Carter Chambers, a blue collar mechanic who gave up his dreams of being a history professor, and Edward Cole, a four-times divorced billionaire, are an unlikely pair, except for one commonality: terminal cancer. They meet because Edward Cole, who owns the hospital they are both seeking treatment in, has decreed that there will be two patients to every room: no exceptions. Edward runs his empire from his hospital bed and Carter has loving visits from his family. While the medical staff often fawns over Edward, Carter’s medical needs are sometimes neglected until Edward orders the doctors to take care better care of him.
Carter loves his family, but sitting alone in the hospital room, he begins to have regrets about the things he did not do with his life. While he is a gifted amateur historian, he gave up his dreams to start a family. In the hospital, he begins a list of things to do before kicking the bucket including driving a Shelby Mustang and witnessing something truly majestic. When he learns that he has less than a year to live, he crumples the list and throws it away. Edward finds the list and convinces Carter to go on a round the world tour to complete a joint bucket list.
Despite his wife Vivian’s objections, Carter and Edward hip in Edward’s private jet and start their trek around the world. They go skydiving, race vintage cards around California speedway, eat dinner at a famous French restaurant, visit the Taj Mahal and trek to Mount Everest, although the weather is too bad to see the peaks. Along the way, we get to know these two diverse characters and their hopes, joys, and regrets. We learn that Edward is grieving his relationship with his estranged daughter and that Carter feels he is falling out of love with his wife.
After Edward hires a prostitute to seduce Carter, Carter realizes he really does love his wife and asks to go home. On the way home, Carter attempts to reunite Edward with his estranged daughter, but Edward considers that a betrayal. Carter is reunited with his loving family, and Edward goes home to cry alone over the mess he has made of his life. It is only after Carter collapses and later dies in surgery that Edward realizes that Carter was probably his best friend in the world and he eulogizes him by saying the last three months of Carter’s life were the best of his. The movie ends years later when Edward’s assistant treks to the top of a mountain to leave Edward’s ashes besides Carter’s.
The specter of death hangs over all of us and we should all make the most of the time we have on this earth. However, The Bucket List brings the fragility of life into sharp focus as two men facing their own mortality realize they still have things left to accomplish. Although some may find it strange that Carter chose to spend his last few months with a virtual stranger instead of his own family, I found it completely understandable for several reasons. The first is that he and Edward had a shared fate, as both of them had a fatal diagnosis. This meant that neither was going to baby the other, instead they were just two guys out to see the world and allowed them to both focus on living instead of dying. If Carter had stayed home, his family’s instinct would have been to baby him and take care of him instead of focusing on life.
The second is that Carter needed distance from his wife and family to truly come to appreciate them. If he had chosen to stay home, he may have become resentful because his wife was–once again–keeping him from living life on his terms. By having his grand adventure, he came to appreciate the love and comfort his wife brought him. This allowed his last few days at home to be filled with joy instead of resentment.
From a thanatological perspective, anticipatory grief was an overriding theme in this movie. Carter and Edward were both anticipating their own deaths and, for Carter, the grief his family would feel without him. Carter’s family was also facing life without their patriarch and anticipating the changes that his death would bring.