The Long Walk

The Long Walk is not for the faint of heart, but it is one of the best Stephen King adaptations ever made, and one of the best dystopian sci-fi movies to hit the big screen in a really long time.

Attempted but abandoned by filmmakers from George A. Romero to King regular Frank Darabont, six decades after completion and 40 years after publication, now it crosses the finish line as one of the best King adaptations.

Jonsson, despite some worrying initial forays into a twangy accent, is the stand-out as Peter, with his crumpled smile and his insistence on solidarity, however much it goes against the spirit of the competition.

The concept, in classic King fashion, is simple but alluring, and designed to explore the kind of adolescent male bonding the author honed in works like Stand by Me and IT.

The Long Walk offers a gripping premise, a lot of characters who feel more like loose sketches than fully-realized personalities, and a narrative that maybe has some minor pacing problems towards the end, but is pretty impossible to turn away from.

The result comes across like a cross between a buddy movie and a horror movie – a war movie without the war. Ultimately, it all comes down to the core relationships, so it’s just as well that Hoffman and Jonsson are both terrific; their stars are certain to rise further off the back of this.

The resolution’s both predictable and perfunctory. “Unsatisfying” comes with the package, and that goes for the movie itself — lazy pop psychology, underdeveloped sociology and psychology and an allegory that never comes close to sticking the landing.

Been a long time since a movie made me feel the way this movie did. By the time it was over, there wasn't a dry eye in the cinema hall.

It was as good as it could be. By that I mean, the entire movie is exactly what the preview shows. There are no real surprises, I predicted the ending as well. It was just a more violent, way simplified version of Hunger Games. Not the most realistic for reasons I won't go into as far as human abilities.

The movie was a little entertaining to watch, but was filled with tropes about race, and race defining who is good and who is bad, which ultimately led to one eyeroll after another until it mercifully crossed the finish line.

Love the book but a lot was changed or didn't work in this adaptation. I recommend watching Battle Royale instead.

Adapting Stephen King is clearly a tricky business, and one wonders why some filmmakers keep trying. Certain novels work only in written form for specific reasons — in this case, because the entire story revolves around people walking and talking. That makes for an engaging book but a disastrous film. The movie loosely follows the novel, changing many deaths and even the ending under the pretext of adding surprise — yet viewers came for an adaptation, not a reinvention. While changes can be necessary when adapting a book to film, they should serve a purpose; here, the real opportunity would’ve been to explore what happens outside the walk and expand the lore. In short, the book wasn’t great to begin with, and the movie is even worse — a shame, considering Mark Hamill delivers a strong performance.