By Matthew Moorcroft

Highest Recommendation

• Directed by Francis Lawrence
• Starring Cooper Hoffman, David Jonsson, Judy Greer, Mark Hamill
• R

Bleakness is the name of the game in The Long Walk. Even from it’s first scene, which showcase a mother desperately trying to get her son to not participate in the violent game. But they have no choice – after all, it’s either die trying for a future on the walk, or die starving.

A long gestating adaptation that was deemed unadaptable for numerous reasons, Hunger Games veteran Francis Lawrence is the one who has ultimately decided to be the one to take a crack at it, and not a moment too soon as, despite it’s bleakness, The Long Walk, in the midst of a burgeoning economic depression, the encroaching nature of fascism, and our continued obsession with “work ethic”, feels eerily relevant and terrifying. While Stephen King has written for horror mainly, it’s interesting that The Long Walk, despite not being a horror on paper, is scarier in practice then almost anything else he’s done in regards to that.

The Long Walk though, while having the makings of a thriller genre film in it’s bones, in practice has far more in common with King’s dramas like Shawshank Redemption, Stand by Me, or The Green Mile, with actual titular walk almost being a side plot next to the rich texture of it’s cast and the general aesthetic of it’s world. There is no stopping on the walk, but even then you can find some level of comradery, however brief, in the middle of terror and the constant fear that you might one day just stop walking. Because you can’t stop walking under capitalism, if you do you are dead weight to the people who oversee it.

And through that spectacular cast – and the incredible performers who portray them, who are magnificent here – The Long Walk is one of the finest outings of the year in a year full of great outings. Gripping as it is shocking, as well as enthralling as it is heartwrenching, Lawrence’s no bullshit direction gives all of it’s focus straight on the performances at the front, especially Cooper Hoffman and David Jonsson, whose chemistry just radiates off the screen and commands your every attention. While both actors have been impressive elsewhere, I think here they truly cement themselves as the next big things in terms of performers. These are movies stars in the making.

It’s thankful they have an amazing script to go off of, one that adapts King’s trademark dialogue in a way that feel naturalistic. So much of the film is carried by these long exchanges of philosophies, backstories, personalities, and opinions, and while the brutality of the walk itself is highlighted multiple times, it’s really only there as a means to an end, a way to force these men to reveal their true selves. Some are revealed to be cowards, unable to really fathom what’s happening to them or too scared to actually form connections with people. Others are maybe too heroic for their own good, never actually capable of completing the walk and instead succumb to a sense of martyrdom that might not actually lead anywhere in the first place. It’s through those true selves that the script lets loose with it’s ideas, deconstructing the toxicity of it’s world with furiosity.

And despite it’s brutality and bleakness, especially as it ends on a note of bitterness that some audiences will likely find difficult to swallow, it never stops having that glimmer of hope that someday things are going to be alright. That’s the real beauty of The Long Walk as a picture; while the walk itself is relentless and always feels oppressive and evil, the men themselves are only there out of desperation. None of them ever feel detestable, even the ones who make mistakes or have personality qualities that make them hard to like. Despite their fates, they see the good in each other and the good in other people. They want this to be better and this to end. A walk for a better world.

Or maybe it’s just preaching to the choir, I don’t know. We are living in a world where it seems like that kind of goodness in man is getting harder to find, but The Long Walk‘s insistence that there is, that we can find some level of friendship as we walk to our deaths I think is a powerful message and one that comes at just the right time and place. It’s ending had me in shambles, completely gutted in the right ways, and while the rest of the film is just as great, that ending sends it into overdrive. The final image is one that’s going to stick in my brain for some time, not just as it’s ambiguities are a lot to chew on but it leaves you with a feeling of carrying on that walk in spite of everything. There is the walk and march of capitalism, but there is also the walk away from it, and that’s hardest one.

One of my favourite films of the past year, you don’t wanna miss it. A Stephen King adaptation that will stand the test of time.