The rules of The Long Walk are simple. Participants must walk at a minimum of three miles per hour until only one remains. Dip below that, and you get a warning. Three warnings, and you’re out. So, basically, it’s walk or die. The concept makes for a very tense, emotional film, which hits theaters September 12. And now, a group of influencers will do their best to complete the same task.
This Saturday, August 30, Lionsgate has invited a group of press and influencers in Los Angeles to see The Long Walk. Only, there won’t be chairs in the theater. There will be treadmills. Treadmills that measure your speed. Viewers will have to maintain the same 3-mile-per-hour pace as the characters for the duration of the film. If they can’t keep up, they’ll be taken from the theater and will be unable to see the rest of the movie.
Unfortunately, the event isn’t open to the public and is more of a publicity stunt, but it’s a damned good one, hence us telling you about it.
In the film, which is based on a novel by Stephen King and directed by Francis Lawrence, it’s pretty clear that three miles per hour, which doesn’t sound too taxing, actually is. Try it. Go outside today for a walk and try to walk three miles in an hour. It’s not easy. In fact, in the original novel, the speed was four miles per hour, but King himself told screenwriter JT Mollner that his adaptation should change it because King realized later he’d messed that up. Four was too fast.
What will happen in LA on Saturday? Who will survive? Keep an eye on social media to find out. But after that, the good news is you can see The Long Walk in a comfy chair starting September 12. And you should. It’s a fantastic, albeit incredibly brutal, movie. We’ll have a full review next week.
The Long Walk stars Cooper Hoffman, David Jonsson, Ben Wang, and Mark Hamill.
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