Director Francis Lawrence is in the hot seat for the long-gestating adaptation of Stephen King‘s “The Long Walk.” The book was originally released in 1979, and there have been several attempts to adapt it since the 1980s. Hopefully, Lawrence will bring along the unique blend of the post-apocalyptic he cultivated doing four of the five “The Hunger Games” films.
“I’m now attached to The Long Walk, the Stephen King book. Very excited about that,” Lawrence said.
Plot details on what we may see in the film adaptation are currently under wraps. However, the novel takes place in a post-apocalyptic United States run by a totalitarian empire. Under this regime, teenagers are forced to participate in the “long walk,” a contest where they must walk along a major East Coast highway without stopping. The rules state, that if one of the participants stops for more than 90 seconds total they will be killed. And if the threat of death isn’t enough to incentivize them, the winner also receives a cash prize.
While the development of this project has languished several times, it was given new life in 2018, when New Line Cinema acquired the rights. The studio brought on André Øvredal (“Scary Stories to Tell in The Dark”) to direct, but he left in August. Øvredal has even referred to leaving the film as “one of the big regrets in my life.”
While we are sure Øvredal’s version of “The Long Walk” would have been fantastic, Lawrence does seem like the perfect choice. Not only does he have “The Hunger Games” films under his belt, which share a very similar plot to King’s novel. He also directed “I Am Legend” which centers around a man surviving post-apocalyptic New York City. It’s safe to say, that Lawrance knows a little something about the end of the world.
And while it isn’t post-apocalyptic, he directed “Constantine” which is also seeing a long-awaited sequel. Lawrence recently stated that they have “been hashing out what we think the story is going to be, and there’s more meetings of those that have to happen,” adding, “[I’m] really hoping that we get to do Constantine 2.”
There are no release dates set for “The Long Walk” or “Constantine 2,” just yet. We’ll keep you posted on updates about these projects as they become available. “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes” is currently in theaters now.
