The Life List

There is a very specific type of cinematic gravity that pulls you toward the "New Releases" tab on a rainy Tuesday night, a force field generated by bright color palettes and the promise that everything will, eventually, be okay. We are currently living in the Golden Age of the "Comfort Algorithm"—those mid-budget, glossy stories that would have been Julia Roberts vehicles in 1997 but now find their homes nestled between true-crime docuseries and baking competitions. The Life List (2025) is the latest occupant of this space, and while it doesn't reinvent the wheel, it polishes the spokes until they gleam.

I watched this while eating a bowl of cereal that had gone slightly soggy because I got distracted by a notification about my car’s oil change, which felt strangely thematic for a movie about the crushing weight of adult responsibilities.

The Ghostly To-Do List

The setup is a classic "post-mortem" quest: Alex Rose, played with a blend of frantic energy and vulnerability by Sofia Carson (Purple Hearts, Feel the Beat), discovers that her late mother hasn't left her a traditional inheritance. Instead, Alex is gifted her own teenage "Life List"—a bucket list of dreams she scribbled down when she was fourteen. To get her actual inheritance, she has to complete the list. It’s a trope we’ve seen before, but director Adam Brooks (Definitely, Maybe) understands that the joy isn't in the what, but in the how.

What makes the film work is its awareness of the current moment. In an era of "hustle culture" and burnout, the idea of a dead parent forcing you to stop being a corporate drone to go "find yourself" feels less like a cliché and more like a collective fantasy. The film leans into the drama of Alex’s unraveling. She has the perfect job and the seemingly perfect boyfriend, but Brooks frames her life with a sterile, high-contrast brightness that makes you itch for her to go do something messy.

A Leading Lady for the Netflix Era

Sofia Carson has become something of a mascot for the modern streaming romance, and here she proves why. She has a way of making "frustrated professional" feel lived-in rather than a caricature. When she’s forced to confront the items on her list—some of which are predictably goofy, others surprisingly poignant—her reactions feel earned.

The chemistry, however, is where these movies live or die. Kyle Allen (Rosaline, A Haunting in Venice) enters the fray as Brad Ackerman, and he brings a relaxed, slightly scruffy charm that acts as the perfect foil to Alex’s high-strung Type-A personality. Their banter has that vintage Adam Brooks snap to it; it’s the kind of dialogue that feels like a polished version of how we wish we spoke during a first date. Sebastian de Souza also pops up as Garrett, adding a layer of complication that keeps the romance from feeling like a straight line from A to B.

I was particularly taken with Connie Britton as Elizabeth. She isn't in every scene, but her presence hangs over the film like a warm blanket. There’s a scene involving an old letter that Jordi Mollà and José Zúñiga elevate from a standard plot point into something that genuinely tugged at my cynical, critic-hardened heart. It’s essentially 'The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants' if the pants were a legal document.

The Brooks Touch and the Streaming Glow

Visually, the film is gorgeous, thanks to cinematographer Florian Ballhaus. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because he’s the man who made the fashion world look so tantalizingly sharp in The Devil Wears Prada. In The Life List, he captures the urban landscape with a romanticized, almost aspirational glow. It’s the kind of cinematography that makes you want to move to a city you can’t afford and buy a coat you don't need.

Interestingly, the film handles its "2025-ness" with some grace. It acknowledges our reliance on tech without being "about" social media. The "Life List" itself is a physical piece of paper, a relic of a pre-digital childhood that carries a weight an iPad never could. Apparently, the production team went through dozens of iterations of the "handwriting" for the list to make sure it looked like the authentic scrawl of a mid-2000s teenager.

However, we have to talk about the pacing. At 123 minutes, it’s a bit of a marathon for a rom-com-drama hybrid. There are subplots involving Alex’s father and some family secrets that feel like they were kept in to satisfy fans of the original Lori Nelson Spielman novel, but they occasionally drag the momentum. It’s a movie that knows you’re probably looking at your phone during the transition shots.

Ultimately, The Life List succeeds because it doesn't try to be an "instant classic." It’s content to be a very good version of exactly what it is: a warm, well-acted, and beautifully shot exploration of the gap between who we thought we’d be and who we became. It’s a film that understands that the "figuring it out" phase of life doesn't actually end when you turn thirty; it just gets more expensive.

If you’re looking for a film that challenges the boundaries of cinema, this isn't it. But if you want to spend two hours with charming people figuring out how to be happy while looking at some very nice interior design, you could do a lot worse. It’s a cozy, reliable watch that reminds us that sometimes, our younger selves actually knew what they were talking about. Just don't be surprised if it makes you want to go find your own old journals—and maybe ignore the parts where you wanted to be a professional mime.