Stephen King’s The Long Walk (published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman) has long been considered an unadaptable story.

The novel — King’s first written but sixth published — has had its rights in the hands of prolific filmmakers like George A. Romero and André Øvredal, spanning all the way back to 1988 before eventually landing in the hands of Francis Lawrence in 2023. It was only then that the 2025 release finally started to form, ultimately resulting in a harrowing but deeply hopeful piece of art that will both give long-time fans the adaptation they’d hoped for and entice audiences who have never heard of the story, the dystopian tale of their gory nightmares. 

When it comes to adaptations, the first question on potential audiences’ minds seems to be whether or not they are “faithful,” but I’ve always found that is the wrong question to be asking. The better question is, instead, whether or not it does the source material justice, of which The Long Walk does in spades.

Faithfulness to the source material doesn’t seem to have been on writer JT Mollner’s mind, and for good reason. There are plenty of changes to King’s original story in the film, but nearly every single one of them improved the novel not just in the shift from page to screen, but for our current political climate as well. 

Performances to die for

That jump from the page to the silver screen means that The Long Walk lives and dies by its performances, of which there is not a bad one in the bunch. Cooper Hoffman takes on the lead role of Raymond Garraty — though he and all of his companions are generally only referred to by their last names or respective numbers throughout the bulk of the film — in which he delivers his fair share of heartfelt and rage-fueled monologues alike.

There’s one in particular where he discusses the beauty and art his father shared with him that makes it impossible not to think of Hoffman’s father, the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman. Most of the time, The Long Walk reduced me to tears on its own merit, but that specific moment had a little more weight behind it than I’d expected when entering the film, despite knowing exactly which character Hoffman was portraying. 

Hoffman and all of his costars each deliver impeccable performances from start to finish, but it’s David Jonsson’s Peter McVries that runs (or I suppose walks at a moderate pace for a very, very long time) away with the film. McVries was changed from the source material in both big and small ways, all of which you should experience for yourself and won’t be spoiled here, but those changes gave the actor the ability to make McVries unequivocally his own. It’s those changes coupled with Johnsson’s presence and unwavering empathy that make his performance in The Long Walk a career best.

The more things change, the more they stay the same

There’s a lot about The Long Walk that will feel like it was tailor made for today’s political climate but, in that regard, very little is changed from King’s original text. It’s up to you to decide whether or not that notion makes you want to curl up under your bed or head out into the streets and do something about it and, in that examination, you’ll find the very question that makes The Long Walk tick.

Are you a Garraty, whose sole purpose is to take down The Major (Mark Hamill) no matter what it costs him, his mother or his compatriots? Or are you a McVries, who knows this world has always been run by cruel oligarchs seeking to pit us all against each other, and the only way to conquer them is through perseverance and community? 

The thoughtfulness of that examination is juxtaposed against The Long Walk’s brutal nature. The premise of the walk is simple: you walk at a pace of 3 miles per hour (altered from King’s original 4 miles per hour) until you can’t walk anymore. Dip under 3 miles? You get a warning. Get 3 warnings? Thirty seconds later, you’re dead, in many cases via a gunshot wound to the head, which The Long Walk showcases in great detail alongside its other gnarly killings.

If brains make you squeamish, I recommend you skip the popcorn on this one, but if practical effects of all kinds delight you, you’re going to have a tremendous time watching the work of the visual and special effects teams. 

One of the only aspects where the film lacks is that there is simply no buying that any of these full-grown men are children. Roman Griffin Davis (playing Curley here, but you likely remember him from Taika Waititi’s Jojo Rabbit) is on the younger side of the cast at 18. Though it’s not uncommon for Hollywood to go with adults for teen roles, a big part of what makes The Long Walk such a jarring story is that they’re a bunch of kids who have no business participating in such a brutal affair.

The Hunger Games franchise, of course, did the same thing (and is also directed by Francis Lawrence), but the fantastical and bombastic aspects of the story allow for a broader suspension of disbelief, while the grounded nature of The Long Walk sort of calls for a bunch of kiddos. That’s garish, of course, but the discomfort of that notion is the point. 

Still, given the performances delivered by The Long Walk’s remarkable ensemble, it’s hard to get too caught up on the age thing. 

Should You Watch The Long Walk?

There are endless adaptations of Stephen King’s many, many (many) novels. Some are great, most are just ok — as is the case for all art — and some are absolute stinkers. Francis Lawrence’s The Long Walk falls under the “great” category, securing itself a spot alongside IT (2017), Stand By Me (1986), and The Shawshank Redemption (1994).

It may not be horror in the way that folks new to King’s work may expect, but it remains horrifying in all the ways that matter. We will all be talking about David Jonsson’s performance for a good, long time. 

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