I’ve been reading Stephen King books for most of my life, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned in all those years, it’s this: truly great adaptations of his work are few and far between — definitely the exception, rather than the rule. For every Shawshank Redemption or The Green Mile, there are numerous Dark Tower-level misfires ready to break your heart.
The Long Walk — an adaptation of King’s first-written novel, published in 1979 under his Richard Bachman pseudonym — somehow managed to stay completely off my radar until I caught the first trailer a few months ago. What I saw there made me cautiously optimistic, though the book had reportedly been considered “unfilmable” for decades, with proposed versions cycling through heavyweight directors like George Romero and Frank Darabont. My skepticism wasn’t entirely unfounded once I learned Francis Lawrence was behind the camera.
Lawrence has been helming Hunger Games movies for so long that it’s sort of hard to separate him from that sanitized dystopian world, and while there are obvious surface similarities between Suzanne Collins’ televised competitions and King’s walking contest, the latter is infinitely more vicious and uncompromising. The Hunger Games films, for all their craft, pull their punches when it comes to violence — a necessary concession for their PG-13 target audience. The Long Walk, on the other hand, demands a brutal honesty about the stakes involved, and I wasn’t sure Lawrence had the stomach for it.
I’m delighted to report that my concerns were entirely misplaced. The Long Walk far exceeded my expectations, delivering one of the most accomplished Stephen King adaptations in years — easily standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the very best entries in the author’s cinematic canon.
It’s a simple enough premise: 50 teenage boys, one from each state, compete in an annual televised walking competition overseen by the fascistic Major (Mark Hamill, playing completely against type as perhaps the most villainous figure of his career). The rules are equally straightforward: maintain a pace of three miles per hour or face execution. Slow down for 30 seconds and you receive a warning; three warnings and you “get your ticket punched” by the military escort. There’s no set distance, and no finish line — the boys walk until only one remains, no matter how long that takes. The prize for the sole survivor? Untold riches and any single wish, provided that said wish doesn’t upset the political order. It’s a setup that makes The Hunger Games look like a leisurely stroll through the park.
Lawrence understands that the key to this story lies in character development, and he wisely keeps the camera embedded with the boys rather than cutting away to the spectacle’s broader machinery. The central bond that forms between Ray Garraty (a stellar Cooper Hoffman) and Peter McVries (David Jonsson, equally affecting) becomes the film’s emotional backbone, and both performers cement their status as two of the most compelling young actors working today. The doomed friendship that blossoms among the central characters reminds me strongly of Stand By Me — another King adaptation about boys on a cross-country trek, speaking in that specific adolescent vernacular of profanity that often masks genuine vulnerability.
Hoffman, who has big shoes to fill given his father’s legacy, continues demonstrating the thoughtfulness that has marked his early career choices, and there’s no arguing this is his most challenging and emotionally impactful role yet. But it’s Jonsson who truly runs away with the film; his McVries serves as both the group’s spiritual center and source of surprising levity, delivering moments that make the inevitable tragedy all the more heartbreaking. Ben Wang also stands out as the motor-mouthed Hank Olson, providing much-needed comic relief with his relentless charisma.
Gone is the polished violence of Lawrence’s Hunger Games work, replaced by an unflinching commitment to the horror of state-sanctioned murder. When soldiers execute teenage boys without a shred of emotion on their faces, it never becomes easier to stomach — in fact, as the numbers dwindle, each death becomes increasingly devastating. There’s a moment after the first death where someone tells Garraty “it’ll get easier,” and his response captures the film’s refusal to let anyone become numb to the violence: “that’s what I’m afraid of.”
This isn’t a film for audiences who can’t stomach graphic violence or crushing emotional weight. The Long Walk is almost unbearably bleak — the last time I felt so emotionally ravaged was during Edward Berger’s relentless All Quiet on the Western Front — but that devastation serves a purpose, confronting the audience with uncomfortable truths about power, sacrifice, and the systems that perpetuate both.
The film hits especially hard in our current political moment. Throughout the story, Garraty is horrified by the system that normalized these deaths while bystanders watch with passive indifference. When the boys join in chants of “Fuck the Long Walk” and “Fuck the Major,” knowing full well they could be executed for such dissent, their defiant spirit provides a spark of hope in an otherwise crushing narrative. We could all use a bit more of that energy right now, as we witness authoritarianism’s continued rise around the world — particularly in the United States, where it was long believed impossible.
I was genuinely surprised by the film’s conclusion, which represents a significant departure from King’s novel, and as someone who’s read the book several times, I’m still processing which version I prefer. But Lawrence and screenwriter JT Mollner (Strange Darling) have crafted something that honors the source material while finding new emotional depths to explore, and for Stephen King devotees and fans of uncompromising dystopian fiction, The Long Walk is practically essential viewing, a rare adaptation that elevates the work through exceptional performances and fearless filmmaking. Just don’t expect to feel good walking out of the theater.