The Best Stephen King Movie Of 2025 Wasn't A Horror Film

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Stephen King is one of our true masters of horror. Not only is he one of the most prolific authors to ever do it, but many of his works have also been turned into movies and TV shows for decades, giving us horror classics like "Carrie" and "It," among many others. And even though King is nearing 80, he remains a prominent voice in popular culture, with 2025 serving as a banner year for him with not one but three different films based on his work arriving in theaters.

Yet, for as much as we associate his name with horror, and even though both 2025's "The Monkey" and "The Long Walk" were good-to-excellent horror movies, the best Stephen King film of 2025 wasn't a horror flick at all. Released over the summer by NEON and directed by another horror master in the form of Mike Flanagan ("Doctor Sleep," "Midnight Mass"), "The Life of Chuck" is an absolute masterwork of cinema that is quite unlike any other King adaptation before it.

For those who didn't have the good fortune of seeing it, the film is based on King's 2020 novella of the same name and is a non-linear story told in three separate chapters. These three sections chronicle the life and times of Charles Krantz (Tom Hiddleston) in reverse, beginning with his death and ending with his childhood in a mysterious house.

Like virtually every other King work, there are elements of horror at play here, from people reckoning with a possible world-ending event to ghost stories and tales about locked doors that should never be opened. But they're all viewed through the lens of life rather than death. That's to say, "The Life of Chuck" isn't focused on the horrors of death.

Instead, "The Life of Chuck" exists as a bright beacon amidst the darkness, reminding us all why life is worth living, even at the worst of times. What Flanagan delivered, working from King's words on the page, is an unbridled, unflinching celebration of what it means to be alive.

I love horror. I love King. I think horror can be extremely cathartic, and I think "The Long Walk" is one of the better King movies in recent memory, if not ever. But there is something so deeply resonant about this particular movie. Its downright optimistic view on the sheer miracle of what it means to live a life, warts and all, feels at minimum refreshing. At best? It's euphoric.

"The Life of Chuck" is the kind of film that makes you cry, shedding tears of both the happy and sad variety. It's a movie that makes you feel things (human things, specifically deep, down-in-your-cells emotions) in the way only the best cinema can. There's something special about this movie that sets it apart from just about every other adaptation of King's writing.

Flanagan, let's remember, has done remarkable work with King's source material in the past. He filmed the supposedly unfilmable "Gerald's Game" and turned it into a banger. He also somehow made a satisfying sequel to "The Shining" with "Doctor Sleep." Yet, he felt so compelled to tell this story on screen that it damn near cost him the rights to "The Dark Tower." Flanagan's passion for the material is on full display, leaving us with perhaps his most emotionally resonant film to date. And that's saying something, especially since "The Life of Chuck" is not the easiest sell to the average film-watcher.

"The Life of Chuck" doesn't have the blockbuster horror appeal of "It." There isn't even the feel-good, impossible to disregard catharsis offered by the end of "The Shawshank Redemption," arguably one of the most roundly beloved movies ever made and, notably, another King movie that's not overtly horror-flavored. Instead, it's something delightfully ambitious and difficult to classify. 

The cast is stacked with Flanagan regulars. Beloved character actors show up and crush it left and right, with Matthew Lillard ("Scream") giving one of his most affecting performances with very minimal screen time. "Star Wars" legend Mark Hamill also delivers, I would argue, one of his finest performances. It speaks volumes that all of these actors brought the goods within the confines of this particular story, reminding us that Flanagan is a pro at getting the most out of his collaborators. 

2025 was a banner year for King, a man who's had a lot of good years. "The Monkey" was an audacious, gory thrill ride. "The Long Walk" was an unflinching, harrowing dystopian masterwork. Yet, this movie stands tall as a reminder that we contain multitudes and that King, for all of his gifts to the world of horror over the years, is a master storyteller capable of knocking us on our ass.

From the moment Nick Offerman's unmistakable voice welcomes us to the movie to the point where the tribute to the late, great Scott Wampler arrives in the credits, "The Life of Chuck" asserts itself as more than just a movie. It's a true work of humanist cinema that will hopefully live well beyond its somewhat muted run in theaters over the summer.

You can grab "The Life of Chuck" on 4K, Blu-ray, or DVD from Amazon.