The Long Walk
Lionsgate | Release Date: September 12, 2025 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
71
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
28
Mixed:
5
Negative:
1

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Total FilmLauren MiliciSep 2, 2025
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. Read full review
91
Original-CinThom ErnstSep 10, 2025
No one should mistake The Long Walk for fun. But there’s satisfaction in its endurance, in the way grim inevitability drives the narrative with allegorical force. By the credits, you’ll feel as though you’ve marched every mile alongside the boys exhausted, shaken, and strangely, perhaps, wanting more. Read full review
90
Screen DailyNikki BaughanSep 11, 2025
It’s one of the most powerful King features for some time. Read full review
90
Arizona RepublicMeredith G. WhiteSep 8, 2025
Despite the gore and the tragedies witnessed on screen, I left the theater hopeful. Read full review
90
SlashfilmBJ ColangeloSep 2, 2025
The Long Walk is an emotionally obliterating all-time great Stephen King adaptation, and undoubtedly one of the best films of 2025. Read full review
90
ColliderJeff EwingSep 2, 2025
The Long Walk exceeds even optimistic expectations to easily become one of the best Stephen King adaptations. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerSep 11, 2025
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. Read full review
88
The Daily BeastNick SchagerSep 12, 2025
Casts itself as a frightening saga about tyranny’s capacity to acclimate its subjects to slaughter and slavery, and to coerce them into performing (and celebrating) self-destruction under the guise of unity, strength, and progress. Read full review
87
The Film VerdictAlonso DuraldeSep 11, 2025
This is gut-punch, feel-bad studio filmmaking, all the more notable for how rarely it happens. Read full review
82
TheWrapWilliam BibbianiSep 12, 2025
It’s not that The Long Walk has made walking terrifying — although certainly it’s a fraught and frightening walk. It’s that it makes every trudge through every day remind us of torture. Read full review
80
The Irish TimesDonald ClarkeSep 10, 2025
Allegories are unavoidable. The walk is American capitalism. The walk is life itself. It requires, however, no such connections to enjoy the best King adaptations in many years. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)Alison WillmoreSep 4, 2025
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. Read full review
80
EmpireJamie GrahamSep 3, 2025
The first of two King-as-Bachman 2025 thrillers featuring a deadly reality show in a dystopian future. Edgar Wright’s The Running Man will need to bust a lung to keep up. Read full review
80
IGNTom JorgensenSep 2, 2025
Anchored by strong performances from Cooper Hoffman and David Jonsson, The Long Walk overcomes the repetitive nature of its story to deliver a timely and powerful condemnation of normalized violence . . . with some seriously brutal, R-rated violence. Read full review
76
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzSep 11, 2025
While Lawrence keeps the momentum steady – just like his contest’s most able-bodied walkers – and ensures that every few minutes delivers some kind of violent jolt, there’s just not enough meat to this particular roadkill story to keep one cinematic foot in front of the other. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneKatie WalshSep 17, 2025
It’s a stunning showcase for the acting talents of the young ensemble. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliSep 15, 2025
Despite a number of narrative holes, The Long Walk succeeds largely on the strength of its performances. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comClint WorthingtonSep 11, 2025
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. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeOdie HendersonSep 11, 2025
The script, by JT Mollner, does an excellent job streamlining King’s book. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubJacob OllerSep 11, 2025
Despite the stamping of hundreds of feet, The Long Walk smolders with the blunt power of a burned flag. Read full review
75
IndieWireRyan LattanzioSep 11, 2025
The Long Walk doesn’t tell you or ask you anything new if you’re feeling pent up with rage by American leadership these days, but the film’s grim commitment to the bit is a rarity for a studio movie: There’s no holding of your hand on this long walk, nor does it read you a bedtime story and tuck you in at the end. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineJustin ClarkSep 7, 2025
This ferocious adaptation of Stephen King’s 1979 novella as a passion play about class solidarity. Read full review
75
ConsequenceLiz Shannon MillerSep 2, 2025
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. Read full review
70
The RevealScott TobiasOct 2, 2025
The Long Walk has an impressively sober understanding of what rebellion looks like in a nation that’s fully smothered by an oppressive regime. Read full review
70
LooperAlistair RyderSep 2, 2025
Lawrence and screenwriter J.T. Mollner's take on "The Long Walk" is a reminder of why King's stories have historically been well-suited for the screen, replicating the blend of melancholy, coming-of-age character study, and fatalistic horror that defined the very best adaptations of his work. Read full review
70
Next Best PictureGiovanni LagoSep 2, 2025
In the end, The Long Walk is a brutal yet strangely moving reminder that sometimes it is not about the destination at all, it is about the grueling path that gets us there. Read full review
70
Screen RantTodd GilchristSep 2, 2025
Ultimately, The Long Walk is a terrific, entertaining film with some interesting things to say about the state of the world. They're not all fully articulated, but I’ll always prefer a film that advances cautiously in the right direction rather than one that hits the ground running without knowing where it’s going. Read full review
65
Paste MagazineJesse HassengerSep 10, 2025
The Long Walk reaches for something profound and disturbing, while at the same time wary of risking a bad stretch. Read full review
60
The GuardianSteve RoseSep 10, 2025
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. Read full review
50
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanSep 12, 2025
That existential paradox — are we all in this thing called life together, or is it every man for himself? — gives the film and its protagonists something meaty to chew on as it, and they, progress. But “The Long Walk” doesn’t dig into it in any deeply satisfying way. Read full review
50
Little White LiesDavid JenkinsSep 10, 2025
The film works best when it allows the boys to simply shoot the breeze and discuss the lives they’ve led up to this moment. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMichael OrdoñaSep 9, 2025
Ultimately, “The Long Walk” is a heartfelt metaphorical drama about people bonding under duress. Instead of focusing on the darker side of human nature one might expect from the average dystopian film, it finds power in small acts of connection. Read full review
40
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisSep 11, 2025
Lawrence’s commitment to authenticity may be laudable (he filmed almost the entire project on the move in Canada), but it’s clear that he was so busy honoring the book, he forgot to entertain the audience. Read full review
38
Movie NationRoger MooreSep 12, 2025
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. Read full review
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