There are good Stephen King movies and there are great Stephen King movies. While The Shawshank Redemption is widely considered the greatest adaptation of the master storyteller’s work, this year’s The Long Walk proved to be not too far behind for many fans of the author. Now, the film has marched straight to the top of the Starz streaming chart on its platform debut.
Set in a dystopian alternate reality in the 1970s, the movie focuses on an annual televised event – similar in many ways to The Running Man’s central plot device. This event is a marathon with no end, which sees a group of fifty boys being forced to walk at a speed of three miles per hour constantly. Anyone falling below the speed, and not heeding the warnings of the armed military presence traveling alongside them, is brutally killed. The Long Walk only ends when a single boy remains, and they win a wish of their choice and riches to see them through the rest of their life.
The Long Walk scored an impressive initial Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes (you can read our review of the movie here), peaking in the high 90s before eventually leveling out at 88%. Fans were just as enthusiastic in their reviews, giving it an overall 85% score, with plenty of praise being given to the script, stars, and director Francis Lawrence’s ability to turn a decades-old story into something incredibly relevant in today’s world.
The film features Cooper Hoffman (Licorice Pizza), David Jonsson (Alien: Romulus), Garrett Wareing (Ransom Canyon), Tut Nyuot (Small Axe), Charlie Plummer (Words on Bathroom Walls), Ben Wang (Karate Kid: Legends), Roman Griffin Davis (Jojo Rabbit), Jordan Gonzalez (Pretty Little Liars: Summer School), Joshua Odjick (Wildhood), Josh Hamilton (The Walking Dead), Judy Greer (Stick), and Mark Hamill (The Life of Chuck).
‘The Long Walk’ Needed to Turn an “Unfilmable” Story Into an Engaging One
While some Stephen King stories are full of monsters and huge set-pieces, The Long Walk is a grueling story that is simply watching a group of young men being forced to walk along a seemingly endless road with the threat of death following them every step of the way. For many years, no one believed that the story, which was written over four decades ago under King’s Richard Bachman pseudonym, would ever be filmed.
The movie’s editor, Mark Yoshikawa spoke to MovieWeb about the making of the film, stating that he always knew “that was going to be one of the challenges editing the movie.” As he pointed out, the novel is just walking and talking, and there is no real plot outside this. With every scene effectively being the same thing, yet, somehow, the end result was almost perfect.
The Long Walk grossed $63 million from its $20 million budget, and also proved to be a huge hit a few months ago when it was released on VOD. Now the film is once again at the top of the charts, this time streaming on Starz, where fans can relive the torture all over again.
- Release Date
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September 12, 2025
- Runtime
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108 Minutes
- Director
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Francis Lawrence
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Cooper Hoffman
Raymond Garraty / #47
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David Jonsson
Peter McVries / #23
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