Stop us if you’ve heard this one before, but a Stephen King novel is about to receive an adaptation. We know, surprising, right? Who would have imagined it? Though in fairness, two of the upcoming releases are actually under King’s pseudonym of Richard Bachman. So do they still count? Either way, writers, directors, production companies; they all can’t seem to get enough of King, which is why yet another of his stories is set to hit the big screen. And this one does have some promise to be uniquely fun.
“The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon” was released in 1999. It’s unique in that it’s a standout quality title in the midst of a generally not well regarded era of King novels. It’s also a lot shorter than most of his books; practically a novella in comparison. It tells the story of a young girl named Trisha who gets separated from her family while travelling in the woods and only has a very limited amount of supplies on hand. One of the items she does have is a Walkman radio that allows her to listen to news reports and baseball games. Her fondness for the titular Tom Gordon plays heavily into her efforts to survive.
We mentioned Richard Bachman earlier, which is the pen name that King used to write several novels, including “The Long Walk.” That book is also being adapted into a film with a screenplay written by JT Mollner. Mollner is the one who will be writing and directing this upcoming film of “The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon.” His most recent previous directorial effort was the 2023 thriller “Strange Darling.” The non-linear, murderous story, isn’t too far removed from the territory of a King novel, even though “Tom Gordon” is a much simpler story in terms of its scope. Sometimes simple is better when it comes to horror.
We’ve seen a mixture of King projects that are remakes of previous films, mixed with completely new projects. We have the upcoming remakes of “The Running Man” and “Carrie“ but we also had the recently released “The Life of Chuck” and the aforementioned “The Long Walk.“ It’s just staggering how much Hollywood is still going to the well of King even after all these years and so many other stories to adapt and tell. We’re not ENTIRELY complaining but, you know, there are other authors out there too Hollywood! That being said we also very much look forward to seeing who takes on the role of Trisha as the inevitable casting news comes in the months to come!
