Content Warning: Spoilers for the book and 2025 film “The Long Walk.” Both the book and the movie contain foul language, senseless violence, death, and gross depictions of bodily functions.

Bay Area natives are familiar with the annual “Bay to Breakers” race in San Francisco, a 12-km (about 7.4 miles for my fellow idiot Americans) course that starts in Downtown SF and stretches to the Great Pacific Highway and Ocean Beach. Once you’ve traveled down Howard Street, you eventually reach a stretch of the race known as “The Hayes Hill Challenge.”

It sucks.

The Hayes Hill Challenge involves walking straight up several hills while racing against thousands of other Bay Areaans. It’s only about two-thirds of a mile, but at an 11% grade, that 128-foot elevation gain is agony. It may only take about 20 minutes to complete, but your calves are screaming by the time you reach the summit.

So maybe I can’t exactly relate to the moment when Ray Garraty, the main character from the 2025 horror film “The Long Walk,” sees the “Steep Hill” sign and shouts, “F*CK ME. F*CK.” Especially not the part where hired soldiers start gunning down anyone walking under 3.0 mph, but I have some idea what it might have felt like. And technically, Bay to Breakers can involve shots, just of a different variety.

“The Long Walk” is an adaptation of Stephen King‘s 1979 novel, with the screenplay by JT Mollner and directed by Francis Lawrence (that’s the guy who directed all the “Hunger Games” movies). The film makes several changes to the book, most notably reducing the book’s speed from 4 mph to 3 mph (at Stephen King’s request, a decision I very much agreed with) and altering certain characters to tighten the cast.

In the world of “The Long Walk,” an alternate United States is under the strict control of a military dictatorship, which, to contend with the country’s depressed economic state, sponsors a single competition in which 50 boys, one from each state, are selected to compete in a marathon walk. The last boy standing is the winner, who will receive a grand prize and a wish of his choosing.

The rules of the walk are simple: don’t stop walking. Each contestant must maintain a pace of at least 3 mph, and if they are under the limit, they receive three warnings before receiving their “ticket” (execution by the armed guards stalking them along the journey). Contestants are given rations and, interestingly enough, are allowed to help other contestants, though only one can win. The irony of this kindness is that it arguably prolongs the contestants’ suffering as they give aid to the very people they’re supposed to be competing against. It’s a bleak story, as the camaraderie among the contestants inevitably concludes as each meets their end.

The story is better when you realize it is a metaphor of sorts for the Vietnam War. My knowledge of the Vietnam War is limited to what I learned in high school and saw on TV (“Forrest Gump,” “Tropic Thunder,” and that one episode of “King of the Hill“…), so I’m far from an expert, but I do know that many of the young men who were drafted to fight for this war never came home.

Once you embrace the Vietnam War metaphor, “The Long Walk” makes much more narrative sense. “The Long Walk” takes place in a post-war-devastated United States, and in an attempt to stimulate the flagging economy, the government sponsors a brutal event in which fifty boys compete in a marathon walk. And every young man in the country registers to be chosen to represent their state. You may wonder, “How does enlisting 50 boys to go on a death march stimulate the economy?” To which I respond, “It’s a Vietnam War metaphor; don’t worry too much about world-building.”

And that’s one of the movie’s strengths. It doesn’t dwell too much on the world around the long walk – instead, it focuses on the young men who are walking, who, despite the horrors around them, try to find joy and purpose in their terrible circumstances. There are only two instances in which the narrative turns away from the walk. The first is a scene with Ray and his mother, who at the beginning of the movie begs him not to go. The second scene is an expansion of that moment with his mother, showing how his father was executed for his beliefs. Ray’s father chose an honorable death rather than live a lie, and this act of heroism inspired Ray to enter the Long Walk. Unfortunately, this act of heroism also left Ray without a father and his mother a widow. Ray makes a similar choice to leave his mother to enter the Long Walk to carry on his father’s legacy, only to have to grapple with the reality of leaving his mother completely alone.

Several other characters accompany Ray (Cooper Hoffman) on his journey. The most important would be Peter “Pete” McVries (David Jonsson), a warm, loving soul who is too good for his cruel world. Given that the character was kind, Black, and possibly gay, I spent the entire movie dreading his inevitable death. There are many film tropes I hate, but “Kind Black Person Bravely Sacrifices Themself for the White Main Character” may be at the top of that list. I was pleasantly surprised by how the movie subverted this trope, but I’ll let interested viewers check it out for themselves.

A theme this movie seems to emphasize is the importance of friendship and camaraderie in the face of a challenge, even if, technically, that challenge pits them against each other. Although entering the Long Walk is voluntary, Ray quickly points out that every boy able to do so enters his state lottery for a chance to be selected. Meaning that even though the boys enter the competition by choice, there was never really a choice, as no one ever chose not to enter.

It would be difficult not to compare this movie to “The Hunger Games,” especially as both stories share many similarities, but the psychology of the participants is different. In “The Hunger Games,” it is common for young adults from wealthy districts to volunteer for the games after years of training. Those participants briefly team up with other highly trained volunteers and slay all of the less-talented competitors until they inevitably turn on one another.

In “The Long Walk,” there is a scene near the beginning in which one participant, Gary Barkovitch, taunts another walker, Rank, with crude insults until Rank loses his temper, swings at Barkovitch, and badly injures himself. Rank is eliminated by the armed guards, which horrifies the other boys, who label Barkovitch a murderer. His cruel taunting and cocky attitude at the beginning of the contest alienate him from the other contestants, who see Rank’s death as an avoidable tragedy. He spends the remainder of the contest dwelling on his guilt and loneliness, with some part of him desperately hoping to make amends.

All the boys, even Barkovitch, know that there can be only one winner, but that doesn’t mean they can stand to leave each other behind. The boys regularly risk their lives to help each other, offering tips, swapping rations, and even helping straggling walkers keep moving. If another walker needs help, they try to help him the best they can. When another walker is removed, they’re sad to see their friends go. It adds depth to the relationships between characters, making their inevitable deaths even more distressing.

The movie manages to eke out its horror in simple ways. The movie avoids any clear antagonists outside of the Major (played by Mark Hamill), who only appears sporadically to shout vague military slogans and serves more as a concept than as a character. Even Barkovitch is painfully human as his guilt over Rank’s death, and the subsequent shunning he experiences from the other contestants, proves to be too much for him to handle.

The psychological aspects of being forced into a death march are explored, but so are the physiological effects. Walkers are injured for a variety of reasons, ranging from charley horses to rocks in their shoes. As the competitors risk death if they slow down for any reason, they’ll walk with bleeding feet, while suffering from the common cold, and in one particularly horrifying scene, while desperately needing to poop.

Runner’s diarrhea is a surprisingly common problem that most marathon runners and walkers face, characterized by an intense need to use the restroom during or after a race. Viewers of the 2016 Summer Olympics may remember the story of Yohann Diniz, a French race walker who infamously fainted and crapped himself while competing (he still finished in 8th place, even as blood dripped down his legs, so kudos to him).” The Long Walk” boldly addresses this issue early in the movie, as a competitor is repeatedly forced to stop and defecate on the road, resulting in his undignified end.

I mention this not only to commend the movie for addressing a simple but universal horror (everybody poops, after all, and not always when we want to), but also because it made me wonder whether Jack Griffin, the actor playing that role, invited his family to see his movie. Do you think he called up his mom and proudly told her that he was “Ronald,” the boy in “The Long Walk” who gets 30 seconds of screentime in which he bares his ass to the audience, sh*ts on the street, takes three agonized steps, and then gets his “ticket” while doing it all again? Do you think his family got together to watch the movie in the living room, and when his big scene approached, everybody shouted, “Get in here! Jack’s scene is coming up!” and then his meemaw got to watch him drop trow and crap on the road and die? Do you think he was paid a decent amount for the role, or do you think maybe he did it for the exposure?

Horror doesn’t always need chainsaws and masked killers to be scary. A lack of a bathroom can make for the most terrifying moments of your life.  

There were several moments in the movie when characters continued walking under circumstances that would have had me happily lying down under one of the tanks rolling alongside them. But I may not have a winner’s attitude. I always told my friends that if I were ever drafted into the Hunger Games, my brilliant strategy would be to fall off my designated platform, detonate the explosive inside, and make both an incredible entrance and exit in one swoop. Because what else should you do in a contest that doesn’t allow second-place winners?

My plan for “The Long Walk” would be to sit down as soon as I was over it, because I’d rather “get my ticket” than walk on a broken ankle or with diarrhea dripping down my legs. I guess I’m just a bit of a princess that way.

“The Long Walk” manages to say quite a bit despite its low budget and simple storyline. Although the setting is grim, the contrasting themes of friendship and camaraderie bring a lightness to the film that makes it all the more compelling. That said, there are moments in the movie that are absolutely devastating and will turn your stomach at the sheer waste. In a better world, a world I wish we lived in, there would be no need to sacrifice lives for a hazy cause and some money. It’s a bit of a pipe dream, but if the boys in this movie can spend the walk pondering their wishes, I might as well share mine.