Kimber Myers
I would not equate watching a sub-two-hour movie with trekking hundreds of miles nonstop to almost certain death, but there are times where The Long Walk feels like as much of an endurance test as the event of its title. Director Francis Lawrence’s take on the Stephen-King-writing-as-Richard-Bachman novel is gripping as hell (pun intended), but it is often equally difficult to watch. In one scene, I reached a point where I just wanted to close my eyes, rather than see another teenager shot to death on screen without cutting away. Yet the horrific nature of what you’re watching is kind of the point; there is a lot of violence, but none of it is gratuitous. Lawrence and King are trying to disturb the audience in this gore-filled story set decades ago in an alternate totalitarian America, and gentlemen, mission accomplished. I’d salute you if The Long Walk hadn’t further soured me on submitting to authority.
The Long Walk doesn’t waste a lot of time table setting; instead, it marches right into the action, parcelling out information about its setting in a dystopian version of the 1960s and trusting that we can keep pace. Raymond Garraty (Cooper Hoffman) is one of 50 teenage boys who have won a place in the Long Walk, an annual competition where representatives from each state can win money and whatever they wish if they are the last survivor of the contest. The rules are simple: they cannot stop, and each time they fall below three miles per hour, they’re given a warning by the soldiers following them in tanks, led by the Major (a sunglasses-clad Mark Hamill, evoking Morgan Woodward’s Boss Godfrey in Cool Hand Luke). After their third and final warning, they’re shot by the soldiers.
The Long Walk is 110 minutes of dialogue punctuated by moments of extremely graphic violence. As the boys walk for miles and miles and days and days, their conversations reveal their characters. Ray makes an immediate connection with Peter McVries (David Jonsson), a scarred sage who seems older than the rest of the teens in spirit. Hank Olson (Ben Wang) cracks sarcastic jokes, while Arthur Baker (Tut Nyuot) is eager to make friends. Conversely, Gary Barkovitch (Charlie Plummer) seems like the reality show star who declares both verbally and through his aggressive actions that he isn’t there to socialize. The comparison is fitting, given that the whole thing is broadcast for the nation and attracts roadside viewers desperate to glimpse some of the grisly action. As the days and their feet drag on, their teens’ ranks winnow, and the audience sees practically every bodily fluid imaginable as witnesses to their grueling race.
While King was inspired by the horrors of the Vietnam War and the draft when he wrote the novel back in the ‘60s, the adaptation feels contemporary in its concerns. JT Mollner’s script takes on a variety of themes, swapping the book’s echoes of Vietnam for the dangers of capitalism, while keeping its musings on totalitarianism, masculinity, and friendship intact. It’s a lot to pack in — and unpack— and it would be too much if there weren’t intersections between these ideas. The alternate history that The Long Walk is set in is one where America is in economic decline (ahem), and the annual contest is government propaganda, supposedly meant to spur its citizens away from laziness after they witness the industry of the competitors. Boys sign up, desperate both to not be known as the only one not man enough to “volunteer” and to win the money that would literally change their family’s fortunes.
Yet amidst the challenges of living in this tightly controlled society and going through this hell, connections are forged between the young men — at least for the ones who are lucky enough to find allies who will both physically and emotionally carry them through the walk’s toughest points. In addition to some small moments of levity, these bonds are what keep The Long Walk (both the movie and the characters’ experience on screen) from descending into pure misery. There’s hope in how Ray and Peter become fast friends at the beginning of the ordeal, with something even realer emerging over the miles.
Lawrence is no stranger to this type of story; he directed all but the first film in the Hunger Games franchise, which also focuses on a sadistic game where children die to satisfy a cruel government. While those movies maintained their PG-13 ratings to keep their YA audience appeal, he’s off the leash here. Between the extreme violence done to these boys’ bodies and the profanity they speak in the midst of the waking, walking nightmare (and in just being teenagers), The Long Walk earns its R rating.
Yet it also earns the audience’s attention. This horror movie is not an easy watch, but it is engaging and well crafted. Lawrence and editor Mark Yoshikawa keep things moving, balancing the quieter moments with the crazier ones, and it moves far faster than an ambling three miles per hour. All of the young actors are good (as is Judy Greer as Ray’s worried mother), but as Ray and Peter, Hoffman and Jonsson are the movie’s heart. British actor Jonsson’s American accent wobbles a bit, and you’d never know that Hoffman’s Ray is supposed to be from Louisiana. However, their chemistry as these fire-forged friends is what matters, and it’s entirely believable.
The Long Walk is already the third King adaptation of 2025 (The Running Man and TV’s IT: Welcome to Derry arrive later this fall). What we get with this movie is a cross between the unhinged violence of The Monkey and the sentimentality of The Life of Chuck, and it’s better than both of its predecessors this year. This is consistently compelling work, which is the only thing that ensures you’ll make it through the finish line.
