the one who knows all the stories.”

I kept thinking about that during the movie. One of the film’s memorable lines, by the way, is this: “We are all stories, being written and re-written every day.” Hmmm, I thought when I heard it. Did I say that sometime in the past? Or write that? I certainly believe it.

My second after-thought: So, despite my warning, if you’re going to a movie in the afternoon after you’ve been to the funeral of a friend in the morning, you might want to avoid a movie based on a novella by Stephen King and directed by Mike Flanagan.

They are two of Hollywood’s best and most acclaimed, of course. They are also known as masters of the horror genre. And while there are some scary moments in this movie, overall, it is, as USA Today reviewer Brian Truitt wrote last weekend, “the kind of story that’ll lift your spirits rather than scare the stuffing out of you.”

But, despite my initial hesitancy, there we RicheBurgers were Friday afternoon at “The Life of Chuck.”

My third after-thought: I already said this film is “a little weird.” Truthfully, on the scale of movie weirdness, it barely registers against the all-timer “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” of a couple years ago. When Mary suggested we go to that, she told me it had been nominated for 11 Academy Awards. When it was over, she asked me what I thought, and I pronounced it the “worst movie I’ve ever seen.” She said that would “make up for” taking her to my alma mater Vanderbilt’s 2022 Thanksgiving Saturday night football game against arch-rival Tennessee when we sat in a cold, steady rain in Nashville and watched UT win 56-0, leaving me pouting the rest of that trip.

And one more after-thought: I hereby assign “The Life of Chuck” to the “First Friday Film Club (FFMC),” in Des Moines, of which Mary and I are members. (The group began six years ago, rarely meets on the first Friday of the month now that FFMC founders Mary Pat and Joe Gunderson live in Idaho, and we always have very good discussions.) Mary Riche has given me her review of the movie, and now I’m asking current FFMC members Kaye and Dick Lozier, Jann Freed and John Fisher, Karen Downing and Jeff Marks, for their input/reviews covering some possible points for discussion, like those below here.

He was inspired.

--This one-hour & 51-minute movie opens with “Act Three,” and then “Act Two” and “Act One” follow. Curious, huh?

--In “Act Three,” we are entertained by “the last times” and the world ends, with the initial warning about all that being that, yes, the internet has died.

--Four different actors play the protagonist, Charles “Chuck” Krantz, at different stages of life, and the four play the part brilliantly: Tom Hiddleston, Jacob Tremblay, Benjaman Pajak and Cody Flanagan. And, yes, like most of us Chucks, he is referred to at different times as “Charles,” “Chuck,” “Chuck-o,” and “Chuckie.”

--Everybody who sees this movie is going to go away wishing he or she could dance better. Really. Chuck Krantz dances his way through all three acts of the film, and there is a good amount of screen time devoted to his impressive footwork.

--Mary Riche said it’s very impressive that “The Life of Chuck” won the “People’s Choice” choice award at the Toronto International Film Festival last September. She’s attended several TIFF festivals and says that one of her favorite films “The Green Book” was named the “People’s Choice” award winner and went on to win Oscars as have many other of the TIFF “People’s Choice” award winners. (I did not ask her if one of those was “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”)

--Another great quote from it: “You never really know someone, not all the way through.”

--Another one: “What is life, except a collection of memories – some real, some imagined – strung together with heartbeats?”

--One more: “Even as the world falls apart, there’s still time for one last dance.”

--And finally, there’s this line adapted in the movie from a poem by the 19^th century poet Walt Whitman, that after the movie, you’ll realize you should have paid more attention to: “I am large, I contain multitudes.” Listen for it.

So, go see “The Life of Chuck,” and tell ’em I sent you. Stephen King and Mike Flanagan are as good as everybody says. And I swear I’m going to work on my dancing.

See it there.

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