Line #27 Literature/Choke


1	[[quoteright:225:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_chokecvr_7775.jpg]]
2
3	->"Just keep asking yourself: ''What would Jesus NOT do?''"
4	-->--'''Victor Mancini'''
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6	''Choke'' is a 2001 novel by Creator/ChuckPalahniuk. Victor Mancini spends his days working at a colonial theme park with his best friend, Denny. The duo, who suffer from sexual and masturbation addiction respectively, attend recovery meetings to tolerate the boredom. As Victor's mother suffers from Alzheimer's Disease and lives in a care home, Victor pays her hospital fees by intentionally choking on food in restaurants; as his "rescuers" both pity him and see him as evidence of their bravery, he manipulates them to milk from them for cash.
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8	''Choke '' was [[FilmOfTheBook adapted into a film]] in 2008 directed and written by Creator/ClarkGregg starring Creator/SamRockwell, Creator/AnjelicaHuston and Creator/KellyMacdonald.
9
10	----
11	!!Contains examples of:
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13	%%* AccidentalHero: Victor
14	* AddictionDisplacement: Victor's friend and fellow sexual compulsive Denny drags home a large rock for every day that he successfully abstains from masturbating.
15	* AnachronicOrder: Victor's flashbacks are told out of order
16	* ArcWords [[SelfDemonstratingArticle isn't the right word, but it's the first word that comes to mind.]] [[VerbalTic See also:]] What would Jesus NOT do? See also: For serious. See also: For sure. See also: it's the martyrdom of Saint Me.
17	* BecomingTheMask: Victor soon notes that, while sobbing onto his "rescuers" plays a large part in his act, he soon finds comfort in a stranger briefly hugging and calming him.
18	%%* BittersweetEnding
19	* CaughtWithYourPantsDown: The film has one scene wherein Lord High Charlie, played by Clark Gregg, catches Victor (Sam Rockwell), with his pants down with "Ursula the Milkmaid's" hand on his penis. Ursula is Charlie's dream girl and so he is reasonably upset by this sight saying he can never look at her the same way again.
20	* CloneJesus: A major subplot involves the main character discovering that he may have been created as a clone from Jesus' foreskin.
21	* CodeEmergency:
22	** Different codes are used by a renegade mother to covertly contact her son.
23	** Also by the hospital looking after her... when Nurse Remington is summoned to the front desk, it probably means you have outstayed your welcome.
24	* ComeToGawk: The colonial theme park where Victor works punishes loafing employees by making them sit in the stocks all day.
25	* CreatorCameo: Chuck Palahniuk has a cameo in the film sitting next to Victor on a plane.
26	%%* FaceOnAMilkCarton
27	%%* FirstPersonSmartass: Victor
28	* {{Foreshadowing}}:
29	** [[spoiler:A nurse condescendingly refers to Paige as ''Miss'' instead of Dr., and receives a lecture as a result. The reason the nurse was talking down to someone of high authority is because Dr. Paige is a patient allowed to live in her doctor delusion. Additionally, Victor attempts to figure out which car is hers, but cannot; it's because she doesn't leave.]]
30	** [[spoiler:Victor notes that Alzheimers gets to the point where sufferers can sometimes inhale food and choke to death or contract pneumonia. Come the conclusion, when his mother needs moving to the terminal wards, he feeds her pudding and she chokes to death.]]
31	* HelplessKicking: The poster for the film shows the silhuoette of a woman's legs and high heels sticking out of a man's mouth and kicking like she's being EatenAlive. Televised ads even showed the poor woman's weak little kicks in motion.
32	* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Cherry Daiquiri, who ends up becoming friends with Victor and Denny.
33	* InstantDramaJustAddTracheotomy: Discussed. The protagonist frequently runs a con where he deliberately chokes on food to get strangers to perform the Heimlich on him; he is terrified that one day he'll encounter an idiot thinking of this trope coming after him with a steak knife and a ballpoint pen tube.
34	* MrViceGuy: Denny. [[spoiler:Finally curbing his sex addiction, which had him masturbating uncontrollably, Denny starts collecting a rock to mark every day of being cold-turkey. ''This soon turns into a hoarding addiction he can't control.'']]
35	* OneWordTitle: Named after how choking on food is a significant point of the novel.
36	* PoliticallyIncorrectHero: Victor, by means of StayInTheKitchen. Not only does he refer to emotions, love, optimism and relationships as "chick stuff", his lack of a relationship due to sex addiction means occasionally develops the mentality that committed women treat you like life support for a penis or wallet.
37	* RomanceAndSexualitySeparation: Victor, a sex addict can't sleep with his mother's doctor Paige because he actually has an emotional connection to her.
38	* SilentScapegoat: Victor allows other dementia patients at his mother's hospital to blame him for various past traumas.
39	%%* SnicketWarningLabel:
40	* StrawNihilist: Specifically that love/optimism/happiness is for chicks, and being stuck in a work cubical without danger or excitement means sex, masturbation and drugs are the only way to feel alive anymore.
41	* ThoroughlyMistakenIdentity: Victor's mother, suffering from Alzheimer's, begins mistaking him for people such as her old lawyer, Fred.
42	* TomatoSurprise:
43	** [[spoiler:Victor is Jesus, and was created artificially through cells from a holy relic that was Jesus' apparent foreskin.]]
44	** [[spoiler:Paige lied about the diary's contents as she unable to read Italian. Additionally, she doesn't realize she is a patient on the mental illness ward, and wears a uniform and "works" because living out her delusion that she is a doctor from the future makes her more manageable for the staff.]]
45	* TropaholicsAnonymous: The protagonist is a sex addict who routinely picks up women at his Sexaholics Anonymous meetings.
46	* TheUntwist: [[spoiler:Contrary to Tomato Surprise, Victor isn't Jesus. Paige lied to him, and his mother was a stranger that simply took him from his pushchair.]] [[invoked]]
47	* WhatNowEnding:
48	** [[spoiler: Victor accidentally kills his mother, is arrested, and is run out of town by the people who fell for his scam. Doctor Marshall turns out to be an insane patient at the nursing home, but realizes it at the book's end. Denny's building/sculpture/masterpiece is destroyed by a freak earthquake. The four main characters are left standing in the ruins.]]
49	** The movie has a slightly happier ending, with [[spoiler: Victor's mom still dying and Victor realizing that Paige is a mental patient, but Victor's arrest is for the "rape" one of the mental patients is constantly accusing him of performing, which he is cleared for. He finds Paige and they have loving sex in an airport bathroom]]
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Context Literature / Choke